KANSAS CITY, Mo. — Sylvia Langhammer is a mother who knows the importance of suicide prevention awareness all too well. Since September is Suicide Prevention Awareness Month, she shared how suicide has impacted her, and how it affects the law enforcement field.
“My world has changed entirely. I will never be the same person I was before than I am now,” said Langhammer.
Langhammer's son, Chris Garcia, was a KCPD officer who five years ago, died by suicide.
“The suicide itself is such a traumatic experience,” said Langhammer.
There’s a memorial outside KCPD headquarters that honors officers who died in the line of duty. These deaths are an inevitable and unfortunate reality of the job.
However, departments are also losing too many officers to suicide. More police officers die by suicide than are killed in the line of duty.
It’s because of these harsh realities that KCPD is recognizing National Law Enforcement Suicide Awareness Day.
The department has a trained peer support team and a Critical Incident Response Team, or CIRT, dog available to officers and their families.
The CIRT dog, Rowdy, visits stations, hospitals, and scenes of critical incidents. His owner, Master Detective Kimberly Shirley-Williams, said people can enjoy his company and even though it doesn't take away the pain they may be experiencing, it helps to calm the situation.
KCPD says officers see tough situations, and there’s a culture to act tough when they do. That’s where it can become a problem.
“’Don't be weak,’ has been in our culture for a long time, and it's just probably like within the past 10 years, we're starting to teach our recruits and teach our more tenured officers that that's not necessarily the case,” said Detective Shirley-Williams, KCPD.
Detective Shirley- Williams says its often younger officers teaching the more experienced about mental health.
“Our new recruits who are getting taught more of the resiliency and more of the openness to talk about mental health, are actually having those courageous conversations with more tenured officers to say hey, listen, you know, it's okay not to be okay, and it's okay to ask for help,” said Detective Shirley- Williams.
As mental health grows as a priority in the field, KCPD says they’ve seen the change in officers ask for help, instead of suffering in silence.
KSHB 41 reporter Olivia Acree covers portions of Johnson County, Kansas. Share your story idea with Olivia.
