Dangerous liaison? Violence and community mental health researchers

Abstract

The murder last year of social worker Jenny Morrison, by a South London community hostel resident, raises again the safety question for professionals working with people with severe mental illnesses (Brindle, 1998; Cheston, 1999). As Marjorie Wallace, chief executive of Sane remarked: Morrison’ s death ‘ exposes yet again a policy (care in the community) which is unsafe and is failing to protect patients, families, the public and those who work with seriously disturbed people’ (quoted in Millar, 1998). Such tragedies are, in reality, isolated cases. Homicides perpetrated by people with mental health problems are no more common in an era of deinstitutionalised psychiatric services than they were in 1957 (Taylor & Gunn, 1999). Sensationalised media coverage has, however, created the stereotype of the ‘ dangerously mad’ : the belief that the mentally ill are predisposed to committing violent acts, despite the fact that the vast majority have no history of violence. This erroneous public perception was confirmed by a recent national survey of 1700 randomly sampled people undertaken by the Royal College of Psychiatrists (RCP). Revealed at the launch of the RCPs 5-year Changing Minds anti-stigma campaign, over 70% of those questioned considered people with schizophrenia a ‘ danger to others’ and ‘ unpredictable’ (Cowan & Hart,1998).