Comments

You must log in or register to comment.

drkgodess OP t1_jdx6y25 wrote

More details on the incident that led to the takeover:

> Seabrooks, 31, was a crisis intervention worker and mentor with the nonprofit Paterson Healing Collective and died soon after police shot him when he emerged with a knife from the apartment bathroom where he was holed up, according to the attorney general’s office.

> Long accustomed to helping others in the mid-sized city 20 miles (32 kilometers) northwest of New York, Seabrooks’ co-workers have been shattered by his death and say authorities prevented them from using their mental-health expertise to deescalate the situation.

He was in crisis and needed help, not an execution. Let's see if the state of NJ will implement the necessary reforms to prevent a repeat of this tragedy.

149

robexib t1_je02nb8 wrote

Naw. The police will claim they'll need more money for mental health services for their officers, the state will give it, and then nothing will change.

29

bros402 t1_je2r2n2 wrote

I mean do you remember what they did to Camden?

8

robexib t1_je2z1z1 wrote

My father moved to Camden in the 70's and watched the whole city go to shit. I'm more than aware.

−2

bros402 t1_je3473t wrote

No, they totally redid the police department. It's not openly corrupt now.

8

robexib t1_je3nbm8 wrote

Okay, and? I still wouldn't want to deal with the police there.

1

bros402 t1_je3rdpe wrote

true

I would much rather deal with the Newark police, since they didn't fire a single bullet in 2020.

4

Supertranquilo t1_jdxkv7q wrote

'In Paterson that's just the way things go. If you're black, you might as well not show up on the street unless you want to draw the heat.'

Bob Dylan, 1975

98

JiubLives t1_jdy041m wrote

Urge your local leaders to pressure dispatchers to change protocols. Stop sending cops for health crises. If no social workers can responds, send fire/rescue.

52

Darryl_Lict t1_jdyvwln wrote

From what I understand, this is what the defund the police talks about. Transfer money from police to social workers to de-escalate mental health situations.

39

JiubLives t1_jdywr7r wrote

For sure, but it has to be more specific. You can cut police and move that to all the other services in the world, but if 911 still gets cops showing up, what was the point?

Movements and hashtags are important for starting the conversation. The follow up has to be specific. Dispatch protocol is one of the first things that needs addressing. Unfortunately, where I reside fire/EMT actively resist changes that would send them to do welfare checks, mental health calls, and other situations that don't require an armed response.

10

mindhypnotized t1_jdzw4zw wrote

I’m sorry, your firefighters and EMTs are armed?

−3

masterchef81 t1_je0eb31 wrote

No, they are saying that fire/emt don't want to respond to calls that shouldn't require police, thus armed responders is left as the only option.

5

mindhypnotized t1_je0ggfz wrote

So the firefighters and emts don’t take any calls that don’t require armed escorts from the police? I’m sorry but neither of you are making sense. It seems to me that a lot of fires or medical emergencies do not require someone to show up with a gun and shoot at it. If my grandma is having a stroke and I call for an ambulance, they just won’t show up because the police aren’t needed?

−2

masterchef81 t1_je0io6c wrote

No, sorry for the confusion. As an example...mental health crisis shouldn't require police as the first response. But fire/emt won't respond, so police become the default response.

Personally I don't think fire/emt SHOULD respond to mental health crisis. There is a risk of violence there that they are not trained or paid for. But neither should police, whose training is "eliminate the threat" be the first response.

Either way, EMTs would still respond to your grandma having a stroke because that is clearly within their primary job description.

7

JiubLives t1_je0odd1 wrote

Of course they respond to calls that don't require armed escort, which is why I want them to respond to MORE calls like that (welfare checks, etc.).

The calls you described, they will go to without escorts. If someone, however, calls about a person passed out on a sidewalk or an elderly person missing an appointment, they will NOT respond. If there's a mental health crisis (no weapon), they will NOT respond. That means police are sent, which for many people, is triggering and makes the situation much worse.

3

JiubLives t1_je0nvnm wrote

No. They resist changing dispatch protocol. They don't want to respond to mental health crises or welfare checks (that don't require armed responses, which is why I wish they'd go).

1

OldPuebloGunfighter t1_je17yn6 wrote

That will require some big change. Most fire departments and unions have policies and clauses stating they will not respond to armed subjects or mental health crisis without police securing the scene first. I think you'd probably have to give firefighters weapons for them to feel comfortable responding to such situations. At which point we'd probably be right back where started except with people fearing getting shot by fire fighters as well.

6

cedarapple t1_je0fxad wrote

That sounds nice but what unarmed crisis worker would want to deal with an unhinged lunatic waving a knife around without armed backup?

1

damagecontrolparty t1_je0x8es wrote

It seems like there's a big risk to them going into a situation like that. I would like to hear exactly how the de-escalation is supposed to work so that the worker is kept safe. I never hear any details about how it would theoretically go down.

6

TogepiMain t1_je0tg8o wrote

One who knows they're way less likely to get stabbed if the person isn't freaking the fuck out because 3 angry cops are pointing guns at them?

4

ArrowAssassin t1_je0u1nl wrote

No unarmed social worker is gonna want to solo an armed person having a mental breakdown. They're gonna request armed officers as backup.

8

TogepiMain t1_je0xvky wrote

Got the numbers on that?

−1

ArrowAssassin t1_je1h3no wrote

The numbers on people not wanting to die? Probs around 7 billion. The average person is not gonna confront someone with a weapon without any kind of safety assurance. This doesn't change just because they put social worker on their resume. They already get paid shit wages and Redditors are now speaking for them saying they should be thrown to the wolves.

8

WastedPotenti4I t1_jdyofow wrote

For those unfamiliar with NJ, Paterson sucks, you really just should not go there. It and Camden are among the few blips of NJ (along with the oranges and parts of Newark) that are just straight up not safe to be in.

Hopefully this actually enacts some meaningful change there. Recently there have been some new/remodeling developments, so I think there is still hope for it.

Edit: removed vagueness

32

skoomski t1_jdyt3yd wrote

I live outside of it and this is really an understatement because there are other cities just as bad in NJ like some the Oranges and parts of Newark, it’s not just Patterson and Camden that are rundown unfortunately

16

WastedPotenti4I t1_jdytgz7 wrote

Yeah I badly phrased my response, it wasn’t my intention to say that only Paterson and Camden are that bad, there are definitely other cities (the oranges and parts of Newark like you said). I also live outside of it and while I think it has gotten better recently, it still has a long way to go.

5

skoomski t1_jdyu494 wrote

I moved in about 7 years ago and the common thing I noticed is empty ruins of factories and rundown docks too in the case of Newark. These use to be decent jobs but they been gone for a while and I don’t think they are coming back to be honest. Similar to Philly. That my antidotal opinion anyhow.

4

WastedPotenti4I t1_jdyukyy wrote

Yeah. In the past few years some of those old factories have been updated and turned into art installations/galleries. Not viable for the entire city area but doing something with the space nonetheless. What they’ll do with the rest of the abandoned buildings is beyond me.

2

___deleted- t1_je14m2t wrote

Some of the ruins are hazmat sites.

They were renovating one factory for housing and discovered it was once a thermometer factory and was totally contaminated by mercury.

1

tryhardsasquatch t1_jdzb2vj wrote

The Muslim part of Paterson is fine. My wife's from there and my sheltered white ass has been going there for 6 years with no problems. Al Basha's got some of the best hummus I've ever had.

But also yeah I avoid the rest of the city like the plague.

9

TheBigFreezer t1_je0vho3 wrote

Hey now, my fiancée is from Paterson!

...okay yea, we don't visit very often.

1

bros402 t1_je2r594 wrote

At least the Camden police are better than they were before being dissolved?

1

Wolfieze t1_jdxtt8h wrote

All I knew about this town was that Adam Driver liked to write poetry there.

4