I recently attended a training put on by the U.S. Secret Service called “Mass Shootings in Public Places.”
It includes new training and a report for 2023. Toward the end of the training, a team from North Carolina called the Behavioral Threat Assessment (BeTA) Unit presented.
This team, made up of law enforcement officials, attorneys and mental health professionals, takes referrals from law enforcement, courts and concerned citizens and conducts assessments of individuals. They define their process is “intended to determine if a person of concern is exhibiting behaviors consistent with the pathway to violence and identify appropriate management and mitigation recommendations for the individual.”
The team formed after the Feb. 14, 2018, attack at the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. In consultation with law enforcement agencies, they decided the traditional reactive approach of law enforcement to attacks is not sufficient to address this issue.
The newly formed BeTA Unit was tasked with taking a proactive approach focusing on threat assessment and management to address threats of mass violence.
As some of you will recall, I wrote a column a while back on my experience as a mental health professional crisis worker during and after the Columbine shooting. The subject of preventing mass violence is near and dear to my heart. So I wrote and called the BeTA team. I wanted to find out if they would be willing to speak with me and local law enforcement professionals about what they do and how they do it. They responded, indicating they would be happy to do so.
I contacted Centralia Police Chief Stacy Denham and participated in a Zoom meeting with their legal representative and their mental health professional team members. They walked us through their proactive process of attempting to prevent or circumvent violence in their community and state. In fact, the team was so successful the North Carolina Legislature awarded funds to enhance the program.
When I talk to people who say, “that will never happen here,” I point to another rural community in Texas that thought it would never happen here — Uvalde, Texas. But it did. Nineteen students and two teachers were killed. Seventeen others were injured but survived.
Why can’t we take a proactive stance in our community? Why can’t such a team be formed here in Lewis County? The fact of the matter is that we can take a proactive approach to violence. We can create a team of professionals here to mitigate the risk of violence.
Findings of the Safe School Initiative conducted by the U.S. Secret Service and the U.S. Department of Education suggests that some future attacks may be preventable.
“The fact that most attackers engaged in pre-incident planning behavior and shared their intentions and plans with others, suggests that those conducting threat assessment inquiries or investigations could uncover these types of information.” That’s from a document titled “Threat Assessment in Schools: A Guide to Managing Threatening Situations and to Creating Safe School Climates.”
The primary purpose of threat assessment is the prevention of targeted violence. To stop it before it happens.
According to the BeTA Unit, “The threat assessment and management process involves the proactive work of a trained multi-disciplinary threat management team charged with the responsibility to seek out and thwart potential attackers before they strike. As such, threat management is integral to the work of the BeTA Unit. Threat assessment is the process of gathering and assessing information about persons who may have the interest, motive, intention and capability of mounting attacks against public officials and figures. The BeTA Unit uses this methodology but also incorporates key investigative principles and relies on relationships with other entities to gather information critical to informing the threat assessment process and formulating viable mitigation plans. Threat assessment is one component in the overall strategy to reduce violence.”
Their mission “is to identify, investigate, evaluate and manage person(s) of concern within North Carolina who are recognized as having motive and means to develop, or act on an opportunity to commit a targeted attack.”
We can do something here. It is so much better for us, our children, families and our community to be proactive in preventing violence.
The trauma of violence is lifelong. Post-traumatic stress disorder and the acute stress of witnessing violence stays with you.
For all of our mental health’s sake, let’s prevent violence before it claims another victim.
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Richard Stride is the current CEO of Cascade Community Healthcare. He can be reached at drstride@icloud.com.
