Santa Clarita Sheriff Station, Santa Clarita, CA – Wednesday, April 9, 2025, 12 pm
Hi everyone. My name is Jason, and as someone who lives with mental illness representing NAMI’s SYSLE program, I am here to talk about mental illness and law enforcement. I hope you’ve had your coffee, since without it, you’re going to fall asleep during this presentation, I guarantee you. But I hope I’ve had my coffee, since without it, I’m definitely going to fall asleep during this presentation!
I’ve actually been in this role before, pre-COVID, in Van Nuys, talking to LADMH and LAPD-MEUs. Here is a photograph of me flanked by Senior Lead Officer Jasminka Jurisaga and Lieutenant Brian Bixler. I got to know them during MEU supervision. Here are their medallions presented to me, as tokens of appreciation for the work I collaborated on with them.
I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder 25 years ago, after graduating from Harvard, where I studied philosophy, probably the toughest major. I lived a very unhealthy “study hard, party hard” lifestyle. When I began a senior honors thesis and quit the partying, my condition did not get better. It got worse until by graduation, I was full- blown symptomatic.
Bipolar disorder generates wild swings in one’s emotions. It used to be called manic depression, like the Jimi Hendrix song. Deep-blue (depressed) then sky-high (manic). Up and down, hot and cold. There is no happy medium for bipolar people, a place where most people are. So-called normal people like yourselves are very even-keeled, you know, right in the middle. Not someone like me.
So what can you do about it? Bipolar disorder is caused by a chemical imbalance in the brain. So it responds well to medication. Also, talk therapy corrects distorted thinking that goes along with the mood swings. I take two mood stabilizers, anti-anxiety, bipolar depression, anti-psychotic, and one for medication-side effects. And I have almost no side effects. I’ve had the best doctors on the planet.
The problem with bipolar disorder specifically and mental illness in general is medication non-compliance. Many patients do not want to take medication, and then when they do and feel better, they want to get off them. To them, the less medication, the better. I no longer agree with that. To me, now, the more medication the better. But others must realize that for themselves.
Mis-medicated and drunk, I brandished a golf club at someone and was arrested for assault with a deadly weapon (which is a felony). Thanks to family support and a sympathetic judge, my sentence was commuted to simple assault (which is a misdemeanor). I was detained in the Twin Towers for a few days and nights. A rather forgettable experience. I was placed in a cell with three other bunkbed inmates. A single hole to urinate and defecate in, with just a roll of toilet paper, no privacy, sweaty, smelly beds, the screaming of other prisoners, bland cafeteria food…I was escorted into a holding pen with all the Blacks and Hispanics. I was the only Asian. I rolled in there, they took one look at me, and they all yelled out, “YO, BRUCE LEE!”
But I should’ve been 5150’d rather than get thrown into jail. I needed “help not handcuffs,” and I needed time for treatment in a locked facility. I did not need incarceration. Why? Because when the police arrived at the scene, I did not resist arrest. I told the arresting officers what I had done and that I accepted responsibility for what had happened. And I told them about my diagnosis.
But it begs the question, how do you tell the difference between the two? After all, the mentally ill can engage in felonies, and violent felons can appear mentally ill. I have a mental health diagnosis and I was arrested for a violent felony. So I was both. But you people may be called upon to decide someone’s fate, to make that determination, like my own: help, or handcuffs.
In my experience, the mentally ill are white-hot enraged and emotionally unregulated. Their unbridled anger completely unbalances them. As a result, they even will resist arrest because they are not thinking about what a uniform, badge, and gun mean. It is completely irrational of any citizen to fight the police off when the odds are stacked against them. Mentally ill people tend also to be “scattershot.” The erratic behavior of a mentally ill person has got to be as disturbing as it is outrageous and bizarre. They are out of control, and there’s no “off-button” to shut them down, unless of course, the manic episode subsides and they return to baseline. But mania does not have an automatic “shutoff switch.”
Violent felons are different. They are as cool as a cucumber. That makes them much more dangerous. When they are outrun and outgunned, they will comply with officers’ orders because they wish to live to fight another day. They know the game is over once they face off against a uniform, badge and a gun. There is a cold calculating logic to it. Violent felons know what they are doing. They are on a mission, and nothing will stop them from that goal. That is why there is something unnervingly steely-eyed with felons. There is something frighteningly deliberate about them, like psychopaths who do not know right from wrong, or sociopaths who disregard the difference between right and wrong.
But remember that with the mentally ill and violent felons, if you try to stop them from what they want to do, they will test you. Trust me, they will test your patience. As I once did. So, be on your guard. You have no idea if they will try to bull-rush you or try to snatch your gun away from you. In that case, someone is going to die, and I do not want that someone to be any of you.
While I hope this is helpful, you will be best-served if you trust your instincts, rely upon your training, and get support from your fellow officers. And with the mentally ill and felons, talk is the best thing. Talk will distinguish mental illness from a violent felony, because the conversation will go either one way or the other way. And then it will be clear.
When you encounter someone who could be crazy or criminal, talking starts a chess match. Right away, you say something to them, and then they say something to you, and that gets the dialogue going, back and forth. It also gives you a chance to gather information, evaluate their mental state, call for backup, and determine whether they need jail, detainment, commitment, or nothing.
But your powers of sound judgment are so important to the dialogue you start, because mentally ill people are no match for mentally healthy law enforcement officers. Whether they hold a gun to their head, try to hang themselves from a pole, or try to jump off a bridge, they cannot justify their behavior, even to themselves. When you point that out to them, that is when you got them.
My time is almost up, but I want to leave you with some last words: “to protect and serve.” Do you seriously pursue it? Or cynically advertise it? Just know this: I would never send you out on patrol where I was unwilling to go myself; nor would I advise you on a course which I felt myself unwilling to pursue. You are good officers, you are good citizens. Judiciously enforce the laws, dutifully preserve your honor, and this society of ours which you have sworn to protect and serve can afford to be, and will be, generous to you. This concludes my presentation. Thank you for your attention.
