Fixated Threat Assessment Centres: Preventing Harm and Facilitating Care in Public Figure Threat Cases and Those Thought to Be at Risk of Lone-Actor Grievance-Fuelled Violence

Chapter 33 - Fixated Threat Assessment Centres: Preventing Harm and Facilitating Care in Public Figure Threat Cases and Those Thought to Be at Risk of Lone-Actor Grievance-Fuelled Violence

from Part V - Criminal Justice and Social Considerations

Published online by Cambridge University Press: 19 October 2021

Justin Barry-Walsh ,

David V. James and

Paul E. Mullen

Edited by

Katherine Warburton and

Stephen M. Stahl

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Katherine Warburton: Affiliation:
University of California, Davis
Stephen M. Stahl: Affiliation:
University of California, San Diego

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Summary

Developments in threat assessment, particularly in the area of concerning communications and approaches to public figures, has led to the setting-up in a number of countries of a new style of service for assessing and managing risk to the prominent from the actions of lone individuals. Known as fixated threat assessment centres (FTACs), their central characteristic is that they are jointly staffed by police officers and by psychiatric staff from health services. They are based on the realization that the interests of the prominent in terms of protection overlap with those of the people harassing them in terms of medical care. Research over the last decade has re-established that the majority of those threatening, harassing, or attacking public figures have unmet mental health needs, and that attention to these is often the most effective way of reducing risk, whilst at the same time improving their lot and focusing on treatment, rather than criminalization. The approach has recently been expanded to encompass assessment and intervention in individuals suspected of being radicalised into extreme ideologies and at risk of proceeding to commit terrorist acts.

Type: Chapter
Information: Decriminalizing Mental Illness , pp. 328 - 337

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108920698 [Opens in a new window]

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Print publication year: 2021

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