Community Mental Health Centers’ Roles in Depolicing Medicine

Abstract

America faces widespread gun violence and police brutality against Black citizens and persons with severe mental illness (SMI). Violence perpetrated against unarmed patients is common in health care, and evidence-based safety measures are needed to acknowledge and eradicate clinical violence. Community mental health centers (CMHCs) serve many patients of color and persons with SMI, so their overreliance on police or building security deserves ethical and clinical consideration. Policing of Black persons’ health care begins in powerful, false narratives that White persons need protection from dangerous Black citizens who reside in urban areas or who have mental illness. This article considers White supremacist origins of the myths making CMHCs sites of policing and trauma rather than safety and healing and offers recommendations for advancing policy and practice.