INDIANAPOLIS — IMPD is asking for additional funding for mental health support in the city’s 2025 budget. Chief Chris Bailey says he’s made it a priority — so we sat down with him exclusively to talk about his vision Thursday, on Law Enforcement Suicide Awareness Day.
“They see the worst in society on a daily basis,” Bailey said. “The amount of trauma they’re exposed to… depending on where you work, one day of work is more than some people will experience in an entire lifetime.”
As a result, more police officers die by suicide than in the line of duty.
“‘Put your boots on and go back to work.’ I think that was a lot of [the] attitude for many years in our profession,” Bailey added. “We’ve changed that.”
Bailey — and most officers, if you ask — would tell you there’s long-been a stigma around reaching out for help. But the badge can weigh heavy on the heart, leading him to ask for an additional $340,000 from the city next year — for the “SHIELD” app by ProTeam Tactical Performance. The app is already used by the Indianapolis Fire Department and several other nearby agencies. It allows officers to check in on things like anxiety, depression and suicidal thoughts.
“‘If I say that I’m having suicidal thoughts, they’re not going to let me do something that I love to do, so I’ll continue to suffer in silence,'” Bailey explained. “We don’t want that.”
14 years ago, IMPD created its wellness unit, staffed by only one officer: Captain Brian Navity. At the time, the focus was on discipline. It has since shifted to services that are now largely sought voluntarily, from a full-time staff of six, including Lieutenant Jonathan Baker, who added that Deputy Chief Valerie Cunningham was also instrumental from the beginning.
“That’s a serious commitment of resources for a department that’s struggling with staffing,” Baker said. “We’re all working toward a goal of healthy officers for the officers’ sake and for the community’s sake.”
Baker says PTSD rates are significantly higher for police than the average citizen, and the number one predictor is a perceived lack of support. IMPD’s wellness unit offers peer support and referrals to mental health providers if needed. As needs evolve, he says he’d like to see more resiliency training.
“I think when I joined this job 23 years ago, I had a pretty good idea of what physical danger I was going to be in,” Baker explained. “I don’t think anybody fully realizes what the psychological risks are when you become a police officer.”
Law enforcement suicides are a nationwide problem, but in a 2022 report to Congress, the FBI explained: “It has been noted that there is a gap in information regarding law enforcement officer suicides and attempted suicides. This lack of information has affected the ability to provide adequate funding and support to combat these tragedies.”
It was only that year the FBI began collecting data on current and former law enforcement officers who attempt or die by suicide, with the goal of eventually reaching a better understanding of them — and preventing them.
But I don’t need to be just a reporter to tell you how important the issue is.
“I think about the guy just about every day,” said my father, Mark O’Hara, a former Chicago police officer. “He was very good at dealing with people on the street and different situations. Just an all around good guy.”
Two summers ago, we celebrated when my father, Mark, and his work partner, Pat, retired from the Chicago Police Department together. Unaware that a year later we’d return to the same East Side bar — this time without Pat, just our memories of him.
“I remember sitting in the squad car next to Pat after a suicide, a police suicide had just occurred and we were talking to each other about it,” me dad recalled. “I said, ‘hey, listen, don’t you ever think about it.’ And he just said, ‘you don’t have to worry about me.’ He seemed like the strongest person mentally, physically, but you just never know.”
He encourages everyone, especially those with ties to law enforcement, to check in on their friends, coworkers and loved ones.
“Officers have to go to work and help people with their problems while also dealing with personal problems of their own,” he added. “It was devastating, to say the least.”
The risks of suicide are just as high for retired officers, and not every department has the same resources as IMPD.
“I’ve worked with several people that we’ve lost to suicide,” my dad said. “The more we can do to prevent it, the better we are.”
“That’s probably an area we need to do a better job as well, is thinking about our retirees,” Chief Bailey told us. “I believe if one of those individuals called our wellness unit, they would get the assistance that they needed and they wouldn’t get any pushback from me.”
In loving memory of retired Chicago police officer Patrick Glinski and all others we’ve lost, active or retired, too soon.
