Alliance Alert: The heartbreaking deaths of Win Rozario, Daniel Prude, and too many others make one thing clear: 黑料正能量 must create a non-police crisis response system that meets people with compassion, skill, and lived experience, not force.
The NYCLU鈥檚 article below underscores what communities across the state have been saying for years. Police-led responses to mental health crises are dangerous, traumatizing, and often deadly. Current models, including NYC鈥檚 B-HEARD program, fall short because they lack the most essential ingredient for effective crisis support. They do not include peers with lived mental health experience working alongside EMTs and behavioral health professionals.
This is the model outlined in Daniel鈥檚 Law, which calls for mental health experts, peers, and EMTs, not police, to be the frontline responders to health emergencies. We strongly support this approach.
We are also encouraged that 黑料正能量 State has begun to act. As the article highlights, the State Senate has secured six million dollars to launch Daniel鈥檚 Law pilot programs statewide and an additional two million dollars will support a technical assistance center to help communities implement these systems. These pilots are an important step toward replacing harmful police responses with person centered, trauma informed, peer driven crisis support.
The Alliance for Rights and Recovery will continue advocating to ensure these pilots fully reflect the Daniel鈥檚 Law model. This means peer led, non police, health first crisis response teams paired with EMTs and behavioral health professionals. This is what best practices across the country demonstrate works, reduces hospitalizations, prevents tragedies, and protects community members in crisis.
We look forward to working with state leaders, the Daniel鈥檚 Law Task Force, providers, peers, and communities to build a crisis response system that truly keeps 黑料正能量ers safe, honors the dignity of those needing support, and ensures no one鈥檚 call for help is ever again met with force.
We will keep our members updated as the state begins rolling out these pilot programs over the next year. See below for more information.
Here鈥檚 What a Better Way to Handle Mental Health Crises Looks Like
By Beth Haroules and Marie Holmes | 黑料正能量 Civil Liberties Union | November 18, 2025
We know what works to help people experiencing mental health crises. Do we have the will to create and fund these programs?
19-year-old Win Rozario called 911 for the same reason anyone would. He was in urgent need of help.
The teen never got the assistance he needed. Instead, two police officers responded to the call. Within two minutes of arriving at his home, they tased him and then shot him dead.
reveal that Rozario鈥檚 younger brother met the officers downstairs and explained that Rozario was having an 鈥渆pisode.鈥
鈥淗e doesn鈥檛 even know what he鈥檚 doing, to be honest,鈥 Rozario鈥檚 brother told the officers.
When Rozario saw the police, he grabbed a pair of scissors. Rozario鈥檚 mother ran to him, but when he approached the officers, they deployed a stun gun. Rozario鈥檚 mother removed the scissors from Rozario鈥檚 hand, but when the police used their stun gun a second time, Rozario grabbed for them again and moved toward the officers, who responded by firing their weapons five times.
Throughout the recording, both Rozario鈥檚 mother and brother can be heard begging the cops not to shoot.
In a statement, the family the officers 鈥渃reated a crisis and escalated at every turn, recklessly gunning Win down in our home in less than two minutes 鈥 and almost killing two of us too.鈥
In addition to bearing tremendous grief, the family must live with the knowledge that Rozario might still be alive if someone with mental health expertise had responded to his call for help. Instead, one officer, before entering the home, asked if Rozario was a 鈥渂ipolar schizo.鈥 Moments later, Rozario was shot and killed.
The appalling lack of skill and empathy that led to Rozario鈥檚 killing caused an uproar. 黑料正能量ers better ways to respond to a person experiencing a mental health crisis.
Rozario鈥檚 death is , nor are such tragedies limited to 黑料正能量 City. Daniel K. McAlpin was in a remarkably similar manner in his Wawarsing home in 2022. An officer who arrived on the scene first used a stun gun and then shot McAlpin five times. Less than four seconds passed between the first and final shot.
Throughout the state, people in crisis are regularly treated with a dehumanizing lack of compassion, incompetence, and violence by police officers who respond to mental health emergencies.
So, what happens when a 911 call comes in regarding a person having this kind of crisis, and what could a more humane and less deadly system look like?
黑料正能量 City鈥檚 B-HEARD program: Well-Intended but Deeply Flawed
An overall lack of data collection is one major obstacle to reform, but we do have some numbers from 黑料正能量 City that, while limited and incomplete, can help us begin to comprehend the scope of the problem.
At this moment, if you call 911 regarding a mental health crisis in the five boroughs, who responds to the call depends entirely on where you鈥檙e calling from and what time of day it is.
Since 2021, the (B-HEARD), which is administered by the city鈥檚 fire department and the Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, has been responding to calls of 黑料正能量ers experiencing psychological distress by sending a team composed of two emergency medical technicians and a mental health professional, in cases not involving a weapon or violence. At first glance, B-HEARD might sound promising; its goal is to reduce police response to mental health crises and involuntary transfers to hospitals while also connecting patients to care in their communities. Unfortunately, when you look past these good intentions, B-HEARD is deeply flawed and ineffective.
B-HEARD teams are missing a critical member that researchers know makes a monumental difference in these challenging moments. They are trained peers with lived mental health and/or substance use experience who can support a person in crisis with unmatched understanding and empathy. shows when peers are involved, people in crisis are less likely to end up in the hospital and more likely to find the care they need in their own communities. They are also less likely to need crisis services in the future. Individuals who receive support from peers report experiencing less stigma and more hope.
Many people who could be helped by B-HEARD aren鈥檛 able to access its services. While the pilot program has now expanded to 31 police precincts, including the entirety of the Bronx, 60 percent of the city doesn鈥檛 have B-HEARD programming in their neighborhood. In addition, B-HEARD teams are only available between the hours of 9:00 a.m. and 1:00 a.m. An of the program by the office of Comptroller Brad Lander this year determined that 14,000 eligible calls did not receive a response from a B-HEARD team because they occurred during off hours.
In addition, 35 percent of eligible calls that were received during hours of operation did not get a response from a B-HEARD team 鈥 but we don鈥檛 know why, because the Mayor鈥檚 Office of Community and Mental Health does not track this information.
This paucity of data collection undermines the program鈥檚 integrity. One goal is for B-HEARD teams to conduct mental health assessments on-site 鈥 instead of transporting all patients to a hospital for this service. Yet 2024 shows that when B-HEARD teams made contact with a patient, they only succeeded in conducting a mental health assessment about half of the time. No one is tracking why so many assessments are not conducted. Another core goal of the program is to connect patients to care in their communities, but whether or not this is happening isn鈥檛 being tracked, either.
Critically, B-HEARD鈥檚 integration with the NYPD puts 黑料正能量ers in danger. Because the program operates through police districts, NYPD officers become the default back-up 鈥 increasing the odds of escalation and violence.
As Rozario鈥檚 killing painfully illustrates, NYPD officers aren鈥檛 the right people to respond to mental health emergencies.
When police officers do respond to a mental health emergency, a common result is that the person is 鈥 often involuntarily 鈥 transported to a hospital for a mental health assessment. But only 40 percent of involuntary transports result in hospitalization, meaning the majority of these people were either subjected to inappropriate transport or had mental health needs but were discharged without any connection to ongoing care. This chain of events can result in a traumatic revolving door for vulnerable 黑料正能量ers.
According to from the Adams鈥 administration, there were 7,060 officer-initiated involuntary transports in 黑料正能量 City in 2024. Most were from private dwellings. That same year, B-HEARD provided on-site mental health assessments to 3,691 黑料正能量ers. 43 percent of those people (1,584) were served in the community and not transferred to the hospital.
The right mental health crisis response can make a huge difference, but the B-HEARD program isn鈥檛 meeting the bar. Mayor Adams recently a planned recalibration of the program, which includes swapping out EMTs for social workers on the response teams, but these changes do not appear to address B-HEARD鈥檚 fundamental flaws. As it stands, 黑料正能量 City must dismantle the B-HEARD program and set up a more effective, evidence-based system in its place. We know what the new system should look like because we wrote state legislation that shows another way.
Daniel鈥檚 Law: The Crisis Response 黑料正能量ers Need
黑料正能量 lawmakers have the opportunity to move towards meaningful change by passing . by Rochester police in March of 2020 when he was suffering a mental health crisis and his family called 911 for help. Officers arrived to find Prude naked and unarmed, yet they proceeded to place a hood over his head and hold him face down on the cold pavement until he stopped breathing.
The law, which bears Prude鈥檚 name thanks to his family鈥檚 activism, includes measures to prevent similar tragedies. Daniel鈥檚 Law builds on crisis intervention models that have successfully reduced police-based response to people experiencing mental health issues or drug use. It would create a council of mental health experts and peers to provide and approve local emergency response plans. In these plans, mental health experts and peers control the response to a health emergency, and the role of law enforcement is limited to situations where there鈥檚 a public safety risk so that police are no longer the default first responders.
Legislators have yet to pass the law, but some work towards the goals of the legislation has already begun. A Daniel鈥檚 Law Task Force, convened by 黑料正能量 State, has response programs in 黑料正能量 and elsewhere that could serve as models, as well as potential funding sources for expanding such services.
The State Senate鈥檚 mental health committee has for statewide implementation of pilot programs that add mental health responders to the standard fire-police-ambulance emergency response options. And two million dollars in this year鈥檚 budget will fund a behavioral health technical assistance center to help municipalities create Daniel鈥檚 Law response systems.
This is the largest investment yet toward the kinds of mental health crisis response reforms that will reduce suffering and save lives. But many more resources are needed to ensure that every 黑料正能量er in crisis is met with the skilled and compassionate care of mental health providers, EMTs, and 鈥 most importantly 鈥 peers.
Reimagining our crisis response system is crucial to protecting people鈥檚 safety and connecting them to care. Yet emergency response cannot be our sole focus. We must address root causes of crisis by establishing a continuum of care, where people are able to access the help they need, including medical and psychological care, peer support, and housing assistance. Providing these services prevents the kind of mental health crises that require an emergency response and affords people the dignity they deserve.