KEARNY, NJ – A mental health crisis call that involved the Kearny Police and Hudson County Regional SWAT was peacefully resolved by using a mental health screener.
“At 8:45 a.m. [Saturday}, Kearny Police officers were requested to check the welfare of a man inside a home near Webster and Passaic Avenues in Kearny,” said Kearny Police Chief George King. “Officers and a mental health screener from Jersey City Medical Center’s Mobile Crisis Unit attempted to contact the man. Unfortunately, the man barricaded himself within the home and refused help. Information later aggregated from several sources indicated that the man may have been experiencing a mental health crisis and may have displayed a shotgun.”
The event was a display of mental health professionals working side by side with police officers to successfully diffuse a situation that otherwise could have ended with violence.