If there’s one thing even more shocking than the bare facts of the death of 47-year-old Krista Kach at the hands of police during a mental health crisis in Newcastle last week, it’s that similar deaths at the hands of police are happening with alarming frequency.
Kach died after a shot from a bean bag round pierced her chest. The use of bean bag rounds is classified as a less-than-lethal weapon in the police armoury (along with Tasers and capsicum spray). Kach’s family noted that they advised the police she was not well that day and needed medical help. They describe police actions as a heartbreaking response to a vulnerable person that had been told she would soon be homeless.
The fact that a police weapon has taken another life immediately raises several questions. Why are weapons being used on people with severe mental health conditions? How are police officers being trained in their use? Why does this keep happening?
And are police really the best first responders in a mental health emergency?
In May this year, a Law Enforcement Conduct Commission report confirmed that “a high proportion of critical incidents [i.e. death or injury] involve a person experiencing a mental health crisis [and NSW police].”
And we all recall the death of 95-year-old Clare Nowland in May this year who was Tasered by police, now the subject of a court case.
That death occurred during the same month as the inquest into the death of Todd McKenzie, a man who had a history of schizophrenia and was shot dead by a police riot squad. McKenzie was alone, inside his own home, in Taree in 2019. Our firm, the National Justice Project, has been acting for his still-distraught mother, who cannot understand how her son, who says the police assured her would be alright, ended up in the morgue.
The coroner in that matter will hand down her findings about Todd’s death later this year. But the coroner’s job was made more difficult by the fact that tactical police were not using body cameras. It’s hard to see how that helps police accountability.
What becomes abundantly clear when you attend an inquest concerning the death of a person with severe mental health issues at the hands of police is that general duties police have only rudimentary training in managing health crises. Yet they are expected to deal with vulnerable people and people with complex medical conditions almost every day.
But why?
Surely, we can all agree that dealing with a person in the midst of a difficult mental health episode is a job that requires medical expertise. People in crisis need to go to hospital or a safe place where they can receive appropriate care and attention.
The role of medical professionals is to treat sick people. Police are authorised to use force in certain situations, such as when making an arrest, preventing a crime, or protecting themselves or others from harm – and they are legally protected if they get it wrong, as long as the use of force is reasonable.
Nobody disputes that policing can be a difficult and dangerous job. But their presence can often escalate a situation, as NSW acting police commissioner David Hudson admitted this week after the death of Kach.
We believe it’s time for a royal commission into the use of weapons by police and how police respond in such situations. A royal commission could ask very serious questions about police practices and training, how and when they use their extreme powers and what alternatives might exist.
But it’s not just the culture of our police that is in question. All state governments, cheered on by the usual suspects of raucous conservative elements in the media, are responsible for this situation, with their predictable and cynical “tough on crime” campaigns.
In doing so they grant police increasingly extreme powers without meaningful accountability while starving mental health services of desperately needed funding.
A lack of health funding means that the police have become carers of last resort in a crisis and that is leading to a long and growing number of deaths and injuries. It’s time that we look to other models such as Denver, Colorado, which diverts people away from the criminal justice system and sends a therapeutic response team to individuals in crisis instead of police.
Until then,police may escalate difficult situations they might not understand, with an array of weapons they are told are not lethal.
George Newhouse and Duncan Fine are two of the founders and directors of the National Justice Project, a human rights law firm fighting systemic discrimination
In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, you can call or text the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline on 988, chat on 988lifeline.org, or text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis counselor. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org
