A Boston experiment in replacing traditional policing with mental health intervention ended in violence on Saturday when a city clinician was attacked by a sword-wielding man and officers fatally shot the assailant.
The confrontation unfolded near Northeastern University after officers responded to a 911 call reporting four individuals armed with guns inside an apartment building at 212 Hemenway Street. As reported by The Post Millennial, once police located the disturbance, they summoned a mental health professional from Bostons BEST program, a progressive initiative that embeds clinicians with officers in the name of de-escalation, a model widely promoted by liberal policymakers seeking to scale back conventional law enforcement.
The BEST program, in which mental health workers ride along with officers to manage volatile encounters, has been in place since 2011 and is often cited as a template for reform-minded cities. According to Mass Daily News, the EMS clinician spent 45 minutes speaking to the suspect through a closed door before the situation suddenly turned violent.
"He immediately opened the door and struck the clinician and an officer who was outside the door. He was armed with some type of sword, stabbing the officer in the arm and knocking the EMS clinician to the ground," Boston Police Commissioner Michael Cox said. "One or more officers, which is under investigation at this time, fired a taser and weapon at the individual, bringing the person to a halt."
The suspect, the injured officer, and the clinician were all transported to a local hospital, where the suspect was later pronounced dead. "This was a very chaotic circumstance. The individual was clearly in some sort of mental distress," Suffolk County District Attorney Kevin Hayden said, underscoring the inherent unpredictability of such calls.
Boston EMS confirmed that its employee had been hurt in the attack and emphasized the risks borne by first responders under these reform-driven models. "Our focus tonight remains on the two members of Boston EMS, including one of our BEST clinicians, who were treated and transported to the hospital after the incident on Hemenway Street in Boston. Both suffered non-life-threatening injuries," the statement read.
"Today serves as a reminder of the dangers inherent in this work and the sacrifice our members make every day. Members of Boston EMS show up to save lives not to be assaulted. No one should face violence for simply doing their job. Our thoughts are with our injured members, the Boston Police officers, and everyone affected by todays incident." For many critics of soft-on-crime, therapy-first approaches, the episode will reinforce the argument that while mental health support has a role, it cannot safely replace armed, empowered police officers when confronting dangerous, unstable individuals.
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