Securing Security Personnel: How Health Professionals Support Law Enforcement - Essay Sample

Introduction

Law enforcement officers are taken through a health program where health professionals collaborate and provide health services to the security personnel regularly. The health program I meant to support the security professionals both psychologically and physically to enable them to perform their duties with minimal challenges. When the security personnel is not supported, they are likely to be unable to work properly, and in some instances, they respond violently to situations leading to confrontations. The crisis intervention programs are meant to promote healthy working environments when the security personnel gets the assistance that they require to provide security services efficiently.

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The experiences that the law enforcement officers go through are traumatizing; hence their mental conditions get affected as they face different situations. The experiences cause trauma, which in turn affects how the security officers do their work (Dunning, 2019). The CIT programs unite many stakeholders that perform different roles that help the security personnel in different ways, depending on how the person is affected. The government facilitates the programs to ensure the security officers perform their roles optimum. The program is part of the refreshment program that keeps the law enforcement officers focused on their work. Once the law enforcement officers and other security personnel go through the training, they can handle different challenges that they go through in their work.

Many law enforcement officers are involved in shootings, and they are left with both physical and mental scars. Whenever there are shootings, there are victims that are affected by the shootings, such as the families that are left when their loved ones die from the shootings (Lemieux, 2014). People own guns and threaten the lives of the security officers who target them when the officers are not aware of it. Law enforcement officers have been accused in the past to discriminate against minority groups such as blacks. The police and other uniformed officer need to be ethical and not discriminate against the people based on stereotypes in society. The law enforcement officers need to ensure that the rate of shootings reduces.

Research has shown that many of the people and law enforcement officers that have been involved in the reckless shooting have mental health challenges. The mental illness affects the behavior of the people, and they end up engaging in shootings in instances that could be solved without necessarily to shoot the opponents (Dunning, 2019). The law enforcement officers also have mental health challenges because of the experiences that they go through while on duty, and they end up having depression. The mental challenges create fear making the officers respond by shooting because they fear for their lives.

Some incidents have been recorded by cameras where the law enforcement officers were not facing any form of danger, but they ended up shooting their victims. Such incidences can be linked to trauma, depression, and stereotypes that are formed in the society (Dunning, 2019). The incidences have left the people divided, especially the black community that feel the police discriminate them. Such incidences need to be dealt with to prevent the people from reacting to protect themselves from such attacks.

Affect the Week-Long Training Has on CIT Trained Officers’ Response to Aggressive and Violent Individuals

There is no enough support and medical officers that are able to handle all the matters that arise while the officers are on duty. There is also the limitation of time where the officers would seek medication and support for the experiences that they go through (Watson, Compton, & Draine, 2017). The CIT programs over a wide range of services that are not available in different departments of security officers.

The effects of the CIT programs is that the security officers get the training on how they are supposed to handle different situations safely and effectively. The training equips the officers with techniques that they can use in handling challenging situations that they experience while on duty (Dunning, 2019). The techniques include changing the attitude while handling difficult situations. The attitude determines whether the officers will win their challenges or not. The attitude gives the officers the morale and determination to keep fighting even when the situations seem to be difficult. The mental capacity determines whether the officers will win their fights and challenges or not.

The Crisis Intervention Team programs help in keeping the law enforcers focused on crime but understanding how the crime evolves and what are the best practices of dealing with the new forms of crime (Fulambarker, & Watson, 2013). A program is a form of refreshment program that is meant to give the security officers the opportunity to interact and exchange ideas on how to handle different situations. Different departments have different skills; hence they need to exchange ideas. Sharing ideas helps the police officer to learn from the experiences of their colleagues on the best practices of handling different situations that they come across.

The programs also give the law enforcement officers the opportunity to give feedback to their seniors on their experiences and the challenges that they go through while on duty. The communication during the programs is not official; hence the security personnel has the opportunity to communicate whatever the kind of information that they would like their seniors to know (Lemieux, 2014). The programs are necessary to strengthen the relationship between the senior and junior officers, which is key to the success of the security sector. When the senior security officers understand what their juniors are going through in the field, they can know how they can help them when handling different challenges.

The war and fighting experiences make the security officers have mental disorders and other related illnesses. Most of the officers result in using drugs to cope with the situations. The officers end up being addicted to the drugs that they use (Kimball, 2020). The CID programs offer the officers medication and therapy to heal from the addictions that affect their work. The medical treatment reenergizes the officers and refocuses them to their main objective, which is to maintain security and ensure there is peace in areas where people fight for different reasons. The security officers are not able to provide their services effectively when they are facing health challenges; hence the CID program is required.

It's challenging for the security officers to live with the bad experiences and the stress that the experiences bring to the officers. Many officers end up dying when they are living with stressful experiences because they are unable to continue with their work (Connell, 2018). The officers live with the fear that what happened to their friends is likely to happen to them also hence they trying to avoid the circumstances. The CID programs offer the officers the opportunity to refresh and understand that it's possible to continue working even when their lives are in danger. The programs follow up on how the officers are doing to ensure they have a healthy mind to do their work.

The CIT programs also facilitate the officers to be trained on how they should respond to aggressive and violent individuals. My opinion is that the CID programs need to train the officers on how they should handle violent and aggressive individuals because they have been accused of using excessive force in the past. The officers should be able to understand individuals that they are controlling and how to handle them responsibly.

There is a need to investigate all shooting incidences, including the incidences where the law enforcement officers are involved and accused of having caused the shooting. When the police officers are made to be countable for their actions, they will fear using the guns recklessly; hence such shootings are likely to reduce. The police should be able to demonstrate to the public that they are ethical and treat all the people with the same equality. The CIT programs can be used as platforms of educating the police on the importance of respecting the law while doing their work. Professionalism is key for all the stakeholders involved in the security sector.

Conclusion

In conclusion, there is a challenge of mental health crisis among the law enforcement officers. Therefore the crisis intervention team needs to take the necessary action to help the officers deal with the challenge. The CIT programs give opportunities for the officers to access medical services from healthcare providers. The officers are treated with any health condition that might affect their performance to ensure that the officers can perform their responsibilities.

References

Connell, B. J. (2018). Indeterminate Effects of Crisis Intervention Teams on Law Enforcement Officer Shootings of People with Mental Illnesses.

Dunning, C. (2019). What is the Role of a Crisis Intervention Team | Learn more. Criminal Justice Programs. Retrieved 22 February 2020, from https://www.criminaljusticeprograms.com/articles/crisis-intervention-training/.

Fulambarker, A., & Watson, A. (2013). The Crisis Intervention Team Model of Police Response to Mental Health Crises: A Primer for Mental Health Practitioners. PubMed Central (PMC). Retrieved 22 February 2020, from https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3769782/.

Get Involved | NAMI: National Alliance on Mental Illness. Nami.org. (2019). Retrieved 22 February 2020, from https://www.nami.org/Get-Involved/Law-Enforcement-and-Mental-Health.

Kimball, A. (2020). CIT International - CIT Guide. Citinternational.org. Retrieved 22 February 2020, from http://www.citinternational.org/bestpractice.

Lemieux, F. (2014). Effect of Gun Culture and Firearm Laws on Gun Violence and Mass Shootings in the United States: A Multi-Level Quantitative Analysis. International Journal of Criminal Justice Sciences, 9(1).

Lyman, M. (2019). Gun Violence and Mass Shootings. Ccis.vitalsource.com. Retrieved 22 February 2020, from https://ccis.vitalsource.com/#/books/9780135234846/.

Watson, A. C., Compton, M. T., & Draine, J. N. (2017). The crisis intervention team (CIT) model: An evidencebased policing practice?. Behavioral sciences & the law, 35(5-6), 431-441.