The Informant

San Francisco Police Department

Alarmed at recent police shootings of mentally ill people over the past few months, the San Francisco Police Commission voted last night to overhaul the police department’s crisis response training. A resolution written by Commissioner Angela Chan and approved unanimously by her peers will direct SFPD to create a crisis-intervention team along the lines of a program the Memphis Police Department implemented in the 1980s.

The Crisis Intervention Team training, as developed in Memphis, is composed of officers who volunteer for the assignment, which is in addition to their regular patrol duties. CIT officers are selected for their experience and their ability to use non-confrontational and de-escalation techniques. Officers in MPD’s Crisis Team go through forty hours of intensive training for the assignment.

A majority of SFPD officers have gone through similar mental health training that was initiated in 2001, but fell victim to budget cuts last year. During the hearing, mental health workers and advocates spoke of other past training programs that also withered due to fiscal difficulties.

Commission President Thomas Mazucco said revising San Francisco’s policing strategy towards the mentally ill was a must, considering the size of San Francisco’s homeless population and budget cuts to health services that assist such people.

“We ignore them, they’re invisible people, and our police officers have to deal with them when they go off,” Mazucco said.

Vinh Bui, 46, was shot and killed by SFPD officers in the Portola district on December 29 after he allegedly stabbed a girl and refused to drop the knife when ordered to do so.

Randal Phillip Dunklin was shot by SFPD officers while in a wheelchair on Howard Street on January 4. Dunklin, who allegedly stabbed an officer shortly before being shot, survived the shooting and has criminal charges pending.

Both Bui and Dunklin reportedly had histories of mental illness – and many of the officers involved in both shootings had undergone SFPD’s training for dealing with psychologically unstable suspects.

Major Sam Cochran, a former Memphis police officer who has helped implement CIT procedures in police departments nationwide, told the commission that CIT is not a surefire guarantee that police will not be involved in shooting incidents with the mentally ill. However, Cochran recited Memphis police statistics indicating that before CIT was implemented in 1988, the department averaged one to two shootings of mentally ill people annually. In the last 15 years, Cochran said MPD had had three such police shootings.

The number of MPD officers injured during contacts with the mentally ill has also declined. Cochran and Dr. Randy Dupont, another driving force behind CIT, presented figures indicating such injuries to MPD officers declined from 6,000 from 1984 to 1987 (right before CIT was created) to less than 1,000 between 1994 and 1997.

According to Jo Robinson of the Department of Public Health, San Francisco’s emergency dispatch center receivers more than 10,000 mental health calls for service per year, averaging out to about 30 mental health calls per day, eight of which result in a “5150,” or detention for psychiatric reasons. Most of these calls, Robinson said, are concentrated in the Mission, Tenderloin and Southern Districts.

Although District Attorney George Gascón had initiated research into the Memphis model last year, the Police Commission and staffers from the Office of Civilian Complaints

It is not clear how many SFPD officers will receive CIT training. Chan’s resolution mandates that at least 20 to 25 percent of patrol division receive CIT training and that specialized officers will be available for deployment during each of SFPD’s three daily shifts.

“It takes eight to ten years to define and get your head around what it means to be an effective police officer,” said Kevin Martin, the Vice President of the San Francisco Police Officer’s Association. Martin patrols a foot beat on Sixth Street in the Southern District, one of the areas of the city with the highest number of homeless residents.

Interrim Police Chief Jeff Godown voiced his support for CIT, and has floated the idea about making the program’s de-escalation training required for all SFPD officers.