Less than 10 seconds after officers opened the door, police shot Yong Yang in his parents’ Koreatown home while he was holding a knife during a bipolar episode.
Parents in Los Angeles’ Koreatown called for mental health help in the middle of their son’s bipolar episode this month. Clinical personnel showed up — and so did police shortly after.
Police fatally shot Yong Yang, 40, who had a knife in his hand, less than 10 seconds after officers opened the door to his parents’ apartment where he had locked himself in, newly released bodycam video shows.
Now the parents of Yang, who was diagnosed with bipolar disorder around 15 years ago, have told NBC News exclusively that they are disputing part of the account captured on bodycam, in which police recount a clinician’s saying Yang was violent before the shooting on May 2.
do not call the police. many countries outside the united states understand this already
The US only has 911 for emergencies AFAIK, who else would you call? Of course, police is basically useless here as opposed to an ambulance, particularly in the US when they know little more than brute force, but IDK how much say you have in what service they dispatch.
We have separate numbers for each service other than the central Europe-wide 112, and they are free unless misuse happens. A boarding school roommate had a mental health breakdown so severe an ambulance was called, with actual trauma-trained doctors who provided basic psychiatric treatment (sedation pills and further care advice to dormkeepers). So an ambulance is helpful for mental health crises but I cannot imagine cops helping in any way in this case - they have restraint tools that might thwart violence or suicide attempts but this situation did not need them, and a doctor on the phone (which you get immediately) can help with everything else better than the police anyway.
Uhm, in Germany it’s completely normal for police to assist in situations of mental health and instead of shooting them they talk to them, or, as a last resort, restrain people and bring them back to a care facility, unharmed.
Police receive proper 3 year training and most of them even have a required university degree.
While the cops in Germany are a lot better trained and won’t kill you or harm you, many are still on power trips and try to screw you over. Some abuse their authority especially towards teens and they try to fine you if you’re an adult. Society needs that job, but man I rarely hear about good encounters with police. I feel like older people had a better experience with cops and younger people in Germany like the police a lot less, but I could be wrong.
You’re definitely right, it’s still a place where people with fantasies of power end up. It’s not all just sunshine and the media might be biased but compared to some countries it’s still a pretty high standard which should be the minimum in the US as well.
We shot the sad person, mental health crisis averted!
*jumping highfive over the sounds of grief *
The only way to stop a suicide with a gun, is a homicide with a gun.
Can’t have mental health issues if you’ve been shot dead. It’s the police way
No no no, it’s “fatally shot”!
So he’s deader now?
Don’t call police unless you want someone to die.
Google called police on their own employees. I keep saying this.
When? And why?
It was during a quiet sit-in in protest of Google abetting genocide. They also fired everyone in the area, even people who weren’t directly involved.
“Don’t be evil” was a canary clause. There’s a reason it doesn’t appear in any of their documents anymore.
It does, akshually.
They removed it from the preface of the Code of Conduct to being a footnote in that document no one will read.
Five months later I log back into Lemmy, so sorry for the ancient reply, but I wanted to thank you for correcting my misconception.
There needs to be a way to call for help from unarmed specialists. 😖
There sort of is now but most people don’t know about it yet. Instead of 911, dial 988. I don’t think 988 sends people to you, but they are trained mental health specialists who can talk instead of shout and threaten violence.
Read more here: https://988lifeline.org/
Not likely helpful in a situation like this, but a truly helpful resource in other ways. Thanks!
TIL
Note to everyone here: 988 is a new emergency number for mental health crises. https://988lifeline.org/
They too will call authorities when a dangerous weapon is in play.
