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A year after Ricardo Muñoz's death, responses to mental health calls change; lawsuit progresses

Intelligencer Journal - 9/14/2021

One year ago today, Ricardo Muñoz’s sisters called 911, seeking help for their brother, a 27-year-old diagnosed with schizophrenia and bipolar disorder.

Within minutes of their call, Muñoz was dead, shot by a Lancaster police officer after Muñoz rushed him armed with a knife. The shockwaves caused by the tragedy continue to reverberate.

Almost immediately, rumors began. Protests, rioting and arrests followed.

In February, Muñoz’s mother filed a wrongful death suit against the city and county. And while not solely because of Muñoz’s death, the city has a new police chief.

Calls, too, were made by many for improvements in how to respond to people whose mental health problems bring them into contact with police.

And a family still grieves.

“I can tell you that I speak with Miguelina on a regular basis and every single time that I speak with her, she is in tears and says that not a day goes by that she doesn't think about her son,” said Daisy Ayllon, one the attorneys for Miguelina Peña.

Peña also thinks about “what things could have been to prevent this,” Ayllon said. “It is difficult to witness that pain and the sheer agony of her loss.”

Lancaster Mayor Danene Sorace told LNP | LancasterOnline last week, “Ricardo Muñoz’s death a year ago was a tragedy for his family and our community.”

Changes are being made locally in how police and others respond to calls involving someone with mental illness, according to Sorace.

Exact statistics as to how many police calls involve mental illness are hard to come by, as policing in America is fragmented into thousands of departments. However, some studies put the figure at around 10%-20%.

According to Sorace, all city police officers are undergoing crisis intervention training run by the county’s probation and parole department. The department has about 135 officers.

And though plans were in the works before the shooting, the city has hired a second social worker.

The city has also applied for a grant to help fund a crisis team that would include officers trained in crisis intervention from East Hempfield, East Lampeter, West Lampeter and Manheim township police departments. Manheim Township police provide coverage to Lancaster Township, which also neighbors the city.

“Mental health issues do not stop at our municipal boundary and every agency and community has these same challenges,” the city wrote in the July grant application.

The city and Penn Medicine Lancaster General Health have also been awarded a grant of about $300,000 to help train first responders, including police, and residents, according to Sorace.

“This work is just beginning, and I’m hopeful it will keep opening doors to more trust, partnership and change between city government and the residents we serve,” Sorace said.

The county has also been seeking grants to improve responses to people with mental health issues.

One program the county is seeking funding for is a pilot program tested earlier this year that sent trained mental health professionals with police departments throughout the county.

While the program, called Gateways, was not created specifically in response to the Muñoz shooting, “I would say that the shooting certainly shed a lot more light on the plight of individuals with mental health struggles,” Christopher Dreisbach, CEO of East Lampeter-based Blueprints for Addiction Recovery, said Friday. “And it may have opened the door to the (positive) reception from police and the community.”

The city’s social workers and mental health professionals in the Gateway program do not respond to calls instead of police, but rather are a resource police can use when situations warrant.

At the federal level, U.S. Sen. Bob Casey introduced two bills in December intended to reduce how often police respond to non-criminal emergencies involving people with disabilities — often mental — and provide officers with better training for when they do have to respond.

“My legislation ... would take important steps to preventing future tragedies like the death of Ricardo Muñoz,” Casey said in a statement last week, adding he will continue to push for their passage when the Senate reconvenes later this month.

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Crédito: DAN NEPHIN | Staff Writer