Yep, mental illness is a "get out clause"

People with mental illness LOVE having the stigma of being branded "nuts"

What you BELIEVE is beyond anyone else's control, however the FACTS (of which you are unaware) are the facts.

As I said before on this thread (and others) you cannot prevent people have opinions (informed or not); neither is anyone saying that the death of these dogs can be excused in any way.

Along with the FACTS that these dogs died, is the FACT that the policeman is ill.

I have not said that the situation is "right" I am just reporting the FACTS.

I think you will find mental illness is the last taboo, replacing death. People would rather not discuss it, confront it, admit it and very rarely trained in identifying it.

PTSD is more understood now than it was 80 years ago when soldiers were SHOT for desertion.

Now treatment is available and it is not such a stigma as it used to be. Hopefully other mental illnesses will be better understood and interventions made in a more timely manner in the future.

If they had aircon in the vehicles (as police dog cars/vans are) then it is easier to keep the car cool with all windows and doors closed.

No sb true mental illness is not a get out clause I know that!!!

Its often used as one tho which is not fair on the people that really have this illness....

He should not of been working let alone responsible for lives if this was the case so imo either way u look at it the met has killed these dogs.....again!

I do not think anyone is disputing the FACT ie the dogs are dead.

I cannot speak for those who feign mental illness as I do not know of any of those. I DO know that this individual is NOT feigning.

NOBODY should be working in ANY position of responsibility if they are mentally impaired whether they are a policeman, air traffic controller, doctor, teacher etc.

Unfortunately the fact remains that many are.

The death of these dogs was entirely avoidable outwith the individual's decision to bring them to work with him.

Oops on phone double post

Not ALL police cars/vans have air con, although that is best practice.

And in any case, it will not operate unless the engine is running.

There are methods of running the AC without the engine running but even those methods have a time scale.

Once is an accident. Twice is negligence.

I actually went off reading this thread once all the really unpleasant stuff about mental illness started being posted.

It's incredibly hard to understand just how badly your judgement can be impaired and how the world can seem utterly utterly distorted unless you've been there. It's no secret I suffer incredibly badly with depression (various reasons I fully understand, added with that my GP's a plonker)... when things are at their worst I feel like my brain is trying to function through a mixture of cotton wool and treacle, and like I'm somehow stuck behind a plate of glass from the rest of the world - I can hear them, I can see them but I can't "connect" with them. I function well enough at work (but I manage the work I do very very carefully to not make myself overloaded), but it's functioning level only... indeed when I came to the point of having a breakdown I taught an observed lesson incredibly well and was then found sobbing uncontrollably and shaking and just falling utterly apart at my desk a few minutes after the kids had left the building - my head, who'd seen me in action a few hours earlier commented that I seemed to be just fine back then but now she realised I wasn't well at all and just managed to separate off my work persona from the gibbering wreck that was me in reality (it's easier in teaching to do this I think when you even get called by a different name during the working day - my "Mrs Suit" is an impermeable bullet-proofed superhero outfit that grants me immunity to the rubbish going on inside)... and she kicked my backside off the school premises and threatened deep wrongings if I was seen again until I was truly better (I loved my old boss - she was fantastic in knowing when to be fluffy and when to deliver a good backside kicking).

I'm sure to the outside world I could quite easily have looked like I was faking it or similar then - I simply had coping strategies that had allowed me to function when I was in a really really diabolical mental state that were working so well (and unfortunately allowing me to push on and make myself iller and iller - think it took me a good couple of years to recover from that breakdown in the end) that it came as a collossal shock to everyone the day I fell apart completely (and even when I fell apart - I'd still held it together till I got the kids out of the school door). It took one silly catalyst in the end to unwravel the whole thing completely (for me it was seeing the newsletter announcing I was leaving - reluctantly - without expecting it)... so I can actually understand how a man who was ill to start with, suddenly seemed to do something so much on what looked like the spur of the moment with the suicide attempt - rightly or wrongly and I do genuinely believe he's got mental health issues.

Like I say - you really really can't understand just what it's like and it IS still this stupidly large taboo with people parrotting phrases like "trying it on" or "pull yourself together"... and that's why so far I've stayed away from this thread because the attitudes to mental health being shouted from the rooftops are really sickening to read as someone who suffers from it and has come very close to suicide in the past themselves.

Yep - the dogs died horrifically, yes, processes failed and people failed and the whole thing is hideous - but if you're suffering from mental illness the lack of clarity of thought you can have is really really hard to discribe (and incredibly frustrating when you're trying to think something through and your brain's doing the cotton wool thing).

Carry on baying for blood and calling all those with mental illness (particularly the "soft" ones like stress, depression and the like) fakers and ones trying it on for sympathy now

I can understand people suffering from mental illness, but what concerns me is why the heck wasn't this picked up on and the officer given some help?

I know it's easy to say, but in jobs such as the police, in particular, things like mental illness, depression, stress etc NEED to be picked up pronto and the sufferer given help.

It is possible that this situation could have been prevented ... I don't know what provision there is for noticing/helping officers in this situation but if there is not one, there should be.

Wys
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