Policing and the Mentally Ill: International Perspectives [ Active ]

Preface

The original idea for this book came to me from organising a number of panels on the topic of policing and persons with mental illnesses for the International Academy of Law and Mental Health (IALMH) 32nd International Congress on Law and Mental Health held at Humboldt University in Berlin, Germany, in July 2011. With the nucleus of a book being available from the various papers presented at this congress, a proposal was made to CRC Press for this book to be published as a volume in the Advances in Police Theory and Practice Series, under the general editorship of Dr. Dilip Das. To my delight the proposal was accepted and the project has since moved to a successful conclusion, with the 16 invited chapters in this book offering a wide range of cross-cultural perspectives on an aspect of policing that all too often in the past has not received the attention and priority it deserves.

It is particularly pleasing that so many policing practitioners have chosen to contribute to this book. As readers will discover, although the book does not seek in any way to provide an exhaustive account of contemporary developments in any single country or region, the principal focus is on Australia, where local law enforcement agencies have displayed a remarkable enthusiasm for and commitment to change in their management of interactions with citizens with mental illnesses. The specialised police responses (SPRs) that have emerged in the Australian states of New South Wales (NSW) and Queensland are described in some detail in separate chapters of the book. I am extremely grateful to the staff of the Mental Health Intervention Team (MHIT) in NSW and the Mental Health Intervention Program (MHIP) in Queensland for their personal support and encouragement in making these contributions possible. I was also able to participate in person in the MHIT four-day intensive training programme and am now a proud MHIT graduate.

Initiatives like the MHIT and MHIP that are occurring in Australia are in many ways unique, and certainly worthy of further study and possible replication in other parts of the world since they have taken a concept that was really designed for much smaller urban-based law enforcement agencies in North America and applied it to very large police forces with mandates to deliver services across huge geographic areas, and in rural and remote communities as well as in densely populated cities. When launching these initiatives, there has also been a willingness among Australian police practitioners to engage in the evaluation of outcomes and to rely on evidence-based information when setting policies and directions. Close research relationships have been established between academia and the Australian police community, especially through the activities of the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence in Policing and Security (CEPS), a largely federally funded programme designed to support applied and theoretical research of national significance and importance. CEPS and its director, Professor Simon Bronitt, have been very supportive of the activities surrounding the preparation of this book, and I express my gratitude for this assistance.

I also express my warm thanks to all of the authors mentioned in the list of contributors. They have displayed great patience and understanding over the many months that it has taken to gather, review, and ultimately deliver to the publisher the 16 chapters contained in the book. These warm thanks also extend to Carolyn Spence and Kathryn Younce at CRC Press, and Dilip Das as the series editor, all of whom have willingly granted me several extensions of time to complete the project.