The officer-involved shooting of a Mundelein woman is the latest involving a person in the midst of a “mental-health episode.” It won’t be the last unless authorities begin to adapt to a changing response when individuals are in crisis.
Such scenarios appear to be growing this year as police are dispatched, usually by family members, to settle a person in mental distress. Like what happened the late afternoon of May 11 in Mundelein, where an 18-year police veteran and sergeant discharged his service weapon four times and killed 37-year-old Mary Alice Love.
Every time there’s an officer-involved shooting, I mourn for the victim and the cop who committed the deadly act. Adding to the anxiety in the Mundelein Police Department was the cryptic announcement over the weekend that an unnamed village officer died “suddenly and tragically”.
Watching the body-camera footage released by police shows a woman with what looks like at least one large chef’s knife in hand while opening a glass sliding door from the single-family home’s patio. While trying to get inside the home is when the officer shot her.
A taser might have been deployed instead of a pistol, but we weren’t there in a chaotic circumstance fraught with peril. Maybe a mental-health professional might have lowered the danger level, de-escalating the situation. Once again, we weren’t on scene.
Why these episodes appear to be increasing must baffle mental health professionals. The mind is a fragile instrument, and cases of depression have been rising over the past few years, especially after the pandemic.
One of the non-medical questions for members of the Lake County Major Crime Task Force — Illinois law requires outside police agencies to investigate officer-involved shootings — to answer: Was the officer acting within the scope of his law enforcement duties when the shooting occurred?
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It’s a tough assignment for these investigators, made up of sheriff’s personnel and detectives from county police departments whose findings eventually will be turned over to the Lake County State’s Attorney’s Office. Mundelein is a member of the task force.
According to the Law Enforcement Epidemiology Project based at the University of Illinois-Chicago, 10 to 30 Illinoisans are killed annually by law enforcement personnel. Since 2016, between 130 and 191 people have died after interactions with police. The gap is due to data provided on death certificates, the project indicates.
Nationwide, there are about 1,150 officer-involved civilian shootings a year, the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago reports.
The UIC study points out that African Americans, homeless individuals, persons with disabilities and individuals with psychiatric conditions are more likely to be injured, suffer severe injuries or be killed during contact with law enforcement. In the case of Mary Alice Love, she ticked two of those boxes: She was Black and apparently in mental distress.
In a 911 call to police, which was also released by Mundelein officials, Love’s mother tells a dispatcher that her daughter had “asked me to call the police so they can kill her.” The woman tells the dispatcher that her daughter is bipolar and “she don’t want to live anymore.” She also advises that she doesn’t want her daughter harmed.
A sister of the victim also called the 911 dispatch center. She tells the dispatcher her sister is having a mental episode and is concerned about her mother being alone with her.
Since the shooting, Love’s family has hired an attorney, called for the firing of the officer involved in the shooting, who currently is on administrative leave, and appeared at several Village Board sessions. A protest march in front of the police station at Lake and Division streets has been held.
More legal wrangling is certainly forecast. A Lake County coroner’s inquest will be held as part of the probe into the shooting.
The Love case isn’t the first time Lake County law enforcement has dealt with someone having a mental health episode. The first might have occurred about 50 years ago in Knollwood.
That was when Lake County Deputy Sheriff Gary Murphy was shot and killed after responding to a report of a woman firing a handgun outside of her home on June 15, 1976. Virginia Piggott, a retired Army officer, was upset that children were playing on a nearby playground and fired her weapon several times.
As Murphy and Deputy David Green tried to disarm Piggott, both were shot, Murphy fatally. Piggott was found not guilty by reason of insanity in a trial held a year later. She was committed to the Elgin Mental Health Center and released in April 1979.
Murphy, 29 at the time of his death, was a deputy for eight years after serving in the Vietnam War. He left a widow and two boys.
The Sheriff’s Office marked the deputy’s death on the 50th anniversary of the incident, observing a moment of silence during roll call on all patrol shifts. Also, the Sheriff’s Office honored Murphy with a memorial permanently displayed within the Patrol Division.
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Back in ’76, psychological distress wasn’t studied as much as it has been in recent decades. Medical professionals have been analyzing the data. It’s time for law enforcement to follow suit and begin changing tactics.
Charles Selle is a former News-Sun reporter, political editor and editor. [email protected]. X @sellenews