Making the Case FOR Excited Delirium
/Making the Case FOR Excited Delirium
By: Ken Dye
Excited delirium, as a medical diagnosis has been banned in California. Can other states and/or the American Medical Association and the Department of Health and Human Services be far behind in striking EX as a reason for an in-custody death?
You get a call. A person is standing on top of a car screaming at passersby. He has a machete and swings it violently. You and several other cars are at the scene. What to do?
The onlookers want the police officers on scene to “Do something.”
The weirded-out subject is in no mood to listen to calm and reasoned conversation. De-escalation techniques fail … miserably.
As officers attempt to gain some kind of communication, the person jumps off the car, and in the process of doing so loses his machete.
He is now chasing after pedestrians…the police officers, having already called for an ambulance, must move.
And they do. The officers “swarm” the suspect.
They are met with an aggressive and violently resisting subject. The officers TASER the person and use chemical agents to gain control. Nothing seems to work.
The subject has superhuman strength and is impervious to pain.
The officers finally get control of the person and he’s rushed to a trauma hospital.
Whilse at the hospital a paramedic tells the attending physician the patient has had Ketamine injected. The medical professional is trained on when, how and the quantity of the drug to administer. He also tells the attending physician the in-custody person’s temperature is 115 degrees and his blood pressure is 200/160. The classic telltale signs of out-of-control drug abuse.
The subject admitted to use of cocaine, PCP and meth. After the admission, the patient calms down for a short time where he calmly speaks about the quantity of drugs taken during the last 24 hours.
The patient then dies. He dies from what? It’s not “Excited Delirium”… then just what the hell is it?
Pathologists are reluctant to use EX as a cause of death. OK, how about self-induced drug intoxication that overwhelmed the drug abuser?
Often, police officers are the faux bad guys. Medical, political officials and chiefs can be the biggest critics when it comes to an in-custody death.
The fact is that people die in police custody. Usually from excessive drug use that causes the body to shut down. Police officers desire to be able and efficient. If the EX diagnosis is no longer valid, those that dispute the diagnosis better come up with a plan to deal with these out-of-control subjects … and quit using law enforcement as the whipping boy for these deaths.
Ken Dye is the author of 5 books about crime, cops and bad guys in the St. Louis area. He Blogs under “Cops Perspective” and has over 20,000 followers. Ken served with the St. Louis County Police Department for 13 years and finished his LE career with the Illinois Criminal Justice Authority as the administrator for the statewide MEG’s and Narcotics Task Forces.
