Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Officer Suicide.

Last night at Lorain Correctional Institution there was a female officer on perimeter patrol. During the night at some point she went silent. She stopped answering radio calls. A supervisor went onto their perimeter road to check on her. More than likely, he believed she had fallen asleep. She had committed suicide with her shotgun.

Correctional workers have a lot of mental stress that nobody but another officer can understand. Sad situation. She didn't want her family to be the ones that found her.

Hell of a thing.

Mental health is the real crisis.

Prayers for her soul.

Uncharacteristic for a female.




P

What a sad deal!

I can’t imagine doing that job under any circumstances. I couldn’t have a job that I knew every single day that I go to work I’m going to be dealing with the worst of the worst of “humanity”. The animals that populate our overcrowded prisons in a country that over incarcerates people at disproportionate numbers to the rest of the civilized world are not being rehabilitated, nor is it even punishment for many of them. The animal that gets sentenced to prison and goes away for virtually any length of time comes out of prison a far more dangerous animal than the one that was initially locked up. The criminal gets to network with other criminals and criminal organizations while they are locked up and they are able to really perfect their criminality to the point that they are experts. It wasn’t long ago that I read an article about drug use in maximum security prisons. The article said that most of the new inmates come in with substance abuse issues …. drugs or alcohol or both. Those who are sentenced to prison and don’t have any substance abuse issues upon arriving at prison a large percentage, iirc the article stated that roughly 70%, will be discharged with an addiction. That blows my mind…

A&F….I’m truly sorry for the loss of your coworker and I’m sorry for the pain she was dealing with. I wouldn’t be surprised that no matter what her main issues were, assuming that her main issues weren’t directly related to her work, the job itself weighed heavily on her sad decision. Thank God we have men and women who are willing to do that job and keep those scumbags out of society but I don’t know how you guys do it.

How old was your coworker? Was she married or did she have any children? The real victims are the loved ones left behind…left wondering what they could have done differently and blaming themselves for not recognizing the “warning signs”. Sad deal for everyone….

I don't have any details about her, I've never met her. Now, a real big issue was the amount of mandatory overtime worked. It's not something you know in advance so you prepare yourself for it. A supervisor will call sometime during your shift and tell you you're mandated. Often, it's within 10 minutes of the end of your shift. Some can expect that 3-4 times a week.

But I don't know that is a factor here.

Have a close friend who did that gig for 30 years. Drinks every day. Some of the stuff he's told me about, I would drink too.

That’s untenable for anyone in your line of work and it’s totally unreasonable to require that from people who are in such a high stress job. Working “just” 40 hours each week would be a hell of a mountain to face each week knowing what you have to go to every day but mandating that you have to stay and work a double or you’re mandated to come in on your days off is bullshit! I could see that on rare occasions or in emergency situations but not on a regular basis. That alone would preclude me from doing that crap. I know myself and after a few times of that bullshit I’d be telling them to GFT. My life is dedicated to my wife and family NOT to a government organization that can’t attract enough people to do the job and abuses the employees they already trapped. File an FMLA and take care of what’s important in life….

I don’t envy you and the position they’ve put you!

New people coming in now have to work until 65. Take it from me at 64 years old, that's too old. If I didn't work the post I'm in now I'd be out.

Sad deal.


If someone is that unhappy with their job- get a different job.

had a lot fof riends thatw ere NY guards. a coule worked doubles all summer long then toop paid time off from oct 1 through end of Feb. retired at 25 making over 100k on retirement

Working 2-3 mandated 16s a hitch does suck. Easier for some than others with home lives squared away.

Can’t say I’ve ever thought about eating a shotgun over it though.

This^^^^^^^

But some just love all the drama; my wife (a RN) has a friend that is also an RN who works at a medium security prison, does nothing but complain about every aspect of the job, but won't leave for love nor money & she's had all kinds of personal problems with a few inmate animals.

Just stupid to allow yourself to stay in that environment.

MM

LEO and FD suicides are way up in the last 10 years or so. There is a darkness in both jobs that almost can't always be described. You need a really good support system in place to do the job for 20-30 years. It seems to be a generational thing too. Not sure what's going on with that or how to fix it. It seems like the more effort that gets put into mental health for first responders, the worse it gets.

Sorry to hear. I lost two last year to the same thing. They were the last ones you would have ever thought would go down that road.

Very sad situation . No one knows the demons someone else is dealing with. Those facilities usually have a good HR department and counseling available but that doesn’t always help.

In 2002 a bank in my little hometown was shot up by a group of lowlife scum. Five people died in the holdup. A State Troopers had arrested the two leaders for a minor violation and subsequently found a handgun. The pistol had been stolen from a LGS but the SN had been incorrectly entered into the state’s computer system. The creeps were released and the gun was returned - it was used to kill at least two of the victims. The trooper somehow felt that he had a chance to prevent the massacre but blew it. He had a wife and several kids and lived on an acreage a couple miles from us. He killed himself on the same day as the funerals of several victims.

https://norfolkdailynews.com/news/r...5840a24-3dab-11ed-8867-674f8e258b0f.html

Working in a jail or prison would be awful. Hate them.

Armednfree: Sad deal that - my opinion, dealing with scum sucking slimeballs every day with no end and NO satisfaction from accomplishing anything, wears on humans.
I know.
My 1,100 man department had 11 men and 3 women commit suicide in the 29 years I worked there - and for much of that time (first 2/3's of my 29 years) extensive testing, background checks and mental evaluation was mandatory.
I advised ALL four of my VarmintChildren to seek employment careers outside law enforcement.
May she rest in peace.
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

ArmednFree Bless you. Sorry to hear about it. In my 24 years working for Missouri I heard of several and one is too many. I retired five years ago and I'm still decompressing. Be Well Brothers, RZ.

So true! You know from experience how it can affect us. Oftentimes it doesn’t seem to be an issue until years down the road. I know that from my experience how I was able to deal with the disturbing calls but I also think that while we’re working, not just on shift but still working the job as employment, I didn’t have a lot of time to commiserate about last shift’s call because today was a new day and we were focused on the present.

I didn’t have much use for the psychological debriefings and shrinks “giving us permission to feel…” but I went (usually because it was mandatory 😁) anyway and with time and maturity I figured that even if I didn’t get anything out of it maybe one of my crew members did. I’ve always been able to “deal” with things because I did what most guys from our generation and before did, I buried it deep down inside and didn’t talk about it. That’s a good plan until it isn’t but we’re all different and we process things differently so there really isn’t a “right way” to deal with it. In the years since I’ll occasionally wake up in a cold sweat but I lean into my faith and WITHOUT FAIL the Lord will carry me through. It’s been awhile (several months) since I woke up in a panic but it’s almost always one of the children or youngsters we treated that is in my dream. Last week though we went to bed like normal and I was out when my head hit the pillow, I never really have trouble falling asleep and I NEVER remember my dreams, but that night just shortly after falling asleep I was in one of those weird nightmares. I was strapped to a gurney but there was slack in the belts and I wasn’t restrained. Three guys were wheeling me to the medic unit when I realized that they were not my crew mates, they began laughing maniacally and were about to push me over a cliff while I was strapped to the gurney. I yelled and grunted and sat straight up in bed….scaring the living hell out of my poor wife. I immediately told her that I’m fine and it was just another dream but I startled the poor girl to tears. She didn’t know what to do….she said that she had just finished her prayers and was deep in thought when I shot up with a grunt and holler…I felt terrible but she “understands”.

The benefits of that job far outweighed the after affects and I’d do it all over again in a heartbeat….. I loved the job and I loved the guys I worked with!