The suicide by the policeman – or the brutality of the police?

A few weeks ago, an elderly man led to a police station, hired the police officer in conversation and fired a weapon. Repeatedly ignoring the requirements to throw the weapon – which was continuously indicated to the policeman – was deadly shot by reserve officers. Police brutality? Excessive force? Something else?

The suicide with COP is the term used by police for incidents in which an individual, bent to kill, obliges the police to use the deadly force. ” – Department of Justice:

Only 25-30% of suicides are accompanied by a note. Like mythical Richard Cory (1), the rest want an explanation. However, a kind of suicide that appears in 11% of cases of shootings involved by officers could provide additional clues on the victim’s motivation. It’s called “Suicide by the policeman”. In this scenario, suicide manifests itself as a seemingly mentally ill person, with or without suicidal intentions expressed, who presents an immediate threat to him, the public or the police, carrying a weapon directed to the policeman or hostage. The situation obliges the urgent action of the law officers to prevent their injury or others, often involving the shooting and killing of the suicide in this process. Here, the suicidal person causes the police to do their “dirty work, pulling the trigger” that kills them by forcing the authorities to shoot them in self-defense or to protect the public.

Some researcher You believe that such people propose their behavior to authorities or public for the purpose. This can be a passive-aggressive venda against the figures of the authority; However, psychologists offer other reasons. In some cases, someone because of or after committing an offense is pursued by the police and simply decides to die than to be arrested. In conclusion that life is not worth living if they are incarcerated, they choose to cause (or allow) the police to kill them. In other cases, suicides want to circumvent the shame or stigma of suicide (or want to be buried on a consecrated land).

“Psychologists believe that people who commit suicide with COP are psychiatric sick and choose this method to avoid the fault and stigma to cause their own death. ”

This last explanation sounds empty. I would vote that, probably, the cowardice of the trigger itself or the hostility to the authorities (fixing the guilt on the figure of the ugly authority) would have a more logical meaning than the motivating factor. However, there is another possibility, and the identification of this factor can make a difference- at least in protecting the mental health of our personnel to apply the law- checking if the officer has no responsibility.

Madness is not in means

Life insurance is written to exclude suicides. This disposition often confuses those who intend to conclude their lives, but who seek simultaneously to memorize their existence with a certain financial forgetfulness.

Criminal insurance examiners are carefully trained to recognize a homicide, an accident or a deliberate effort to exclude suicide exclusion. For the most part, uncertainties are resolved against the applicants or reach court. To be sure, most of those who instigate the “suicide by the policeman” have no consideration of insurance in the game, but it is a possibility that, as far as I know, has not been investigated. The registration of a death, so that it seems like a homicide, rather than a suicide, would certainly be a creative and extremely plausible manner to bypass the exclusion.

avert

Police are given EDUCAtIoN To approach these situations, but when injury seems imminent or danger to the public is palpable (including hostages), unfortunately, these filming cannot often be avoided. The problem that the society faces is the disappointment of the “-feric” policeman perceived of the victim with mental deficiencies whose unwavering reason is to cause the police.

Included in EDUCAtIoN It is the identification of the scenarios that perform the suicide, but does not require a police response. These may include situations in which the suspect establishes a deadline for his death, talks about dead people as if still in life, discuss the disposition of their worldly goods, create a confident negotiation, announces his intention to die or make biblical references, especially to the Book of Revelation and Resurrection. Other situations are more difficult to evaluate, as suspects who want to die will dismiss live ammunition, even killing people before being killed alone, putting the investigation officer in the mortal and moral.

Death and consequences

Even when the police pull the trigger, in many cases, death is considered suicide by medical researchers. However, the incident still triggers a complete Investigation of homicides of the actions of the shot officer. Officers involved in these incidents often suffer psychological symptoms similar to post -traumatic stress disorder – even when their actions have saved the lives of others. This type of stress can be essential in the contribution to “psychological suffering, such as depression and anxiety” in the law enforcement staff, recently reported as high as 44%culminating in taking their own lives. Compared to the general population, the law enforcement officers are facing a risk of death by 54% by suicide.

There is a connice in sorting cases in which a suicidal individual deliberately intends to cause a lethal response from a law officer to cases in which the police abused their power, improperly killing a civilian.

Quandar is illustrated by a 2003 case in Great Britain. There, Michael Malsbury attacked his wife with a pike and barricaded into his house. During the ten-hour armed siege, Malsbury said he had a powerful glock (he did not do it) and then announced to the police: “Better get your weapons, go out,” drawing a blow in the direction of the officers. Sharpshooters police killed him. Despite the houses found in the house and two suicide notes Malsbury wrote, the investigation jury found that Malsbury was killed. The verdict was condemned as “perverse and dangerous” and a dangerous precedent. As Deborah Coles, a co-director of the investigation, a group of advocacy for the families of those who die in police custody, said

“The common sense says he was not suicide. He was shot dead by the police. How can he be suicide? Could it be a legal killing, but it was not suicide. The poll of the police could be a verdict used by the police to deviate away from the law of their actions.”

The intersection between mental illnesses, the suicide intention and the police response create a tragic and often legal-to-one, in which the line between self-destruction and excessive force fades. While some individuals cause the law to apply in lethal actions as a means of concluding their own lives, gaining the name “suicide by the policeman”, others fall into an gray area where their intention remains uncertain. The consequences are expanded beyond the victim, leaving durable psychological scars on the officers and feeding the public debates on the brutality of the police.

The recognition and approach of the complexities of the suicide by the COP is not only a matter of forensic classification; It is a critical problem that requires an improved training of intervention in crisis, mental health resources and a more nuanced understanding of the law and psychiatric care. Without these efforts, the cycle of tragedy, controversies and institutional distrust will continue.

(1) Richard Cory of Edwin Arlington Robinson

Whenever Richard Cory descended into town,

We, the people on the sidewalk, looked at him:

There was a gentleman from the sole to the crown,

Cleanly favored and imperial thin.

And he was always quiet,

And he was always a man when he spoke;

But still waved impulses when he said,

“Good morning” and shone when he went.

And was rich – yes, richer than a king …

And admirably scholarized in each grace:

Okay, we thought that he is everything

To make us want to be in his place.

So I worked and waited for the light,

And went without meat and cursed the bread;

And Richard Cory, a calm summer night,

He went home and put a bullet on his head.