Police-Encounters-With-People-In-Crisis

system can manage mental health crises in the community
effectively without help from the other. 39
48. To illustrate the significance of police interactions with people in crisis to the
overall mandate of the Service, as set out in Chapter 3 (Context), in 2013 TPS officers
were dispatched to 20,550 calls for service involving an “emotionally disturbed person,”
8,384 of which resulted in an apprehension under the Mental Health Act. These
numbers are roughly consistent from year to year, and are also likely understated,
because not every call involving a person in crisis is classified as an “EDP call” for two
reasons: first, it can be difficult to tell at the outset whether a person is in crisis in some
situations; and second, calls are classified by type when they reach the 911 call-takers at
TPS Communications Services, an early stage at which it is often not known whether the
call involves a person in crisis. Still, using only the “EDP” number, more than one in
every 50 calls to which a TPS officer is dispatched involves a person in crisis, and
approximately one in every 100calls to which an officer is dispatched will result in that
officer temporarily suspending a person’s liberty under the Mental Health Act.
49. Police are a significant presence in the lives of people with mental illness. A study
by the Mental Health Commission of Canada estimates that, as a general rule of thumb,
two out of every five people with mental illness have been arrested in their lifetime,
three in every ten people with mental illness have had the police involved in their “care
pathway,” and one in seven referrals to emergency psychiatric inpatient services
involves the police. 40 Though these statistics are not specific to Toronto, they are
nonetheless useful in understanding the role of the police in the community of people
with mental illness.
50. In light of these facts, it is clear that calls involving people in crisis are a core part
of policing.
51. When people fall through the gaps in the mental health system, they may be
caught by the criminal justice system, which is not a desirable outcome from a human
rights perspective. As a society, by choosing not to provide adequate care for mental
illness, we risk criminalizing mental illness. The Toronto Police Service has established
several initiatives to ameliorate this concern, in order to divert people in crisis who
come into contact with the police away from the criminal justice system and back
toward treatment, where possible.
2. Mental health and the TPS business plan
52. The TPS has explicitly recognized that serving people in crisis is an important
aspect of fulfilling its mandate. Acting on a recommendation from the Toronto Police
Service Board (TPSB) Mental Health Sub-Committee, the TPS annual business plan now
39
City of Toronto Mobile Crisis Team Coordination Steering Committee, MCIT Program Coordination in the City of Toronto
(Toronto, ON: Toronto Central Local Health Integration Network, 2013) at 8 [City of Toronto, MCIT Coordination].
40
J. Brink, et al., A Study of How People with Mental Illness Perceive and Interact with the Police (Calgary, AB: Mental Health
Commission of Canada, 2011) at 29, online: [Brink, Mental Illness].
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