How LE & others deal with the job of killing and death

[jmm99]

An EMT unit got called to an auto accident. The driver who was high (pot and booze) ran off the road, went airborne and took down a power pole. One EMT took care of the driver (who survived); while the other EMT (my friend) went over to a body that was pretty banged up (dead). When he rolled him over, the body was his younger brother. The kid had been hitchhiking to get home. I represented the family in the wrongful death action, which settled before trial.

Regards

Mike

[davidbfpo]

A NYT article based on interviews with local LE @ Newtown, Conn:http://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/29/ny...pagewanted=all

[davidbfpo]

The title comes from a closing comment in 'Life of a Police Officer: Medically and Psychologically Ruinous' in The Atlantic:http://m.theatlantic.com/health/arch...uinous/284324/

In 2012, an unprecedented study of 464 police officers, published in the International Journal of Emergency Mental Health linked officers’ stress with increased levels of sleep disorders, Hodgkin's lymphoma, brain cancer, heart disease, diabetes, and suicide.

Other studies have found that between 7 and 19 percent of active duty police have PTSD, while MRIs of police officers’ brains have found a connection between experiencing trauma and a reduction in areas that play roles in emotional and cognitive decision-making, memory, fear, and stress regulation.

For once, on a quick scan, the comments have some value.

[davidbfpo]

I spotted this story at the time and was frankly baffled. The BBC has a short post-court report:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-32114878

Today via a policing blogger is the officer's own explanation for his PTSD, dating back to service in the army in Iraq. In places it is rightly critical of his immediate supervisors and the personal impact of policing when budgets have been cut by 20%:https://beatstigma.wordpress.com/2015/04/09/about-me/

[AdamG]

On Killing: The Psychological Cost of Learning to Kill in War and Society Paperback – June 22, 2009
by Dave Grossman

The good news is that most soldiers are loath to kill. But armies have developed sophisticated ways of overcoming this instinctive aversion. And contemporary civilian society, particularly the media, replicates the army's conditioning techniques, and, according to Lt. Col. Dave Grossman's thesis, is responsible for our rising rate of murder among the young.

Upon its initial publication, ON KILLING was hailed as a landmark study of the techniques the military uses to overcome the powerful reluctance to kill, of how killing affects soldiers, and of the societal implications of escalating violence. Now, Grossman has updated this classic work to include information on 21st-century military conflicts, recent trends in crime, suicide bombings, school shootings, and more. The result is a work certain to be relevant and important for decades to come

http://www.amazon.com/On-Killing-Psy.../dp/0316040932

[davidbfpo]

An interesting article by Jeff Sparrow, the author of a 2009 book 'Killing: Misadventures in Violence', which covers many current issues and has several links:https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/aug/04/terror-and-rage-what-makes-a-mass-murderer-different-to-a-terrorist?

Two book reviews via Amazon:https://www.amazon.com/product-revie...owViewpoints=1