NCJ Number
199792
Date Published
2003
Length
12 pages
Annotation
This chapter discusses the issue of trust and the suicidal police officer.
Abstract
When an officer begins to lose trust, the early clues may not be verbal ones. The officer begins to pull away during interpersonal interchanges in barely perceptible physical ways. The stance, interpersonal distance, and eye contact may be altered slightly. This slight distancing may begin with citizens and spread to the officer’s interactions with a partner. The officer may also lose social enjoyment, seem preoccupied, or more irritable. The rigidity on the street may infiltrate his/her behavior and interpersonal interactions at home. The more people try to help, the less trusting the officer becomes. This progressive loss of trust rarely occurs in isolation. By the time mood, anxiety, psychotic, or personality disorder symptoms or substance abuse emerge, the loss of trust is usually far advanced. Without trust, meaningful attachments cannot be formed to other people. Only at this late date does the mistrusting officer begin sending overt messages about suicidal ideas and intent. If the officer cannot trust at all, he/she may weigh the differing degrees of lethality of considered suicide methods. Once the suicidal officer performs the ritualistic final acts of choosing a method, some of the pressure of the final decision subsides. There may be an improvement of mood and signs of great relief in that the decision to die has been made. The impact of trust problems in the suicidal police officer can be felt by the spouse and family, the police partner, fellow police officers, the police squad of assignment, the police substation and department, and the public.