DEKALB COUNTY, Ga. — The DeKalb County Police Department will be taking a mandatory 40 hours of mental health training for all of its officers. DeKalb police say the plan was already in place before a controversial shooting on March 9.
Anthony Johnson lives in the same DeKalb County apartment complex where 27-year-old Anthony Hill was shot by an officer while acting erratically and running around his neighborhood naked.
Johnson told Channel 2’s Liz Artz he doesn’t think this is a racial issue.
“Society is making it a racial thing,” Johnson said. ”White people bad or black people bad, but it's not a racial thing because they shooting everybody, not just black people."
Johnson told Artz he thinks it's about police officers not living in the communities where they police.
"Get to know the neighbors, get to know the kids,” Johnson said. ”Get to know the people we consider the problems, have a conversation with them. Sometimes you have to take off your badge."
DeKalb County Police Capt. Sonja Porter told Artz community policing in DeKalb is a priority and something she feels they do well.
Porter is charge of the department’s training. She said her focus right now is mandatory training that will be required for all sworn officer starting with April's academy class.
"If you don't know what to look for, you're going to be dealing with it in a different way,” Porter said.
Right now, DeKalb County requires officers to take four hours of mental health training to graduate.
Porter said over the next two years every DeKalb County police officer will be required to go through 40 hours of in-depth, hands-on mental health training.
Part of that training will be to work with mental health professionals at facilities where officers can actually see a crisis situation, and witness how the professionals handle the patients.
DeKalb County currently has a unit that consists of a mental health professional and an officer who patrol together.
WSBTV
