In the weeks after El Cajon police stopped automatically responding to certain crisis calls, firefighters grappled with what that policy shift meant for their own responses – and safety.
On June 3, a Heartland Fire & Rescue captain injured his knee restraining an intoxicated woman who ran toward the road after threatening to kill herself. He was forced to go on leave after the injury, records obtained after a public-records request show.
A few weeks later, on June 27, another Heartland Fire captain flagged an incident at an El Cajon assisted living home with a patient carrying a large broom handle who displayed behavioral health challenges on earlier calls. The man had masturbated in front of emergency workers on a call a few shifts earlier. A computer-aided dispatch report states the man waved the broom handle as he walked toward firefighters…