黑料正能量 Note: This incident, and the other mentioned herein regarding the 19-year-old Iowa man killed by police officers this week, continues to highlight the need for broader police training around emotional disturbance calls. Learning how to deescalate a potentially violent altercation with a person experiencing an emotional incident or needing mental health attention are valuable skills for men and women in the line of duty. Gaining training and working with community intervention teams () can increase public safety and help officers negotiate their communication and relationships with community members.
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Police Shoot And Kill Mentally Ill Man Carrying Shovel, After Call For Help From His Mother
By听Nicole Flatow, November 13, 2013
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Police in Burlington, Vt.,听shot and killed a mentally ill man听last week after his mother called the police to report that he was agitated and destroying property. About two minutes after the officer arrived at the home, he shot and killed 29-year-old Wayne Brunette. Police said he was wielding a shovel in a threatening way, according to Seven Days, a Vermont news outlet. The incident was the first time Burlington police have fired a gun in the line of duty in 16 years.
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Not many other details are yet available about the November 6 incident. The family has declined to speak with reporters and neighbors who witnessed the incident simply confirm that Cpl. Ethan Thibault fired several shots at Brunette. But WPTZ News Channel 5 reports that police had听, without any escalation to violence.
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In a very similar incident in 2003, an officer arrived at Brunette鈥檚 home looking for a man who allegedly assaulted someone in a supermarket. When they arrived Brunette came out with a baseball bat in what the officer said was a threatening manner, and refused to put it down even after he raised his gun.
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This time, however, he didn鈥檛 use his gun, and he later told police that Brunette鈥檚 gait, and the fact that he was walking rather than running influenced their decision not to fire. Police also responded to call from Brunette鈥檚 wife in 2001, and found explosives in his closet. After both incidents, he was admitted to a state hospital for mental illness and charges were dropped, without incident.
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This is the second incident last week in which a call to police for help resulted in the fatal shooting of a family member. In Iowa, police听听19-year-old Tyler Comstock, who drove away in his father鈥檚 truck after a dispute over a pack of cigarettes. His father called the police to intervene, but the incident escalated into a high-speed chase that ended with police shooting Comstock on the Iowa State University campus.
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The Iowa shooting was deemed 鈥渏ustified鈥 by the county attorney, who found that Comstock was using his vehicle as a weapon. The Burlington shooting is still under investigation.
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Burlington police regulations听allow an officer to use deadly force听鈥渢o protect him/herself or another person from what the officer reasonably believes to be an imminent threat of death or serious bodily injury.鈥 They also guide officers to consider the 鈥渟ize of the suspect, type of weapon or other instrument the suspect is wielding, the location of the encounter, prior dealings with the suspect, the subject鈥檚 response to verbal commands, and the availability of cover for officers,鈥 according to Seven Days.
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Police force against the mentally ill is particularly problematic. A study by the Portland Press Herald in Maine found that nearly half of people shot by police since 2000 were mentally ill, and that police听听on defusing deadly conflicts. And a听听found a pattern of police abuse against the mentally ill in Portland, Oregon.
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