Commissioner of Police Prioritizes Mental Health Support for Officers

Commissioner of Police Chester Williams is keeping the mental health of his officers as a high priority. Williams said that after several officers were identified with varying degrees of mental health issues the department took action, making counseling services available and, in some cases, mandatory. Williams said that the department’s psychiatrist has been assigned a team to assist with his work and is being given additional resources from the Ministry of Home Affairs.

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police: “I must commend our psychiatrist Mr.Leslie. He’s doing an exceedingly good job in moving around the country speaking to our officers, identifying those officers with various issues whether it is psychological issue, or financial issues, it’s domestic issue, its’ alcoholism he is identifying them for us and with that we are able now to see how we can navigate the process of counseling. We would normally request the officers to do voluntary counseling but when we see that they refuse to undergo voluntary counseling then we invoke the provisions of the Police Act and we make it mandatory. Somehow people feel that when you tell them they need counseling you’re saying to them that they are mentally challenged which is not the case. You need counseling for various reasons so we try to sensitize our officers and make them understand why is it that they need the counseling. We do have two police officers working with him who are trained in counseling. We have an officer who graduated from UB with a Bachelors in Counseling so she’s working with him along with another officer so he does have a team with him and they’re doing the best they can. We’re opening an office for them in Belize City away from the police station where they’ll be able to work in comfort. The Ministry via the CEO has pledged to fit the office with all the equipment that they will need to be able to discharge their duties in the best and most professional way that they can.”

Williams added that financial stress has been identified as a major problem for police officers, prompting the department to seek additional help. In the upcoming weeks financial literacy training will also be made available to the police.

Chester Williams, Commissioner of Police: “Getting a person who is extremely trained in financial literacy to go across the country and teach our officers how they can manage their finances. You know again some of the issues that they do have is that of financial constraints and that may come about because they don’t know how to properly budget what they’re making so we have already commissioner a person to go around the country and try to see how they can help our officers to be able to have proper management of their finance and hopefully that will be able to improve their way of life and remove some of the problems that they may have financially.” 

A mental health survey conducted by the Ministry of Health and Wellness identified police officers as one of the groups vulnerable to suicide due to stress.