THE BADGE OF LIFE

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We are a group of active and retired police officers, medical professionals and surviving families of suicides from the United States and Canada. We have suffered the worst that posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) brings—the hopelessness, the despair, the flashbacks, the attempts at suicide, the nightmares and insomnia, the hypervigilence, anxiety and terror. Among us are victims of both critical incident and cumulative PTSD. Our families have suffered the loss of a loved one to police suicide.

We found that many departments still lack adequate suicide prevention programs. We found many departments have excellent programs—but need more than "suicide prevention."

The cornerstone of our Badge of Life program is an entirely new approach to suicide prevention, called the "Emotional Self-Care Program" (ESC). After reading about it, contact us and we will be happy to send you additional information on how you can impact police suicide numbers, create a healthier police force, improve the quality of service, and enhance officer safety.


Board member Walt Narr, retired police captain. Walt and Leona (seated) lost their police officer son to suicide.

Commissioner Julian Fantino, (ret.) Ontario Provincial Police, Badge of Life Guest Speaker. After the terrible loss of Eddie Adamson, he now looks back on other police suicides with a mix of feelings.

Everything we do at Badge of life is free.

"It's not just about suicide." It's about mental health for all police officers. Rather than waiting until an officer is in crisis to act, we teach them how to stay out of emotional trouble in the first place.


	CPSA Conference, 2010, featuring a lineup of Badge of Life speakers.


John Violanti addressing the California Peer Support Association on police suicides

Our program came after long discussion and research--and the realization that, in the search for complex answers, we were all missing some of the simple solutions. For that reason, we undertook a two-year study, with Dr, John Violanti of the University of Buffalo, to determine once and for all how many police suicides were happening each year. This put to rest some of the outlandish figures that were being passed around the lecture circuit for far too many years.

We fully support suicide prevention programs, but they represent only one-half of the "solution." To that end, we have developed our program of "Emotional Self-Care" (ESC) training, from the "cradle to the grave, to supplement suicide prevention and keep officers from reaching the point of crisis and suicide in the first place.


Board member Dick Augusta greets California Highway Patrol Commissioner Joe Farrow and CHP Chief Susan Coutts at the State Capitol.

WHY? What's in it for your department?

Much. Your results will be measured not only in saved costs from replacing dead officers, but in lawsuits, citizen complaints, sick leave, alcoholism, tardiness, grievances, reckless behaviors, and more.

We do not challenge your existing programs, be they suicide prevention, chaplaincy programs, departmental EAP's, psychologists or whatever. We support them and wish to supplement them.

Badge of Life Police Suicide Group founders Dick Augusta and Andy O'Hara

Dick Augusta and Andy O'Hara. co-founders


Janice McCarthy discusses whether or not police work itself can go beyond PTSD and lead to suicide. In her husband's case, it did but, in spite of horrific events and his PTSD, his department refuses to acknowledge it.


Andy O'Hara at 2011 Fraternal Order of Police Conference, Salt Lake City


Dr. John Violanti, Janice McCarthy, CPSA President Maxine Lynch, Commissioner (ret.) Julian Fantino (Ontario Provincial Police), Andy O'Hara

Working lunch

Committing to the ritual of a yearly psych check “forces you to focus on what’s going on in your life, to take stock of yourself and how you’re doing. Without that obligation, when do we take time to evaluate our mental health and our relationships?”