Police-Encounters-With-People-In-Crisis

38. These groups are intended to provide informal peer mentoring and coaching,
networking, team-building, support and encouragement, planning and implementation
of social, cultural or educational opportunities, development of professional skills, and
general information sharing. 24
39. The TPS currently has ISNs providing peer support to Aboriginal, Black, disabled,
East Asian, female, Filipino, LGBTQ, and South Asian members of the Service.
40. There is currently no ISN designed specifically to provide peer support to officers
who have been involved in traumatic incidents such as those involving the use of lethal
force. The Review heard that, in addition to support from the CIRT, there is informal
peer support for officers involved in such incidents—for example, officers may reach out
to one another on an ad hoc basis to provide mutual support.
41. A practice adopted by some other police services is to establish an anonymous
telephone service that allows officers to call for peer counselling, in the aim of
minimizing officer resistance to psychological counselling. 25
D. In-service monitoring
42. Supervisory officers within the TPS are currently required to monitor officers’
fitness for duty. However, “fitness for duty” from a mental health perspective is a
relatively low standard within the Service, and there is no formal requirement for
supervisory officers to monitor the psychological wellbeing of members more broadly,
or to take proactive steps to assist them in getting appropriate mental healthcare.
43. Officers in supervisory roles are in a unique position to influence other officers
and the culture of the Service as a whole. Ideally, these individuals should be attuned to
the mental health of the officers whom they supervise, in order to serve in a mentoring
role and to promote an environment in which officers’ mental health needs are
effectively addressed. This can help ensure that issues are addressed before they become
significant problems of misconduct that require discipline. 26
1. Fitness for duty evaluations
44. TPS Procedure 08-02 “Sickness Reporting” states that it is the responsibility of
each officer in charge to ensure that a fitness for duty assessment is requested from the
Medical Advisory Services (MAS) unit of the TPS when it is apparent to the officer in
charge that an officer has an illness or injury that is affecting or may reasonably be
expected to affect the officer’s performance of his or her duties. 27
24
Ibid.
25
For example, the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, 5/110.22 “Police Employees Assistance Program” (Las Vegas, NV:
Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department).
26
Martin I. Kurke & Ellen M. Scrivner, Police Psychology into the 21st century (Mahawah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Assoc, 1995) at
59 [Kurke & Scrivner, Police Psychology].
27
Toronto Police Service, Procedure 08-02 “Sickness Reporting” (Toronto, ON: Toronto Police Service, 2011) [TPS, “Procedure 08-
02”].
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