Suicide By Cop: Who protects our protectors?

            Police officers are out in our community to protect us from harm, but what happens when a sick individual takes advantage of their responsibility to protect?

            That is exactly what one individual (called Seth to protect his identity) did. Seth was a 19 year old and attending college in New Jersey. He had already attempted suicide twice. He had a clean record with the law but he was struggling with depression plus had already attempted suicide twice but was unsuccessful both times. Now Seth was looking for a successful way to kill himself. He devised his plan to die. Seth was going to get in his car and drive recklessly. Then a cop would pull him over for his reckless driving and he would pull some insane stunt in order to make the cop shoot him and kill him because that is the job of the cop to protect the community from those who are a threat.

            Seth put his plan into action on March 22, 1997. He dropped off his girlfriend at a college function, then opened and began drinking a bottle of champagne and began his reckless driving. He drove through New Jersey and made it all the way to his home state of Connecticut. It had reached about 3 A.M. and Seth had yet to see one police car. So he figured he would go find one. He drove to the Wallingford Police Department blew his horn and did everything to get their attention, and it worked. He created a chase involving several squad cars from several counties. He finally ran into the back of a police car. The officer in the police car halted immediately and prepared for a foot chase. But instead Seth came at the officer with the champagne bottle in hand as a weapon screaming “I’m going to kill you! You better shoot me, or I’ll kill you.” The officer  really have no choice but to pull out their gun and use it. This officer did, he shot Seth in the abdomen with the bullet lodging near his spine. Then officers cuffed Seth and he pleaded with them to please shot him in the head. Seth was taken to the hospital and has been receiving depression treatment and is still alive today, but unfortunately this is not always the case.  

            The officer on duty that night, Lt. Mark Poisson, and Seth’s mother Louise Pyers are taking their story to police departments all over the country. When sick and depressed people are at the end and just want to die they think having a police officer shot them is a guaranteed way to die. But what they don’t think about is the police office that has to deal with killing someone. Suicide by cop is becoming a growing problem and its tough getting people to realize that preventative measures need to be taken. Together Poisson and Pyers created the Crisis Intervention Team to hopefully education other police officers. Because if they do encounter a situation like Seth’s, maybe they can talk him down or figure another way to get him under control without killing him.  

            However now we do have the taser that is helping with this growing problem, and that was not an option back when Seth was shot. However the best defense against suicide by cop is knowledge, and with the Crisis Intervention Team hopefully that will happen, because innocent cops are getting wrapped up in someone else’s suicide mission and it is getting out of hand. Police Departments as a whole need to take a stand against suicide by cop and get these sick individuals the help they need.   

Original Story: Here

Sara Cosgrove
Communication Studies
Wilkes 2012