Public Safety

Bass orders outside review of LAPD mental-health crisis response

The evaluation will examine officer training, dispatch, supervision, de-escalation and calls where police avoided using force.

Image credit: Akino601 / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0; archival 2019 photo of LAPD headquarters

Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass ordered an outside review of LAPD policies and training for encounters involving people experiencing mental-health crises, the Los Angeles Times reported September 24. Bass said specialized crisis-intervention training is not standard across the patrol officers who answer most service calls. The review will cover the roles of dispatchers, supervisors and other personnel involved in responding to reports of erratic behavior.

What it means locally

Bass said the audit will study five years of calls involving people with known mental or behavioral-health conditions in which officers did not use force. The goal is to identify response patterns and de-escalation practices that worked. The directive also calls for a review of training used when people are booked, restrained or transferred to medical facilities.

The Times reported that LAPD officers have fired at people 16 times so far in 2026, compared with 34 shootings in 2025, and that several recent incidents involved people in apparent crisis. The review has been ordered, but its findings and any resulting policy changes have not yet been announced. The accompanying image is an archival photograph of LAPD headquarters.

Full report and further details: Read original report →