Aurora's Crisis Response Team has a new partner attempting to prevent violence

Jennifer Fierberg from UCHealth has taken her skills out of the clinic and to the field.

"I think it's more unpredictable," she said.  

Since January she has been the clinical supervisor of Aurora's Crisis Response Team and Mobile Response Team. They are mental health clinicians that work with Aurora Police to respond to calls in the city where people are in distress.

She says their presence changes the outcome of most interactions between police and the public.

"It has a better outcome when a clinician and officer are present together.," she said.

Sgt. Thomas Graham is the officer in charge of the program and he's seen how the clinicians from UCHealth can make a difference.

"In a lot of cases, it makes a great difference," he said. "They (the patient) start to go down a road a tangent or something, they can bring them back in point and then connect them with the resource that they need."

One of the areas the clinicians are making a big difference is in the Targeted Violence Prevention program. 

When APD gets a tip that someone may pose a threat to the community the department first verifies its credibility, but then attempts to intervene with the help of a clinician.

"(We ask) Are you really serious about this? Have you taken any substantial steps toward this? And then if it's mental health-related, we'll try to connect him with those resources to avert that situation if we can," Graham said.

While it's impossible to count how many crimes didn't happen, both APD and UCHealth say their partnership has likely prevented tragedy.

"The bigger thing for us is these people are getting the help they need and if we don't get any more calls on them, we believe we've been successful," Graham said.

"The community has been asking for us more and officers are calling for CRT more and AMRT," Fierberg said.