Abstract: The Role of Law Enforcement in Dispatching and Responding to a Mental Health Crisis in a Non-Police Crisis Response Model (Society for Social Work and Research 28th Annual Conference - Recentering & Democratizing Knowledge: The Next 30 Years of Social Work Science)

Schedule:

Friday, January 12, 2024

Independence BR B, ML 4 (Marriott Marquis Washington DC)

* noted as presenting author

Preston Roberts, MA, Doctoral Student, State University of New York at Albany

Tomoko Udo, Professor, State University of New York at Albany

Jordan Dyett, LSW, Student, State University of New York at Albany, Albany

Denard Cummings, Student, State University of New York at Albany

Timothy Campbell, LCSW, Doctoral Student, State University of New York at Albany

Carmen Morano, PhD, Professor, State University of New York at Albany

Background: Numerous high-profile adverse interactions between police and people with serious mental illness (SMI) and the overrepresentation of people with SMI in the criminal justice system (CJS) has prompted many communities across the United States to implement alternative approaches to divert this vulnerable population away from the CJS, while addressing the underlying needs on the scene. In the Albany County Crisis Officials Responding and Diverting (ACCORD) program, 911 call dispatchers are tasked with deciding which calls are to be responded to only by the ACCORD team, consisting of a trained mental health professional and emergency medical technician, vs. calls to be co-responded to by an officer, with a goal to reduce the involvement of law enforcement in mental health crisis scenes. To our knowledge, the role of law enforcement in alternative mental health crisis response models has not been closely examined, despite important implications for program fidelity. This paper evaluates the ACCORD service triage process, the proportion of crisis intervention services where police was present, and their role.

Methods: Two data sources were used for this study: 911 dispatch records that include the time and address of the call origin, call priority levels, and the primary concern(s) shared by callers, and the ACCORD service fieldnotes that were written by the ACCORD social worker and contain information such as primary reasons for requesting the ACCORD team, methods of services (e.g., on scene, phone), and presence of law enforcement and their role. Descriptive statistics were used to evaluate questions such as whether the ACCORD services were primarily requested by the dispatchers as originally designed, who else requested the ACCORD team, whether an officer was present at the scene, and their role if they were at the scene.

Results: Through June 2021-June 2022, the ACCORD team provided 325 ACCORD crisis intervention services. The origins of service requests were: 129 by dispatchers, 81 by police on the scene, 26 by patients, 15 by family/friends, 12 by the County Mobile Crisis Team, 21 by EMS, 27 by self-dispatching, and 6 cases by others (e.g., doctors, someone in the community, school). Police officer was present in 80.0% of cases. However, they simply observed the scene as a backup in 78.2% of cases, and they were directly involved in 13.8% of cases (i.e., arrest, restrain). Police were requested to the scene by family members of patients 56.9% of the time and patients 10.6% of the time.

Implications: These findings show that ACCORD services were frequently requested by parties other than dispatchers, including self-dispatch by the ACCORD team. Law enforcement was more present on the scene than originally intended, although they played a backup role in the majority of cases without being directly involved with the patients. Most requests for law enforcement came from patients and family members. To improve program fidelity and reduce the unnecessary involvement of law enforcement in future encounters, it is important to more clearly define the ACCORD dispatch process and educate law enforcement and community members on the goals of the program.