Read on Twitter
Bennie Edwards appears to be the latest person with mental illness to be killed by police. The homeless man was fatally shot by Oklahoma City officers this afternoon, according to early news reports. Edwards' family said he suffered from bipolar disorder and schizophrenia. https://twitter.com/kfor/status/1337509885764833283
My recent @OklahomaWatch investigation revealed that @OKCPD cadets receive 1,105 hours of training. Of those, 16 are spent training officers to handle encounters with people struggling with mental illness. 2/
Officers can volunteer for an additional 40 hours of mental health training. All @OKCPD patrol officers respond to mental health calls, but fewer than 14% have received the additional training.
The risk of being killed during a police encounter is 16 times greater for individuals with untreated mental illness, according to @TreatmentAdvCtr. More from my investigation with @QuintonChand of @StateImpactOK below. https://bit.ly/36z57Bi ?
. @OKCPD response to more than 50 mental health calls a day. But Capt. Jeffery Pierce, who runs the mental health unit, told me police should not be doing this job. He explains in this video. https://bit.ly/3o92GvB
If you value this coverage, please consider supporting my work at @OklahomaWatch by visiting our donate page. We are a nonprofit newsroom, which means we rely on your support to do these important investigations. Every bit really does make a difference. https://bit.ly/2JVzIjv
