Wilda L. White, Hilary Melton, and Malaika Puffer are founding directors of MadFreedom Advocates, Inc., a grassroots, nonprofit organization run by and for psychiatric survivors, mad folks, and others marginalized by the mental health system. "We're working towards equal rights, better services, and ending discrimination," they write. "MadFreedom Advocates works across Vermont to support leadership, education, and advocacy for people with lived experience of trauma, institutionalization, neurodivergence, extreme states, or other marginalization by sanism."
WATERBURY CENTER-MadFreedom Advocates grieves the killing of Scott Garvey, a 55-year-old unarmed man experiencing an apparent mental health crisis, who was shot and killed in his own home by Vermont State Police on July 7.
According to official reports, Mr. Garvey had barricaded himself inside his apartment in Putney and was making statements of self-harm. Law enforcement responded to the scene with an embedded mental health caseworker.
Yet instead of continuing efforts to engage Mr. Garvey safely, the Vermont State Police obtained a warrant to forcibly enter his home. They reported seeing an object in his hand that they believed was a firearm. It was not. No weapons were found in the apartment.
Mr. Garvey was shot multiple times and died from gunshot wounds to his torso and leg.
We are outraged that this preventable death occurred despite the presence of a mental health professional on the scene, despite years of statewide policy development, and despite a widely publicized prior tragedy - the 2016 killing of Phil Grenon in circumstances that bear a chilling resemblance to this case.
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In the wake of Mr. Grenon's death, the Vermont Mental Health Crisis Response Commission released an urgent set of recommendations aimed at preventing any future fatal encounters between law enforcement officers and individuals in emotional distress. The state also adopted a comprehensive Statewide Use of Force Policy that includes specific guidelines for interacting with persons experiencing a mental health crisis.
Taken together, the commission's report and the policy set out the following directives:
• Avoid forced entry unless there is an imminent threat to others;
• Use time, space, and containment to avoid confrontation;
• Allow embedded mental health professionals to lead crisis responses;
• Engage natural supports or known contacts to de-escalate the situation;
• Center the sanctity of life in every tactical decision.
These directives were not followed. Instead, police chose force over time, confrontation over compassion, and escalation over care. That is not just a policy failure. It is a moral failure.
It is a moral failure to meet suffering with violence.
It is a moral failure to treat disability as dangerousness.
It is a moral failure to ignore the lessons of past tragedies and repeat them, with fatal consequences.
When the state responds to a call for help by delivering bullets instead of support, it tells the public - especially those with mental health challenges - that their lives are disposable. That their crises will be met not with understanding, but with guns drawn. That no amount of training, no number of task forces, no list of reforms can ultimately guarantee their safety - even in their own homes.
Mr. Garvey did not need to die. He needed time. He needed care. He needed someone to see his humanity.
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We call on the Vermont Attorney General's Office and the Windham County State's Attorney to conduct a transparent and public investigation into Mr. Garvey's death.
We demand immediate release of all body-worn camera footage.
We call on state officials to explain why Vermont's Statewide Use of Force Policy - which strictly limits deadly force and emphasizes de-escalation in mental health encounters - was not followed.
If Vermont is to uphold the dignity and rights of all people, especially those in a mental health crisis, we must do more than update policies. We must honor the lives lost by refusing to normalize their deaths.
Until we choose compassion over coercion, and care over control, these tragedies will continue. We must choose differently.
Mr. Garvey deserved better.
We all do.
This Voices Open Letter was submitted to The Commons.
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