Managing the Mentally Ill: Training for Law Enforcement

Silver Hill Hospital will host the Connecticut Alliance to Benefit Law Enforcement (CABLE) training for the sixth consecutive year in June. This year, law enforcement officers from Bridgeport, Darien, Greenwich, Norwalk and Stamford will participate.

The mission of CABLE is to provide quality mental health training for police officers, helping them diffuse situations where an individual may harm themselves or someone else. As the funding for many state agencies is cut, it is often police officers who first encounter mentally ill individuals, making this training more important than it has ever been. It is the hope that with the proper tools, injuries to citizens and other police officers will be reduced, and that there will also be a reduction in the number of repeat crisis calls for police support, saving taxpayer money and officer time.

Officers are hand selected by their respective departments. The week-long sessions are intense, covering subjects like de-escalation techniques; a phenomenon called “suicide by cop” where, rather than taking their own life, the individual creates a situation where the police officer will be forced to shoot; and a session called “Hearing Voices” where the officers have to carry out simulated daily tasks while listening to an audio of repetitive voices.

Silver Hill is pleased to open our doors and again welcome this esteemed group of officers. In its efforts to work with law enforcement, CABLE is truly unique. It is a model we would love to see replicated in other communities as well as we know having well trained law enforcement, sensitized to the needs of those with mental illness, makes a tremendous difference.

We salute their work and the officers who attend and are happy to help in any way we can.