The families of vulnerable people fatally shot by New South Wales police have united to call for an independent inquiry into the way officers use force when responding to mental health emergencies.
Their call has been backed by a former coroner and leading lawyers after four fatal police interactions in as many months.
Clare Nowland, Steve Pampalian, Jesse Deacon and Krista Kach were fatally wounded or shot by NSW police between May and September while they were experiencing mental health issues that left them detached from reality.
Their deaths came after that of Todd McKenzie – a 40-year-old who was shot in the back by police while he was suffering from psychosis in July 2019. His death was examined by a coronial inquest which is due to hand down its findings in the coming months.
The families of Pampalian, Deacon and McKenzie are demanding a royal commission into how police respond to mental health callouts.
“This really, in some respects, is not just about my son,” Judy Deacon said of Jesse, who was shot in his home at a Glebe public housing estate after police were called to reports he was self-harming.
“My son, he’s gone. But he’s gone because of the system and the system needs to be changed. That needs to not only be dealt with correctly, but independently, and that should be through a royal commission.”
Deacon believes police should not be involved in most mental health callouts, but if they are, they need to be better trained.
‘If they don’t comply, they die’
Eddie Pampalian said he had wanted to give police the benefit of the doubt after they shot his brother, Steve, three times in his driveway in Willoughby in May after he slipped into psychosis.
But he said he now believes it was not a series of unfortunate events that cost his brother his life but a systemic issue that requires urgent change.
“I’m not unreasonable, I know it’s a difficult thing to fix, but it needs to be,” he said. “I don’t see change happening until there’s an independent inquiry.”
Pampalian said he was not against police attending mental health callouts but he didn’t understand why a different response wasn’t triggered when neighbours told police that his brother was staring at the sky and screaming.
“It’s OK if they know how to handle it but clearly they don’t,” he said.
McKenzie’s stepfather, Neil Wilkins, said hearing the news of the four deaths was a painful reminder of his family’s loss.
“Every time it comes up my wife particularly is just devastated by it, and she gets so angry with the police and the fact that they don’t seem to change their methods,” Wilkins said.
“It just seems that society and governments seem to accept that, well, this is an inevitable part of the process of dealing with mentally unwell people. The end result seems to be – if they don’t comply, they die.”
Wilkins said the issue had reached “boiling point” and he would write to the mental health minister calling for a royal commission.
‘No effective oversight’
McKenzie, Pampalian and Deacon were all holding knives when they were shot dead by police. The 95-year-old Nowland was holding a steak knife in one hand and clutching her walking frame with the other when she was Tasered in her nursing home.
Police claim Kach threatened them with an axe before they Tasered her and shot her with beanbag rounds, one of which pierced her heart and killed her.
Sam Lee, a senior lawyer at the Redfern Legal Centre, speaking generally and not about the specific cases, said it was not uncommon for people experiencing psychosis to pick up weapons when police entered their homes.
“They have all these demons going on inside their head and the presence of police feeds into that,” she said. “The key is having the skills to de-escalate the situation and that’s not just a one-day training, it’s a profession.”
Lee said a powerful inquiry such as a royal commission “should be on the table”.
“It’s not just training, it’s coming from at it from all levels – look at recruitment, workplace monitoring, the actual skills required to be in the police force, data collection, accountability at all levels including up to the commission level.”
The Law Enforcement Conduct Commission issued an urgent call for better mental health training for officers when it handed down a review in May.
The police watchdog found almost half the people involved in critical incidents – those that resulted in serious injury or death – over the past five years were experiencing a mental health crisis.
In the police’s formal response to the LECC’s report, the force said it was looking at “preparing a holistic training package” for all officers.
But, it said it was “concerned that by adopting any changes, NSW police officers rather than trained medical professionals will be relied upon as subject experts as responders to persons suffering a mental health crisis”.
The state police minister, Yasmin Catley, has said the force commissioned a mental health review which is due to report back in November.
George Newhouse, a human rights lawyer whose National Justice Project supports families affected by police violence, said he was dubious about the police’s internal review and that he supported a royal commission.
“There is no effective oversight of the police use of force in this state. An inquiry may be an opportunity to review police policies and protocols and culture and develop alternatives,” he said.
Lee and Newhouse have joined other prominent lawyers and academics in writing an open letter calling for an alternative approach where mental health specialists, rather than police, are sent as first responders to mental health callouts.
The NSW police union’s president, Kevin Morton, last month also called for health professionals to lead these responses.
But Hugh Dillon, a former deputy state coroner, said this week that not all mental health callouts could be handed over to healthcare workers “because it’s too dangerous”.
Dillon said he supported an independent inquiry to examine the issue dating back to the death of Roni Levi – a French tourist who was infamously shot by police on Bondi beach in 1997.
Dillon said he was “appalled” by the deaths but also felt sympathy for police.
“They’re not psychopaths, most of them are just young people who are trying to do a job,” he said. “And suddenly they’re confronted with these very complex situations.”
The NSW premier, Chris Minns, told reporters at the end of September that NSW Health and police were “open to change”.
But Minns said a royal commission into the police’s use of force against vulnerable people wasn’t necessary.
The premier said he had confidence in the LECC and the police’s internal processes to review their own conduct.
‘Gaping chasms of ineptitude and tragedy’
What frustrates Eddie Pampalian the most is the feeling that when he speaks to police, they are “on the defensive” and a trying to “set a narrative” about his brother’s death.
He said the force had also offered little support to him and his two young daughters aged 10 and 13.
His daughters refuse to go the park because that’s where they went with their uncle. When they see an ambulance they spiral into thinking something bad has happened to their family again.
“They used to message [their uncle] every day, my older one said, ‘Who am I going to tell when something good happens now?’ because that’s the first person she’d tell,” he said. “One is in therapy, the other one refuses … she’s shut down.”
Deacon is determined not to give up until there’s sweeping change.
“I am totally focused on doing whatever I can to mend these gaping chasms of ineptitude and tragedy,” she said.
“Not just for the victims and their families, but for the police and mental health people who have to work under conditions that are not well thought out and are antiquated and underfunded.”
– additional reporting by Tamsin Rose
