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SALT LAKE CITY -- Advocates say more police need to be trained on how to deal with the mentally ill, and the need is most keenly felt in rural Utah.
At the National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI), Utah, Executive Director Sherri Wittwer has pinpointed on a map police agencies with officers who have crisis intervention team training. There are many along the Wasatch Front, few outside it.
"It still isn't in enough communities and on enough of the Wasatch Front, like we'd like to see it," she said.
Wittwer says it can be difficult to immediately tell if somebody is high, drunk or mentally ill. She says family members are key when present and should tell officers first-off about mental health issues.
E-mail: aadams@ksl.com
