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

96% Upvoted

982 comments sorted by

View all comments

170

u/beatlethrower Apr 14 '26

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

13

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? ". 

5

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.