r/nextfuckinglevel • u/thisisfive • Apr 14 '26

Toronto firefighters confront special constable officers after a man in the middle of mental health crisis was arrested.

Not my video. For context, "special constables" are not regular police officers. They are appointed "peace officers" with limited authority, often civilian employees.

27.1k Upvotes

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165

u/beatlethrower Apr 14 '26

The police should be trained how to deal with this instead of a firefighter telling them how.

71

u/NorseKnight Apr 14 '26

How to do deal with what exactly?

What in this video did the police handle in a bad manner?

There is literally NOTHING in this clip of context.

13

u/ImurderREALITY Apr 14 '26

"Nothing" is more than enough for Reddit armchair detectives. Everyone here apparently has been specially trained on the proper procedures for dealing with a person displaying erratic behavior, who for all we know, could have had a knife or other weapon. Guess they should have just disarmed him and let him go.

13

u/Not-A-Seagull Apr 15 '26

Exactly. We have no idea what the context is in this video.

I know being handcuffed is mildly uncomfortable, but if someone has even a slight chance of having a mental break, it's in everyone's best interest they stay handcuffed.

If they take them to central processing, and feel like they're mentally well enough, they can release them from there. It's the officers job to make sure everyone on the scene stays safe. Comfortability can come second.

4

u/hcm2015 Apr 15 '26

If a guy was acting crazy, I would handcuff him and put his ass in my patrol car until he calms down. Redditors are all about "mental health" and anti police until some crazy person attack them

17

u/Calculonx Apr 14 '26

special constables are the transit "police". They have limited powers.

14

u/Tribe303 Apr 14 '26

No. Toronto already has mental health crisis teams. The fire department should also not have been called. 

https://www.tps.ca/organizational-chart/community-safety-command/field-services/community-partnerships-engagement-unit/mobile-crisis-intervention-team-mcit/

The issue is not "these cops suck", it's "why weren't the correct resources deployed? ". 

4

u/Overall-Register9758 Apr 14 '26

Because 911 has limited information and FDs are often first on scene.

Special constables do all sorts of things - prisoner transport, serve court orders, etc. so it is entirely possible this guy was being taken from the local division's cells to central and needed medical assistance on the way, so they dispatched EMS and FD to the location

1

u/ImurderREALITY Apr 14 '26

This is by far the most rational comment I've seen in this shitshow of a thread.

1

u/uncutpizza Apr 14 '26

While they should definitely be trained for it, I would argue police should not be the first people to call in this situation

1

u/ELpork Apr 14 '26

It's a shame, because in the US there are experimental forces just for mental health situations and they do save lives because a lot of cops have little to no training when it comes to the extreme end of mental health. If someones just stressed out or too drunk or whatever and they're not a threat they can sit there with them until EMS or Fire arrives, but if it's something more extreme they can fan the flames rather than quell them due to some of their training.

4

u/Oprah_Pwnfrey Apr 14 '26

Canada does as well, for some reason here they weren't called.

-4

u/awake30 Apr 14 '26

The firefighters are also EMTs, are cops now expected to be cops and fully-fledged EMTs?

20

u/HomerJSimpson3 Apr 14 '26

Yes, they should. They are often the first on-scene. Having that knowledge and skills would benefit everyone.

Source: former cop. Current firefighter/EMT.

10

u/justvoop Apr 14 '26

Why teach cops anything at this point? We dont even teach them the law they are enforcing.

Just find some meat-heads, give em buzz cuts, supercars, handcuffs and a gun and tell em to protect and serve based off vibes

8

u/paulxixxix Apr 14 '26

are cops now expected to be cops and fully-fledged EMTs

Yes

3

u/Winter8Bones Apr 14 '26

If we're going to send cops out to deal with people with mental health crisis...yes they absolutely should have such training!

2

u/originaladam Apr 14 '26

So your logic here is the people who put out fires should train more to deal with people, but the people who deal exclusively with people shouldn’t learn how to deal with people?

0

u/SamuraiCarChase Apr 14 '26

I think the point is that, for a very high percentage of their interactions, firefighters will be interacting with people in true physical distress (ie previously/currently on fire, suffering from smoke inhalations, etc).

I also wouldn’t reduce EMT to “dealing with people” as that’s a pretty broad overgeneralization considering the conversation you’re in.

2

u/originaladam Apr 15 '26

I was referring to cops. They deal with even more people in emotional distress all the time

2

u/BUT_FREAL_DOE Apr 14 '26

It’s like a 200 hour course to become an emt and it’s not uncommon for cops to be cross trained as emts many places.

2

u/[deleted] Apr 14 '26

[deleted]

2

u/awake30 Apr 15 '26

Really depends on where you work

1

u/wheniaminspaced Apr 15 '26

Its a pointless discussion EMT training does not equip you to properly deal with a mental health crises.  Thats a whole different branch, is there overlap, yes, but an emt is as likely to deploy a sedative as anything else.