The death of Biagio Kauvil at the hands of Hinsdale police highlighted the deadly stakes of emergency responders confronting people in the throes of mental health crisis.
Two months after Biagio Kauvil was shot and killed during a well-being check, the DA’s office has confirmed the shooter was a Hinsdale police officer but has refused to identify them. The Eagle has learned through its reporting the identity of the officer.
In this case, the difficulty and danger of the situation seem to have been compounded by responding Hinsdale officers, including the town’s chief, breaking with their own department’s policy for dealing with a person in a mental health crisis. That policy directs officers to deescalate wherever possible, avoid physical contact in the absence of violent or destructive acts and request “professional assistance, if available and appropriate.” The policy lists “behavioral health care providers” among the extra resources officers may call — such as the Brien Center’s crisis clinicians available to assist police at the request of an officer, including in the hilltowns — though dispatch logs obtained by The Eagle make no mention of any request by officers at the scene or dispatch for those relevant resources.
To anyone whose life or family is touched by mental illness, it’s shocking to consider that officers straying from their department’s established protocol might have been the difference between someone in crisis living or dying.
While it’s a heartbreaking story on its own, it fits into a larger context also worthy of concern. Mere weeks after the incident in Hinsdale, another Berkshire town was unsettled after a police officer fired on an individual in a state of extremis — this time in Adams. Fortunately, the Adams incident did not end like the tragedy in Hinsdale. The officer fired one shot that missed its target, who was then taken into custody without serious injury to him or the officer.
Two instances of Berkshire police firing their service weapon at an individual beset by mental health struggles within the span of one month demands our attention. Our concern is reinforced by the fact that Mr. Kauvil’s death in Hinsdale strikes us as sadly similar to the death of Miguel Estrella on a Pittsfield residential street a few years ago. Both cases involved a man obviously in crisis with mental health problems who presented self-harm and potential danger to others. Both ended tragically with a young man dead, a family torn and a tight-knit community rattled.
These troubling stories underscore the pressing need to update our communities’ first-responder protocols for individuals in the throes of mental health crisis. To be clear, this is not a matter of judging any particular police response to these difficult situations. The DA’s Office has cleared the officer in the Adams incident, finding it was a justified use of force. Additionally, we have no intention of prejudging the ongoing investigation into the Hinsdale police shooting.
The apparent departure from best practices by Hinsdale police on Jan. 7 notwithstanding, we sympathize with police departments whose already considerable duties are expanded by being pressed into mental health crisis responses for which they are often not adequately trained. That goes especially for rural police forces with smaller staff and budgets whose constituents often lack accessible mental health treatment.
We have applauded Berkshire police departments that have taken steps to update their training and policies for these all-too-common situations where law enforcement intersects with mental health concerns. The line between an individual who simply needs help or poses a threat to themselves and one who is a legitimate danger to others is at best blurred by chaotic interactions in which first responders often find themselves. The impact of the tragedy in Hinsdale might have motivated town voters shaken by the incident to take a good first step in calling for a professional evaluation and audit of the town’s police department.
However, we know that not every Berkshire town has the resources to quickly onboard modern updates to emergency response protocols. Even if the Hinsdale officers followed their department’s protocol to the letter, that protocol’s inclusion of the phrase “whenever possible” underlines the fact that those resources aren’t always immediately available for smaller towns.
But what if they could be? This is an area where shared services could go a long way.
Plenty of Berkshire first responders have mutual aid agreements, and there are multiple examples of regionalized public safety agencies, from law enforcement groups like as the Berkshire County Drug Task Force and the Berkshire Special Response Team to regional ambulance services.
That model could be pursued between neighboring communities or even countywide to humanely modernize emergency response to apparent mental health matters while diffusing municipal budget burden. For example, Hinsdale already has a mutual aid agreement with Dalton, which is why Dalton Police personnel also responded to the Jan. 7 incident that left Mr. Kauvil dead in Hinsdale. We can only wonder what might have gone differently if such mutual aid agreements meant not only more officers responding but another option for responding to mental health crisis. Further, it’s worth noting that Hinsdale Police had the wherewithal to summon an ambulance to stage near the scene but not a crisis clinician, even though the latter might have made a bigger difference in the incident’s outcome.
Pooling regional resources to bolster this sort of obviously needed response could even help those communities that have implemented those sorts of responses but are still limited in their capacity by budget constraints. In the 2022 incident involving Mr. Estrella, for example, Pittsfield Police Department had a mental health responder on staff — but that singular responder’s shift ended just minutes before the fateful emergency call that led to a young man’s death. Pittsfield has since staffed up on those specialized responders — but what if the entire region could do so affordably by working together?
We know it’s easier to call for an ambitious, cross-municipal program than it is to fund and organize one. Still, a team effort offers the most realistic and efficient path to seriously addressing a problem for our rural county. In a country where mental health crises are underaddressed, the individual manifestations of any crisis know no town lines or time constraints.