State Representative Kathy LaNatra and Jim Creed, a Lieutenant with the Plymouth Sheriff’s Department, joined WATD’s Christine James to discuss House Bill 3845, filed by LaNatra, which seeks to help law enforcement officers after involvement with a critical incident.
In 2016, Creed was celebrating his 35th birthday when a man stabbed multiple people at a restaurant in Taunton. Creed shot and killed the attacker.
He met with support services after the incident, and talked with clinicians. He was able to have support to ease back to work, but that’s not standard for all departments. He says the goal is to erase the stigma around mental health treatment.
The bill aims to add resiliency training, standardized on-scene care for all departments, and ongoing mental health treatment for an officer or their family. LaNatra says the bill was voted favorably out of committee, and was referred to the House Ways and Means Committee.
