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York County commissioners hire co-responders to respond to mental health crises

Intelligencer Journal - 9/4/2021

Police in York County will soon have a new type of backup to call to the scene.

York County commissioners secured $17.9 million in funding as part of a human services block grant to hire behavioral health experts or “co-responders,” according to a press release.

Co-responders will serve as liaisons between police and the county’s mental health program to respond to mental health crises in the area. These co-responders are not police officers.

York County District Attorney Dave Sunday told WITF that the program will keep those who haven’t committed serious crimes out of jail. According to the report, in York County 65% of approximately 9,000 crimes per year are related to behavioral health or addiction issues.

Rather than incarcerate these individuals, a co-responder can de-escalate the situation and connect them with services.

Sunday told WITF the goal is to have a co-responder assigned to each of York’s 20 police departments.

The program is part of York County’s efforts to take a different approach to law enforcement stemming from a grand jury inquiry into a prison inmate death.

Just under three years ago, Everett Palmer Jr., a 41-year-old man, died in the York County Prison. Before his arrest, Palmer had allegedly binged on methamphetamine. During his two-day incarceration, he died from banging his head against his cell door in an attempt to commit suicide, according to the York Dispatch.

Palmer’s mother filed a wrongful-death lawsuit in April 2020 alleging that Palmer was drugged with methamphetamine by prison guards who beat him and allowed him to die, according to the article.

In addition to the co-responders program, over 167 police officers across 19 York police departments have been trained in the Memphis Model of Crisis Intervention, according to the 2021-22 York County Human Services budget proposal. The Memphis Model of Crisis Intervention is a curriculum to educate law enforcement in responding to mental health crises.

And York isn’t the only county to face a wrongful death lawsuit against its police and government.

Last year, Ricardo Muñoz was shot and killed by a Lancaster city police officer responding to a domestic disturbance call. His mother filed a wrong death lawsuit but the shooting was ruled justified by Lancaster County’s district attorney.

Lancaster city Mayor Danene Sorace told LNP | LancasterOnline that a crisis intervention co-responder model is both a priority in the city budget and to police officers.

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Crédito: Ashley Stalnecker | Staff Writer