Man Shot by Police

I came across this article a week ago. A week ago on a Thursday morning a man was shot by police and he happened to be mentally ill. His mother said he struggled with schizoaffective bipolar disorder. The family said they had warned the police that he had a plastic Airsoft gun. “I did everything I could, everything I knew was right to do to try and stop it,” said his mother, Cheryl Miller. What more could she have done to help her son? The article goes on to say: “The family had called 911 early that morning, because Kyle had a knife and was trying to harm himself, she said.” He was already trying to hurt himself so why would he not try and raise a gun and make the police shoot him? There is an investigation and that is why there are two articles made a week apart about this terrible shooting.
It is terrible that this had to happen. His mother said: “She does not bear ill will toward the officers who shot her son. No one goes to work in the morning wanting to shoot someone.” It works both ways to protect the officers and the person who is mentally ill to make changes in the way that the mentally ill are treated in a similar situation as this. His mother said: “I think that is where he lost all hope. … He had a choice to drop the gun, but he was in a tormented place mentally, she said.” Not everyone that wants to work if they have a mental illness does a good job.
This second article tells more about this serious situation.  On June 28th of this year a mentally ill man was shot by the police. That is the second article in the Denver Post. “Investigators are trying to determine why Broomfield, Colo., police shot and killed a mentally distraught man even though his family told 911 dispatchers he was carrying a gun that shoots plastic pellets, not a real gun.” His family had told the dispatcher that it was an airsoft gun that shoots plastic pellets. They tried to get help for their son or brother. He was distraught over losing his job. That would make any one distraught. You have bills or that is how you get your money from working. To lose your job would upset a normal person. By being mentally ill it is even harder to find another job.
The article goes on to say: “It’s not real, the victim’s brother, Alex Miller, is heard telling the dispatcher on the 911 recording. The dispatcher assures him that officers are trained in this type of thing. They’re not going to go around shooting people, OK? Moments later, Miller was shot to death on a Broomfield street.” Although that is what they did shoot him did they not hear he was mentally ill and carrying a plastic gun? He did point it at the officers. His mother says he was shot multiple times. “…the shooting has been a very traumatic thing and the family was awaiting details of the investigation before commenting further. We do want to share what went wrong, she said, We know they knew it was not a real gun and our house had been flagged for mentally ill person.” They should have asked that he drop the weapon. Something else should have been tried if they knew he was mentally ill. We will be moving the blog to a new address in about a month. We will provide the new link in the near future.