Member Since: 8/13/2012
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Officer who witnessed homicide beheading commits suicide
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After a long struggle with post-traumatic stress disorder, a Mountie who witnessed the beheading of a Greyhound bus passenger has taken his own life.
A family member has confirmed that recently-retired RCMP corporal Ken Barker died by suicide last weekend. A total of 13 Canadian first responders have taken their own lives over the past 10 weeks.
For first-responders, PTSD is all too common. Those burdened with confronting horrific crime scenes and accidents often suffer psychologically. For people like Andy Cunningham, that suffering is largely done in silence.
Ken Barker, seen here in this RCMP photo, has died after a long struggle with post-traumatic stress disorder.
"I was afraid that people would think I'm weak," said the firefighter.
At first, Cunningham didn’t want to tell his supervisors. But after 22 years on the job, the trauma became too much.
"I started seeing all the bad calls that I had ever run,” he said. “Dead bodies, parts of people, horrific accidents," said Andy Cunningham.
Vince Savoia, a former paramedic and founder of the Tema Conter Memorial Trust, said Cunningham isn’t alone in being afraid to speak up.
"When they finally do come up and ask for help, they are harassed, they are ridiculed, they are isolated, they are ignored," said Savoia.
Read more: http://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/mountie...#ixzz3PWZlkxlp
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