One Wall for All

On 16 December 2014, it will be a year since Retired Detective Sergeant Ashley Bryant called ‘000’, asking for more support for officers with PTSD and their families, before he took his own life….

Ashley Bryant is one of AT LEAST 40 NSW Police officers, and AT LEAST 70 Australian Police officers, who have suicided in the last 20 years – who will not be honoured on the National Police Memorial because of the way they died.

Despite the sacrifices they made, the courageously selfless way they executed their duties to keep us safe and the reality that the ‘job’ caused them to have PTSD and attributed to their suicide – they are deemed to be not worthy of recognition or remembrance – and even though there are already four officers named on the National Police Memorial between 1987-93 whose death was ‘self inflicted occasioned by duties’. See:  1/ Peter McGrath   2/ Andrew DIXON   3/ Grant Eastes   4/  Peter TICKLE

PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) is a serious and debilitating medical condition that continues to destroy the personal and professional lives of our brave emergency service personnel, especially Police Officers. Without the proper education and support, coupled with mistreatment and being forgotten, some Officers can’t cope and end up taking their own life…

Since December 2012 there have been more than 5 times as many police officers who have taken their own life than were killed in the execution of their duties in NSW….

Between July 1st 2000 and December 31st 2012 at least 58 past/present serving Police Officers have taken their own life – 25 are just from NSW and there have been at least another 8 in the last two years – and due to the current Death & Disability scheme and lack of support services available to Police officers, that number will only continue to grow…

Despite years of selfless commitment and sacrifice to protecting their community as a Police Officer, these brave men and women are ineligible to be honoured on the Police Wall of Remembrance because they took their own life – even though the manner in which they died was as a result of what they experienced and were confronted with ‘in the execution of their duties as a Police Officer’…

On the Sunday Night program on 16 November 2014 (https://au.news.yahoo.com/sunday-night/features/a/25520435/police-officers-suicide-call-ill-be-gone-before-they-arrive/) Deb Bryant bravely told of how her husband, Retired Detective Sergeant Ashley Bryant, called 000 asking for more to be done for PTSD sufferers and their families, before he took his own life. Because he didn’t die at work, his name will never appear on the Wall of Remembrance – unless we raise our voices and have one Wall for All…..

Police Officers, all over Australia, should be remembered for how they served and not how they suffered, how they lived and not how they died and for the sacrifices they made for the job and not for the job that sacrificed them.

Regardless of the manner in which our Police Officers die, it is the job that takes their lives.

Their memory and sacrifice to the job deserves to be honoured and respected – One Wall For All….

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