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People with chronic medical illnesses that affect their thinking and emotions – that is, people with mental illness – are 16 times more likely than others to be fatally shot by police, according to a report recently published by the Virginia-based Treatment Advocacy Center.
Take the case of Alan Pean, a 26-year old college student with a history of bipolar disorder who drove himself to the hospital in the throes of terrifying paranoid delusions. Actually, he literally drove himself into the hospital – crashed his car into the wall of the hospital in his desperate pursuit of help. Brought in to the Emergency Room on a stretcher, Pean still had enough self-awareness to say, “I’m manic, I’m manic!” The physician who saw him initially wrote down the diagnosis. So how did he end up shot in chest in his hospital room?
Alan Pean’s story was investigated and reported last week by Elizabeth Rosenthal of the NY Times and Ira Glass of “This American Life”. It makes for very disturbing reading and listening. Although clearly not in his right mind, and not aggressive – at one point he danced naked in his room and occasionally out in the hallway - this young man who came to a hospital for help was never seen by a psychiatrist. Instead, he was treated like a dangerous criminal and nearly killed. Hospital security was called, and two armed off-duty police officers responded. They Tasered him, handcuffed him, and shot him in the chest.
Alan Pean survived his ordeal. Others are not so lucky. Last December, Chicago police called to a domestic disturbance shot and killed Quintonio LeGrier, a 19 year old emotionally disturbed college student who was home for the Christmas holidays. Police response to the call also resulted in their shooting and killing a bystander, a neighbor Bettie Jones.
In response to our national concern with police killings, the Washington Post tracked fatal police shootings throughout the calendar year 2015. Its analysis found that one out of four people killed by police was either mentally ill or in the midst of an emotional crisis, according to police or family sources. At least 243 people with mental health problems were killed: 75 who were explicitly suicidal and 168 people with a history of mental illness confirmed by either police or family members.
Most of the mentally ill killed by police had been armed, either with a gun, knife or other sharp edge. Nevertheless, police and mental health experts believe that many such deaths may be preventable.
Even before the risk of being shot by police, the mentally ill have a fragile hold on life. Mental illness is associated with high-risk behaviors, with substance abuse, and with suicide. Major mental illness can reduce life expectancy by seven to 24 years – as much or more than smoking a pack of cigarettes a day.
We have no functioning mental health system, so the mentally ill are discarded, and wind up living on the streets or in prison. They are often the victims of violence in both settings, and they receive treatment in neither.
Neglect and violence are both killers of Americans with mentally illness. Other countries kill their mentally ill citizens using different methods. In the Netherlands, where euthanasia and assisted suicide are legal, an NIH (National Institute of Health) report recently raised alarms about the ease with which psychiatric patients’ requests for euthanasia were approved.
The lives of people with mental illness are precious and complex. Their behavior can be frustrating and frightening – but they don’t deserve to be killed. They need treatment and support. They need advocacy.
