This Man's gonna Hurt Someone or… himself

by Clive Whistle/PNN

"If you don't come right away this man's gonna hurt someone" That was me last week calling the cops on one of best friends in The City who, like me, has bounced in and out of shelters and the streets for the last 5 years and was alternately holding a gun to his head and then wa ou.

The police, who as a poor black man, I do not trust, like or even want to deal with at ALL, much less call on for help were the target of my 5150 (mental illness emergency) call, because in his mind and in reality, my friend had run out of options. My friend was only a young cat, who before he became homeless was in foster care but once he reached 18, was thrown out into the cruel world with no support services or help to "fend" for himself. My friend had sought help to no avail. My friend was mentally ill.

The frightening part of my 5150 call to the police is my friend, who reminded me of Idriss Stelly, another beautiful young African Descendent brother sufferinng from mental illness murdered by SFPD after a 5150 call, stood just as good of a chance of being shot at the hands of the police as he did of shooting himself.

"With this legislation we would like to see more treatment available for juvenile inmates who suffer from traumatic exposure to street or domestic violence at an early age" District Attorney, Kamala Harris spoke to a packed crowd of politicians, bureacrats and mental health advocates gathered at City Hall on Friday to discuss the benefits of Prop 63, a legislation that would add approximately 50 million to California's Mental Health Services budget by adding a special income tax on the rich.

As it stands now, people like myself and my friend, poor folks without insurance, have to seek help at County Hospital Emergency rooms under a psychiatric emergency call, which means if you are lucky enough to actually see a therapist you might get a referral to very short term, talk therapy (one-three sessions) but most likely will get some psych meds (pills) or even more likely, nothing at all According to the statistics provided by the San Francisco Mental Health Board, San Francisco has one of the States highest rates of 5150 calls

I was holding that same gun 4 years ago, I was lucky enough to get some psychiatric care through Veterans Hospital because I am a vet and it saved my life. My friend is not so lucky.

"We are not mental health professionals" Chief of police Heather Fong spoke at the conference. She went on to say that although there are more than 250 SFPD officers on the force with crisis intervention training, she'd much rather see mental health professionals responding to day and night "well-being" checks than police officers.

"We run one of the largest mental health institutions in the state of California" , Sheriff Mike Hennesey brought out the truth that most poor mentally ill people know and he went on to say that he would like to stop that so he could "make room" for real criminals.

The proposals sponsor, Democratic Assemblyman Darrell Steinberg of Sacramento said his vision of taxing income above $1 million with a 0.1% surcharge would create an annual funding stream of up to $1 billion statewide.

My friend made it out of that night, barely, the cops came, he was thrown in jail for 30 days where he received no treatment. After his release he was still never given any treatment and is self-medicating with Crack as I write this. I wonder how many more days or nights will pass before his internal torture lashes out again and actually does permanent harm to himself or others

Clive Whistle is a poverty scholar and community journalist for POOR Magazine/PNN. To read more journalism by folks dealing with poverty and racism go on-line to www.poormagazine.org