The other night, I was listening to the police scanner, when there
was a call for an officer to check on a girl because she had told
her mother on the phone that she had cut her wrists. The
mother lives in a different city, so she could not go check on her
herself. So, an Antigo policeman was disbatched to the
address.  After a little time had passed, the policeman came
back on the radio to say something along the lines of, “She
only said it to get back at her mom”, and “she has no
intention of harming herself, she has family with her, a cousin.”
and the policeman left.

It has always been my understanding that this type of thing is
NOT a judgment call for the police to make. Every time I have
ever heard of the police catching wind that someone MAY be
suicidal, it meant a mandatory stay at the Wausau Health
Care Center for an evaluation.  I would assume because the
people at the Health Care Center CAN make the call on
whether or not someone is truly suicidal.  I would also assume
that the reason the police don’t make those kind of judgment
calls is because if someone did harm themselves AFTER the
police had been there, the police dept. may get sued.

I didn’t hear anymore, so I am assuming that the call that was
made was correct.  Even so, that doesn’t mean that something
can’t happen in the future to the girl and maybe a stay at the
Health Care Center could have helped her.  If that were a
family member of mine, or someone I knew, I would most
certainly make a complaint against the Antigo Police.

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