We hear that veterans from the Vietnam War who have committed suicide as a result of their service, could not get their names on the Vietnam Memorial. The memorial committee stated that the number of names had to be constricted to combat deaths only because the sheer number would be too great including those who died from suicide. Instead the Memorial Administrators have opted to have a Memory Day for all veterans who died during the war but not necessarily from line of duty deaths. Their names would be placed on the wall but not carved into it. The Police Memorial Wall has similar constrictions . A review of the guidelines of the Police Memorial in Washington for inclusion on the wall clearly does not list police suicide as one of the criteria. We often hear from the frustrated families of those lost to suicide that their names and memories appear on the other side of the wall where no one can see them but they remember that they are there. Some effort has been recently ongoing for a separate memorial for those who died from suicide from the wars in VietNam, Iraq and Afghanistan which is some comfort for those who lost a loved one to suicide from what they saw and experienced during their service . No such separate memorial is proposed for law enforcement.
For the police, some sort of recognition is being sought but the sticking point has been whether the suicide was a “line of duty” suicide, directly connected to some event that the officer experienced and led to his/her suicide. The organization Badge of Life has proposed this consideration of line of duty suicide as possibly a point of agreement for inclusion on the Police Memorial Wall. Many officers have had life changing events that altered their lives and from which they never fully recovered. Those are straight forward and traceable for those considering bestowing this honor and they are welcome changes.
But what of the officer that served honorably but cannot point to a specific event that changed them, but , instead, were crushed under a career full of traumatic events none of which could be the blame or culprit to their deciding to take their own lives? What can we do in their cases? Ignore the loss the family sustained and further victimize them? How do we draw the line of who is honored and who isn’t? Line of duty deaths at the hands of another are fairly simple to determine and very straight forward. But suicide isn’t. It waits in the dark of the officer’s soul and lies in wait. The only person who knows why the officer took his own life is the officer and he’s gone now.
Some legislative efforts have tried to remedy this. They deem it a line of duty death if a physician or therapist can attest that that officer was demonstrating suicidal behavior and tendencies. That would be a great start. But it would entail that they were being treated by a physician or therapist, and there is the problem. Many of these suicides weren’t being treated and no one knew they were behaving that way. In so many cases of officers that I personally knew who took their own lives, no one, not family or close friends, saw this coming. It happened quickly and with no warning. In many cases it appears that they don’t openly plan these acts out and they don’t let anyone know the way they are thinking. They simply make up their minds to end their pain and carry out that last act to end it.
What about those suicides that were the result of PTSD? We know from findings from organizations such as Badge of Life that there is more of a chance of dying by your own hand than by that of a criminal, and that the frequency of PTSD in active police ranks is between 15-25%. It would appear that PTSD is a real problem for police and that programs for suicide prevention and on the job stress would be beneficial. Gary Felt in the American Academy of Traumatic Stress in an article entitled “The Relationship of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder to Law Enforcement: Importance of Education” stated that education of police concerning PTSD is imperative. He goes on stating that education would enable police to get beyond their perception of being Superman and Wonder Woman and enable them to seek help. Sadly because of budget constraints and funding problems, most police departments concentrate on preventing death by a third party than in preventing death by the officer’s own hand . Educating officers on how to recognize and get treatment for PTSD is key to bringing these numbers down. But there then is the second problem, treatment. If an officer won’t come forward for treatment than how is the department supposed to treat them?
The problem may be due to insurance problems and coverage restrictions, and the department or the officer cannot afford to get this officer treatment, then the PTSD rates and suicide rates continue to climb . Recently, for example, the State of NJ enacted the Federal mandate under Affordable Health care to give mental health treatment equity to other health concerns. This goes a long way to enabling public employees to seek therapy and not have their benefits run out because of some spending ceiling that was placed on mental health care.
Some officers may go, instead, the route of self help. They drink their problems away with alcohol abuse, they abuse drugs both legal and illegal. They attempt to mask the pain they are in on their own and they fail . In a study done by the US Department of Veterans Affairs-The National Center for PTSD in an article entitled “PTSD and Problems with Alcohol Use”, it was stated that binge drinking, typical to PTSD, may be a response to the memory of trauma. They go on to say that the drinking aggravates the stress reaction and actually makes dealing with the PTSD more difficult resulting in doomed behavior.
So what can and should be changed to start addressing this problem? Police departments need to set up education programs addressing the symptoms of PTSD and urging the officers to seek help if they are experiencing these symptoms., according to Gary Felt.
Second, treatment programs have to be set up and sick leave policy has to be adjusted to give the officer with PTSD as much time off as any other injury suffered in the line of duty. A Worker’s Comp Insider, Lynch Ryan wrote that 5 states have made changes in their compensation laws: South Carolina, New Jersey, Michigan, New York and Oregon to address PTSD but reform is needed nationwide.
Third, should it become necessary, tasks and duty assignments need to be modified to accommodate the injured officer with PTSD. This would necessitate changes in the Americans with Disabilities Act. At present PTSD would only be covered if it was a mental disability. Many fall short of the definition, cannot meet the requirements to be a police officer, do not receive compensation benefits and are terminated from employment.
Fourth, if the PTSD is complex and cannot be addressed properly with treatment and therapy including drugs, and the officer can no longer function as an officer, they must be afforded a disability pension. Taking that officer through the process and then terminating him/her with no pension can lead to a situation of desperation that will end in a suicide. Gerard Miller in Governing the States and Localities- Rethinking Disability Pensions stated if the officer cannot be an officer anymore consideration should be given to disability pension not termination. The converse is seen in states such as New Jersey where they formed investigatory units to re-examine those now awarded disability pensions and the nationwide trend is to tighten the purse strings on such determinations. If an officer can no longer function as an officer and the disability pension is no longer an option, they cannot have their tasks modified on the job to accommodate them, they are not compensated for their disability and they face termination, is it any wonder why so few officers opt to say anything, do not report their PTSD, deal with their demons by drowning them in alcohol and reckless behavior and ultimately die from suicide that no one wants to acknowledge or memorialize?
This last part of granting a retirement is no easy task. To terminate an officer, even with a disability pension is an extremely traumatic experience for the officer. They are being forced out of and away from the job they loved because of an incident that was not in their control to avoid and which they are still second guessing themselves over and engaging in self criticism and self blame. This is just adding to that impossible burden they are laboring under. Counseling pending termination is a necessary final step to ease the officer out of the department. We should be trying to ease their pain and their burden, not worsen it . The transition should be seamless . As Badge of Life stated “retirement should not be a simple eight hours of paper completion before throwing the officer out the front door.”
