A coalition of civil rights organizations is calling for changes to how mental crises are handled in Baltimore City.
RIGHT MIND.
BALTIMORE CITY ISBEING CALLED ON TO CHANGE ITSWAYS AS.
CIVIL RIGHTS GROUPSPOINT TO A RECENT OFFICERINVOLVED SHOOTING IN NORTHEASTBALTIMORE.“Unless we changethe way we do things this isgoing to happen again” WMAR2NEWSTHE BALTIMORE POLICEHEADQUARTERS DOWNTOWN.
THEYGOT A LIST OF DEMANDS FOR THEMAYOR, STATES ATTORNEY ANDPOLICE DEPARTMENT?YEAH THE GROUPS WANT TO SEEREFORM TO DISPATCH, TRAINING,AND PERSONAL WHO GET SENT TOTHESE SCENARIOS.
THE POLICECOMMISSIONER SAYS THEY AREGOING TO ROLL OUT A 40 HOURCRISIS INTERVENTION TRAINING.BUT THE GROUPS SAY MORE NEEDSTO BE DONE.A ━━1 from a family membertrying to get help for a manhaving a mental health crisis.For ten minutes these officerstalked to this man identifiedas Ricky Walker Jr. He can beheard repeatedly saying theyare going to kill me and theBaltimore city police officerstry to calm him down.
When hepoints a gunshoot him several times.
DavidPrater Managing Attorney atDisability rights Maryland3:1━3:34 Relying on police tohandle what we call behavioralhealth crisis, or mentalhealth crisis really providesa one way path back toinstitutional settings.
Eitherjails or state hospitals, oreven in extreme circumstanceslike Mr. Walkers case injuryand in even more serious casdeath” David Prater is theManaging Attorney atDisability Rights Maryland.
Hesay when institutions formental health patients startedto close down, leaderspromised to make communitybased mental servicesavailable.
He and other civilrights organization leaderswrote a letter to the Mayor,Police Commissioner, StateAttorney, and HealthDepartment.
In it they listfour demands.
4:0━4:21“Including 24 mobile crisisteams. Including crisisstabilization centers.
Anability to take calls from9━━1 and connect them withservices” Walker was arrested10 days before he was shot,andthat time police said he wasin the street naked shootingat cars.
Investigators say inbother incidents Walker wasarmed.
But Prater says thereare times when officers arecalled and there is noimminent threat, and thatneeds to change.
10:0━10:11“Dispatch and their Ã━1call centers and identifyingcalls where police response isnot needed” David Rocah withthe ACLU of Maryland says itnot the officers fault thatthey were put in thesituationfault for not having a bettplan.
David Rocah ACLU of MDSenior Staff Attorney4:5━5:19“They are nottrained or equipped to dealwith this.
It was not deescalation.
In fact their merepresence with guns andhandguns was itself escalatingwhich you can see.
Which anyhuman being can see simply bywatching the video andwatching him get more agitatedand say over and over againthey are here to kill me”WE REACHED OUT TO POLICE FORAN UPDATE ON THIS WALKERS CASEAND CONDITION AND FOR ARESPONSE TO THE LETTER BUTHAVENCHARGED WITH FIRST DEGREEASSAULT.
EDDIE KADHIM WMAR2NEWS.THE LACK OF MENTAL H
The COVID-19 Crisis Response Fund of the Greater Evansville Region has awarded $102,640 in allocations to seven nonprofit agencies..
