In the third and final part of our Veterans Day investigation of how the U.S. justice system interacts with veterans, we look at innovative programs designed to help police understand the traumas afflicting soldiers in the transition to civilian life.
Last August, in the hallway outside a classroom at the Oklahoma City Police Training Academy, Sergeant Cory Nooner was playing dress-up. Instead of his gray uniform and black boots, he was sporting old Army fatigues and beat-up sneakers. He pulled a dingy wool blanket around himself, took a moment to get into character, and waited for the signal.
“We’re ready,” said social worker Vicki Downing, poking her head out from behind a metal door.
Nooner nodded and stepped inside. He was no longer the department’s Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) trainer: for the next half hour, Nooner was a homeless vet.
He shuffled into the classroom mumbling nonsense, his eyes darting around the room like spun marbles. Two of the student officers approached him and began a 10-minute role-play where the officers tried their best to communicate with the troubled man, determine whether he was dangerous, and finally assess whether he needed to be taken to jail or to the city’s mental health crisis center.
Nooner had played this role before. A veteran of the Gulf War, he was instrumental in creating the department’s 40-hour CIT program, which, like a growing number of similar programs around the country, now includes a section on Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and discussion of how officers can better spot, approach and interact with veterans.
“We’re trying to create an empathetic response,” says Darin Farr, a former marine who fought in Desert Storm and now works as the outreach and research director for the Utah Department of Veterans Affairs. “The PTSD soldiers suffer from is different from that endured by rape victims or car accident survivors. There are so many circumstances that can trigger a reaction, from driving to crossing beneath bridges to crowds.”
Farr explains that after reading about an incident near Las Vegas during which police responded to a troubled vet in what he considered to be an over-aggressive manner, he concluded that with the proper instruction they might have been able to talk the vet down. He decided to use his college training as a filmmaker to create a video that would give police an “awareness and sensitivity” to the psychological issues faced by returning veterans.
“We as a society have created this problem,” says Farr. “We took these kids who were basically innocent , and subjected them to horrific circumstances. To expect them to rationally integrate, it’s hard.”
The problem of veterans who struggle with the psychological scars of war is not new. Tom Schumacher, the PTSD Director at the Department of Veterans Affairs in Washington State, helped police interact with troubled Vietnam veterans in the 1980s, and says that although law enforcement had relationships with VA counselors back then, there was never any formal training provided to officers.
Farr wanted to change this. He sought permission and support from his bosses at the VA for the video, and in late 2008 received $5,000 from his outreach budget. He consulted with Utah’s CIT program director, hired some friends to help him, and in March 2009 began presenting the 18-minute video entitled “Walking Wounded,” to law enforcement leadership in Utah.
The response was overwhelmingly positive, and Farr says the video is now being used by law enforcement in at least 28 states and by three federal agencies. Further information about the number of law enforcement agencies who are training officers on veterans issues is hard to get. The International Association of Chiefs of Police told The Crime Report that it did not collect such data.
"It's all been word of mouth," says Farr. "CIT officers started talking to each other, saying, 'You gotta use this for training.'"
Trouble on the Road
Because much of the fighting (and dying) in America’s current overseas wars occurs in urban areas and on roadsides, highways and roads have emerged as a common point of interaction between police and veterans.
“Roadside bombs are a huge tool for insurgents, so soldiers are trained to drive at high speeds, and if you see anything – a package, a car – alongside the road, (you) veer,” says Ron Bruno, Utah’s CIT program director. “So when a soldier comes back, hits our streets and sees a broken-down car, out of habit, he may swing wide. If an officer sees this, he may think the driver is impaired, and pull him over. The veteran is already experiencing nervousness, anxiousness – he’s having an emotional reaction, almost like a flashback — and the presence of the officer adds more stress. Maybe he starts sweating.”
For a police officer, these bodily signals often indicate that the person they’ve pulled over is intoxicated, or hiding something. But for a vet, Bruno says, it can be a “a normal response to an abnormal situation.” Simply asking, “Are you a veteran?” can put the vet at ease and help the officer end the situation peacefully.
Schumacher recalls hearing about the case of a local veteran who, while driving the highway, spotted a police officer with a radar gun.
“The vet went nuts,” says Schumacher, who fought in Vietnam. “He tried to aim his car at him, then realized what was happening and veered away at the last minute."
Stateside Shoot-outs
Of course, not all situations are as easily resolved as a simple driving incident. In the fall of 2007, I wrote an article about Sgt. James Dean, a veteran of the war in Afghanistan. Dean had returned to his hometown in rural Maryland suffering from depression, and began drowning his sorrows in alcohol. He received inconsistent mental health treatment from the local VA and just after Thanksgiving 2006, received news he would be redeployed, this time to Iraq.
Dean, who’d just gotten married, took the news hard, and on the night after Christmas, holed up in his childhood home and called his sister threatening suicide. Dean’s sister called 911. She told the operator that her brother was a veteran, was armed, and needed help.
Unfortunately, instead of following the guidelines for intervention espoused by Farr and Bruno, the responding agencies, perhaps acting out of fear that a soldier with a gun is highly trained and thus potentially dangerous, surrounded Dean’s remote home with armored cars and snipers.
Although a negotiator attempted to interact with him over the phone, the tapes of the call revealed a clear lack of understanding of Dean’s situation and mental status. Dean begged the negotiator to tell the dozens of officers to stand down, back off, leave him be. Instead, the officers launched tear gas into his home, and finally, when Dean stepped out on his front porch with a rifle in hand, they shot him dead.
Farr hopes his video, and the training that goes along with it, will educate officers about why a veteran like Dean might react poorly to the kind of escalation of force the Maryland State Police engaged in. “Vets with PTSD often have an exaggerated fear response, and more stimulus will cause them to be more reactive,” he says.
Last year, Schumacher, a Vietnam vet, was approached by the state’s Department of Health and Social Services to create a program for law enforcement aimed at promoting better understanding of new veterans’ issues. He received a $40,000 grant which allowed Schumacher and his colleagues to train more than 200 officers in Yakima County, and in July he received another grant that will allow him to continue and expand the training over the next two years. Part of Schumacher’s aim is to educate officers about the similarities between the kind of work soldiers do overseas and the work police themselves do stateside.
He explains, “When veterans get approached by police, they often think, ‘Wait, I’m one of the good guys – I’m on your side!’”
Julia Dahl is a contributing editor to The Crime Report
Photo by amg200, via Flickr.
Posted by sherry fanara
Tuesday, December 08, 2009 02:04
I work at ft campbell and would love a copy of this for our training and to use to educate the public and military famlies, how can I get one?
Posted by Crystal Dowen
Thursday, December 03, 2009 11:24
Sir,
I am writing on behalf of my Husband, A vet who served with distinction for over 25 years, before he fell ill to his undiagnosed Bipolar Disorder, Adjustment Disorder, OCD, and severe Depression and anxiety. He has a host of service connected physical issues as well, which according to his Dr, contributed to his implosion.
He is currently considered disabled by the VA due to his service connected disabilities.
Please read the whole e-mail if you can as I do not know where to turn.
This is a matter in which my husband of 9 years, who after serving in the Recruiting command, for 14 years (high stress) who is a great father and husband, with no criminal history, committed a “sex offense”. He had what is called a manic episode after being under tremendous stress, and being awake for 3 days.
He was caught up in an internet sting. He after repeated requests to meet, over hours of chatting in an ADULT chat-room, despite repeated requests from police to send graphic pictures (he did not) drove to meet a well developed (they sent a picture) but never stopped, never exited his car, and was leaving when arrested.
Subsequently he was jailed, and due to a well publicized rift with state prosecutors, his charge went Federal. We also believe they used his position in the Military (he was AGR in the recruiting command with the Utah Army National Guard) for publicity.
Sir, i Have known this man for over 10 years and have seen the slow course to implosion. He denied his depression and began to self medicate (drinking). His family and close friends saw a huge change in him. He was depressed, anxious, irritable, had huge mood swings, and could not turn his mind off and could not sleep for days. If we would have recognized the symptoms of the Bipolar Disorder, we would have intervened. He was getting promoted to E-8 and refused to seek mental health help for fear his career would be over, which ultimately it was anyway.
He of course, has been disgraced, lost his career, retirement, home (bankruptcy) reputation, and most of his friends. The local media (Utah) is extremely biased, and loves a juicy story about “supposed” threat to the children. He in fact recruited for 14 years in and around high school students, coached at the middle school level, and substituted at the elementary, middle, and high school levels for years without one single mention of impropriety.
What happened to due process? When a man who is supposedly “innocent until proven guilty” has his face and name splashed across the news and internet for days…how could he expect to receive a fair and unbiased trial? The police, despite him being innocent until proven guilty, and fabricating and coercing answers from him, despite his repeatedly telling them he was up for 3 days, under a tremendous amount of stress, coerced answers, lead him into answers, and publicly humiliated him, all before he was found guilty of anything. IS THIS EVEN REMOTELY LEGAL OR ETHICAL
As a side note, there have been numerous educators, and Police Officers that have actually had sex with minors, yet received far, far less punishment. What happened to fair and equal punishment?
This was part of an internet sting. He did break the law, but as his Psychologists mentioned in his official evaluations, given his poor judgment and lack of impulse control during a manic episode, he succumbed to repeated requests by the officers to meet. He did not however, despite repeated requests by the officers, posing as a minor, send any pictures of himself or his genitals. There was nothing in the police transcripts to indicate he was masturbating. In addition his computers were seized, but later returned as there was no evidentiary value on them.
He has been evaluated extensively and has taken a detailed sex inventory with no remarkable results. The psychologist stated that he shows no signs of the several pedophile tendencies. The evaluation essentially states that due to his long lasting,extremely high-level of occupational, marital, physical stresses, he imploded.
Yet another reason I am writing you in particular is that, unfortunately after the fact, was diagnosed with the following severe mental Illnesses:
Chronic Adjustment Disorder
Bipolar NOS
Chronic Pain Disorder with both a general medical condition and phsyclogical factors
GAD
He has also been diagnosed with several severe physical issues as well.
I was amazed when the Federal Judge, during his sentencing actually asked “how could being Bipolar make you commit a crime”?
I am shocked, that Federal Judge, with all the evaluations in front of him, outlining his severe mental and physical issues, could ask such a question? Even without the evaluations, just being in that position for 15 plus years would surely mean he has come across such a disorder before?
This is clearly yet another case of the continuing criminalization of the mentally ill if I have ever heard of one????
Surely you can offer guidance on how such a thing could happen given the publicity, the DSM IV, the scholarly articles that outline what happens to a person that suffers from Bipolar Disorder, GAD, and Chronic Pain Disorder?
As the public becomes more educated concerning the unjust “grouping” of all who have been deemed “sex offenders”, registry reform must follow. The Adam Walsh Act, (as currently written was to identify all child abusers) is not being used to identify child; physical abusers and murderers and is being used to identify people whose victims were adults thereby creating a registry that does not protect children and will continue to grow out of control. It is time for fact-based laws that will benefit society as well as the offender.
On a personal level, I am so very worried he will not receive the care, counseling, therapy and medicine that he depends on to manage his disorders.
HELP!!! Any thoughts you may have would be appreciated
Crystal Dowen
ccdowenye@msn.com
Posted by Tom Schumacher
Wednesday, November 25, 2009 04:13
I just want to note that much of the information offered in this article and attributed to me is incorrect or related without adequate context. I would encourage anyone who reads about my efforts to educate First Responders (police, MH Professionals, and crisis workers), and the effort to improve the homecoming and care of war veterans, and wishes to know more, should contract me directly via my email tom@dva.wa.gov I will do my best to answer your questions.
A couple of point: The focus has never been to make police into counselors of veterans, but to help them at least watch for ques that will help them avoid making a life ending mistake, and to help them better identify and manage war veterans with PTS/PTSD, substance abuse, or other problems at the point of arrest.
I am all about helping OIF and OEF war veterans obtain the help that they need, and when their war related symptoms and other homecoming problems lead them into troube with police or result in them encountering a crisis workers, that these professionals have better methods of thinking about the veteran’s conduct, know about alternatives, and know directly of solid local referral connections to the right provider.
I am also interested is seeing more Veteran Courts evolve around the state and country, like the one that we had 30 years ago in the northern countries in Washington State. This deferred prosection model worked extremely well, assisted the entire community to work together on behalf of VN veterans, removed the veteran from the legal system processes (charges, trials, jail time); and did not increase their problems by convicting them of behavor that clearly was related to combat stress issues. This allowed them to either keep their jobs, or to obtain reasonable work, maintain family and social connection. While some counties and cities have looked successfully at jail diversion programs, I believe that deferred prosecution is a much better approach – one that does require some assessment and treatment expertise within the community, as well as informed police, prosecuters, and judges. One county in WA (Thurston) is just now using this approach.
Best wishes,
Tom Schumacher
<strong>ED RESPONSE:</strong> <em>In subsequent e-mail conversation with the post writer, he did not specify any error of fact, with the exception of one alleged misquote. Our reporter’s notes support the quote, and TCR stands by the story. But we also hope readers will take up the post writer’s invitation to continue to explore this crucial issue with the seriousness and depth it deserves.</em>
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Posted by Donna Yancey
Wednesday, November 18, 2009 04:31
I am with NAMI Indianapolis and would like more information on this program. I would like to do more education of our Crisis Intervention Team (CIT) officers on PTSD as it relates to veterans.