Police departments confront ‘epidemic’ in officer suicides

NEW YORK — A rash of suicides by police officers has shaken the New York Police Department, leading the commissioner to declare a mental health emergency and highlighting the problem of untreated depression among law enforcement officers nationwide.

On Wednesday, Robert Echeverría, 56, became the ninth NYPD officer to take his own life this year. His death came a day after another officer, Johnny Rios, 35, killed himself.

The deaths have come despite the department’s mounting efforts to encourage officers to seek help for depression and other mental health problems. After two officers killed themselves on back-to-back days in June, Police Commissioner James O’Neill sent a note reminding the more than 36,000 officers and 19,000 civilians in the NYPD that help is available if they’re feeling depressed, hopeless or contemplating self-harm.

But the deaths continued. “It’s extraordinarily painful,” Mayor Bill de Blasio said Thursday. “We have lost officers in the past, but this concentration is devastating. We’re going to do everything conceivable to help officers and to stop this.”

The suicides have been a recurring nightmare for the nation’s largest police force and have driven a discussion about the psychological toll of police work, a profession in which discussing mental health was long seen as taboo.

“This was something that no one ever spoke about,” O’Neill said.

Law enforcement leaders around the country say they are hoping to change that mindset.

President Donald Trump recently signed a bill authorizing up to $7.5 million in grant funding a year for police suicide prevention efforts, mental health screenings and training to identify officers at risk.

“It is receiving much more visibility than ever,” said Chuck Wexler, executive director of the Police Executive Research Forum. “The nature and extent of this issue is not well known, and the numbers we have are probably underreported.”

Suicide claims more officers’ lives annually than violence in the line of duty.

Prior to this week, there have been at least 122 law enforcement suicides in the United States this year, according to Blue H.E.L.P., a Massachusetts nonprofit dedicated to helping officers with PTSD, depression and other mental health struggles. That figure, which includes retired officers, puts the country on pace for the highest toll in at least the past four years.

“This is an epidemic,” said Randy L. Sutton, a former Las Vegas police lieutenant who founded The Wounded Blue, another law enforcement advocacy group.

The suicide rate among police officers is about 16 per 100,000, according to 2013 figures, the latest available from a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention database.

The suicide rate among the general population has climbed to about 14 per 100,000, according to the CDC, its highest point since World War II.