Justice Dept. focuses on police treatment of mentally ill
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FILE – In this May 26, 2015 file photo, Vanita Gupta, the head of Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, speaks in Cleveland. Justice Department lawyers investigating police agencies for racial discrimination and excessive force are increasingly finding a different problem: officers’ interactions with the mentally ill. Tony Dejak-AP File
By ERIC TURNER, Associated Press
August 29, 2016
WASHINGTON–Justice Department lawyers investigating police agencies for claims of racial discrimination and excessive force are increasingly turning up a different problem: officers’ interactions with the mentally ill.
The latest example came in Baltimore, where a critical report on that department’s policies found that officers end up in unnecessarily violent confrontations with mentally disabled people who in many instances haven’t even committed crimes.
The American political class has become increasingly diverse in recent years, but people with disabilities remain extremely underrepresented — apart from a few notable politicians, including Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, a paraplegic, and Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth, who lost both of her legs in a grenade attack while serving in Iraq. By ABIGAIL ABRAMS, TIME […]
By MARTHA STODDARD, OMAHA WORLD-HERALD (August 10, 2019)–Erin Phillips has made great strides in the three years since moving out of her parents’ home. The 31-year-old has learned how to do her laundry entirely on her own. She takes showers with only a little nudging. She cleans her own bedroom and bathroom. That’s on top […]
By MARK REAGAN, Staff Writer, THE BROWNSVILLE HERALD A first-of-its-kind mental health jail diversion program between Cameron County and a private healthcare group is the subject of a federal lawsuit a little more than four months after receiving its first residents. Disability Rights Texas filed the lawsuit against Inspired Behavioral Health, the parent company of […]
