Police-Encounters-With-People-In-Crisis

MCIT provides. This issue is addressed in greater detail in Chapter 11 (MCIT and Other
Models of Crisis Intervention).
C. Points of intersection between the mental health system and the TPS
74. As a result of the overlapping connections between the mental health system and
the police in addressing the needs of people in crisis mentioned above, the importance
of building bridges, maximizing cooperation, and facilitating communication between
TPS and the mental health system cannot be overstated. Below, I discuss the primary
current intersections between the mental health system and the TPS.
1. Apprehensions under the Mental Health Act
75. Officers are given the power to apprehend people in crisis and bring them to a
physician for evaluation. One prominent person in the field characterized officers acting
pursuant to their powers under the Mental Health Act as “psychiatric ambulances,” and
a primary mechanism for connecting people in crisis with needed care. This view is
supported by other experts in the field. 63
76. As mentioned in Chapter 3 (Context), section 17 of the Mental Health Act gives
all police officers in Ontario the power to apprehend persons acting in a disorderly
manner in order to take them for examination by a physician, where the person: (a) has
threatened or is threatening bodily harm to himself or herself, (b) has behaved or is
behaving violently towards another person, (c) has caused or is causing another person
to fear bodily harm, or (d) has shown or is showing a lack of competence to care for
himself or herself, and where the officer is of the opinion that the person is suffering
from a mental disorder that will likely result in serious bodily harm to that person,
another person, or serious physical impairment of that person. 64
77. Physicians and justices of the peace have similar powers under sections 15 and 16
of the Mental Health Act to order the psychiatric examination of a person. 65 Physicians
can also order that a person be brought in for examination if he or she has reasonable
cause to believe that a person subject to a Community Treatment Order has failed to
comply with his or her obligations under that order. 66 When a physician or justice of the
peace orders a person to be examined, police officers are often called on to apprehend
the person concerned and bring them to a specified psychiatric facility for examination.
78. TPS Procedure 06-04 “Emotionally Disturbed Persons,” discussed above, governs
situations where officers are acting pursuant to their powers under the Mental Health
Act, including when they are directed by a physician or justice of the peace to apprehend
a person under a form. The procedure sets out a process governing police interaction
63
Brink, Mental Illness, supra note 40 at 26.
64
MHA, supra note 2, s. 17.
65
Id., ss. 15, 16.
66
Id., s. 33.3.
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