Joe Rogan Experience #1517 - Nancy Panza

1. 0:00 – 0:30

   Nancy Panza’s role: professor, forensic psychologist, and police psychologist

   1. JRJoe Rogan0:00

      ... one. (claps) Hello, Nancy.

   2. NPNancy Panza0:02

      Hi, Joe.

   3. JRJoe Rogan0:03

      How are you?

   4. NPNancy Panza0:03

      I am doing well.

   5. JRJoe Rogan0:04

      Thanks for being here.

   6. NPNancy Panza0:05

      Thank you for having me. Thanks for letting me come and talk.

   7. JRJoe Rogan0:08

      Um, my pleasure. Uh, so, tell everybody what you do.

   8. NPNancy Panza0:11

      So, I am... Well, my day job, I'm a professor in the psychology department at Cal State Fullerton, and in my side gig, I am a forensic and police psychologist.

   9. JRJoe Rogan0:23

      That is a very appropriate subject-

   10. NPNancy Panza0:26

       Mm-hmm.

   11. JRJoe Rogan0:26

       ... for the strange times we find ourselves in right now.

   12. NPNancy Panza0:29

       Indeed.

2. 0:30 – 2:56

   Watching George Floyd and the protests as someone who supports police wellness

   1. JRJoe Rogan0:30

      So, as you are watching all this play out, from the George Floyd murder to where we're at right now, um, w- what, what has this been like for you since this is your field of study?

   2. NPNancy Panza0:46

      It's a weird place to be and you're kind of, (sighs) uh, for me, caught in between two worlds it seems. Um, (smacks lips) I mean, my job is to take care of police officers. So, keep them healthy, keep them well, to make sure that they can do a good job doing their jobs. Um, (smacks lips) and so the first thing I see is, oof, we got a mess on our hands. Um, for me, when I see a lot of the videos that end up, you know, on, on TV, my initial reaction is, "Well, let's have a look. Is there something really to be upset about here?" And, (scoffs) well, obviously in seeing the, the video of George Floyd's murder, there's a whole lot to be upset about here. And so, you know, heartache comes from that. Um, and then my, you know, my next response is to kick in is, "Okay, we've, we've got problems on both sides." We need to n- not only figure out why such things are happening and prevent them, 'cause that's not good. Nobody wants bad policing, even the police don't want bad policing. On the other hand, how do we also take care of our officers who are out there, who now have to go out and continue doing their jobs in a really, (sighs) difficult and overwhelming environment?

   3. JRJoe Rogan1:54

      Yeah, it's such a strange time because on one hand, you, you got all these people that are calling out for defunding the police, and, you know, this is... Here's a point of view that, uh, Ben Shapiro had when he talked about the protests. He said, um, he said, "Saying they're mostly peaceful protests is like saying O.J. Simpson had a mostly peaceful day when he killed Nicole Simpson 'cause he was only violent for a couple minutes. The rest of the day, he was m- it was mostly peaceful."

   4. NPNancy Panza2:25

      Yeah.

   5. JRJoe Rogan2:25

      And he's like, "That's a, a good way to describe the protests." I think you could also say the same thing about the police department. The police department and police officers are mostly good people doing a good job.

   6. NPNancy Panza2:38

      Yeah.

   7. JRJoe Rogan2:38

      But the problem is when one, out of all these millions of interactions, when one goes bad or there's a bad officer, people see that, they highlight that, and then they say, "This is the cops. These are the cops." I don't think that's true. I've met a lot of great police officers. I know a lot.

   8. NPNancy Panza2:55

      Mm-hmm.

3. 2:56 – 4:17

   Training gaps: why “train more” is hard—but necessary

   1. JRJoe Rogan2:56

      (sighs) And it's an insanely difficult job. I don't think they get paid enough. I don't think they get respected enough. I don't think they get trained well enough. Um, I had Jocko Willink on here, who's a former Navy SEAL commander, and-

   2. NPNancy Panza3:08

      Yes.

   3. JRJoe Rogan3:08

      ... his perspective is very clear. He's like, "They do not train enough." He goes, "If I was in control, they would be trained 20% of their time, 20% of their week would be spent in training."

   4. NPNancy Panza3:17

      Mm-hmm.

   5. JRJoe Rogan3:17

      "Deescalation drills, safety drills, how to handle things if one o- one of your partners is losing his cool. All, all, all sorts of drills that they should be doing, that they do do in the Navy SEALs, that they should be doing in the police department as well."

   6. NPNancy Panza3:31

      Yep. I listened to your, uh, your podcast with Jocko on it and I was, I was blown... Actually, I listened to it twice. (laughs) I listened to it the first time and was like, "Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes." I loved everything that he had to say.

   7. JRJoe Rogan3:42

      Well, he's a real leader.

   8. NPNancy Panza3:43

      He's so good. He's so good. And, and his idea about training was, I mean, I'm in full agreement and full... The 20% training thing would be, would be super hard, especially n- now where we are, 'cause money's going away, not coming in-

   9. JRJoe Rogan3:57

      Right.

   10. NPNancy Panza3:57

       ... 'cause that would mean 20% of the force would be off training and we'd need that many more officers and that many people on duty, you know, to fill in the active ro- So, you know, uh, while that would be a dream, and I think he's right, all those skills that you need, if you're not actively, you know, if you're not-

   11. JRJoe Rogan4:13

       (sniffs) .

   12. NPNancy Panza4:13

       ... actively training and keeping them up to par, they're going to, they're gonna go away.

   13. JRJoe Rogan4:17

       Yeah.

4. 4:17 – 7:24

   The missing core skill: communication and de-escalation training

   1. NPNancy Panza4:17

      They're gonna decay. But on top of what he said, the piece where I was like, "Y- yeah, but let me come in and talk with you too," (laughs) is, is that, you know, he thinks, like the warrior that he is, you know, Navy SEAL, super tough guy, talking about firearms. And he's right, the firearms training is probably not enough. But what's even more so, especially in today's world and society, is that when you look at the, um, the makeup of a police academy training, you know, first of all, it's, it's so short. And, and they do, they get field training after that for a long period of time, and so that, that's good, it balances it out. But the content of the academy, you know, by far most of that time and training is spent learning laws, learning the kind of textbook of, of what it is to be a cop and how to function. And then, the other parts, there's the physical training and the firearms training. But if you look at what happens once a police officer gets out there on the job and what they're doing, a huge percentage of it is in communicating. And there is almost none. Almost none. Um, (smacks lips) you know, the example I think of that comes to mind m- most, when I... Prior to being at Cal State Fullerton, I was a, uh, faculty member at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York. Um, and so, in the city we worked, uh, we did some trainings with the NYPD and we had a contract to do deescalation training. So when the recruits are coming through the academy, they would come over to John Jay and we would have police trainers and, and us, the psychologists would come in, and we had these wonderful actors who are, uh, trained to portray individuals with mental illness, and we did this interactive deescalation training. Um, teach them how to talk to somebody, how to... What do you say that's gonna help bring someone down as opposed to s- And it was this, you know, okay, ready? Here goes this training scenario. We pull these rookies up who are scared to death, give 'em like a block gun. Say, "Okay, go." Like wood block, not a real weapon.

   2. JRJoe Rogan6:01

      Right.

   3. NPNancy Panza6:01

      You know, go to it and, and, and engage this individual. And our actors are, were brilliant and, and, and portray these, uh, individuals with mental illness wonderfully. And, you know, inevitably they'd come in hot and things, you know, screaming erupts and the, the rookie's going for their gun and we're like, "Okay, okay, okay. S- Hold up. Stop. Let's talk about what just happened." From the psychology side, we kind of explained, "Here's what's going on. Here's why that didn't work with this type of individual." The police tac- you know, would come in on the tactics side and we'd say, "Okay, rewind. Do over," and then we would run them through the scenario and we would keep stopping and starting. And this interactive, like hands-on training-... by the end of the day they were like, "I learned more today than I learned in the last (laughs) two months."

   4. JRJoe Rogan6:40

      Yeah.

   5. NPNancy Panza6:40

      But we got them for one day.

   6. JRJoe Rogan6:42

      Right.

   7. NPNancy Panza6:42

      Six hours, and then that's it. You know, so that whole constant training and giving the skills, not just the firearms and the tactics and the f- you know, how to use force properly, but also the communication and dealing with these stressful situations and, and distressed individuals, because that is what they do nonstop, day in and day out.

   8. JRJoe Rogan7:05

      Yeah. I, I know what you're saying when you were talking about how difficult it would be to actually have them train 20% of the time.

   9. NPNancy Panza7:14

      Right.

   10. JRJoe Rogan7:14

       But I don't think it's difficult enough that we should ignore it. I think th- I think if ... Obviously, I'm never gonna be in control, but if I was in control, I would say, "That's how it's gotta be."

   11. NPNancy Panza7:23

       Yeah.

   12. JRJoe Rogan7:23

       We have to hire more people.

   13. NPNancy Panza7:24

       Yeah.

5. 7:24 – 10:01

   Stress exposure, PTSD risk, and why prediction is so difficult

   1. JRJoe Rogan7:24

      We need ... I think they need way more people, way better training, and I think there also has to be evaluations in terms of like, w- how are they dealing with stress? 'Cause it's not just how to deescalate, how to deal with a, a situation with, uh, with uh, uh, a possible criminal, but also how are you dealing with the fact that every time you go to work you might get shot?

   2. NPNancy Panza7:48

      Right.

   3. JRJoe Rogan7:48

      You, you might not ever come home to your family. How many times do you see suicides? How many times do you see murders? How many times do you see car accidents and, uh ... All that stuff weighs on a person.

   4. NPNancy Panza7:58

      Absolutely.

   5. JRJoe Rogan7:58

      And all those police officers that see that stuff every day, depending entirely upon ... and that's one of the things Jocko talked about-

   6. NPNancy Panza8:04

      Mm-hmm.

   7. JRJoe Rogan8:04

      ... their psychological makeup, he talked about it with, uh, soldiers, that some soldiers can see some crazy shit and be like, "It's okay, I'm good to go."

   8. NPNancy Panza8:12

      Yeah.

   9. JRJoe Rogan8:12

      And then other soldiers are like, "I'm fucked up. I don't know what to do here. I-"

   10. NPNancy Panza8:16

       Yeah.

   11. JRJoe Rogan8:16

       "I have anxiety. I can't sleep. I'm a, I'm a nervous wreck."

   12. NPNancy Panza8:20

       Same thing is true for, for cops. Some folks are ... They can go through, you know, have the worst call that you could imagine, death, gore, you know, loss of a child's life. I mean, these things are, are horrific and they see it and, you know, they, they react and it's awful, but they recover and, and, and they're okay the next day. And then, you know, on the opposite hand, you've got somebody who has m- maybe a, a, a less intense or, you know, a less horrific call, and it just puts them over the edge. And, you know, from the psychology side, you know, we've studied this, we've looked at this. What i- how can we tell, is there a way we can predict, you know, what type of event, what type of person, who, who is likely to, to, to fall apart, t- to end up with, you know, post-traumatic stress disorder? C- can we tell who's likely to develop a, you know, a, a clinical syndrome later? And, and the s- the short answer is we can't.

   13. JRJoe Rogan9:09

       Hm.

   14. NPNancy Panza9:09

       There are some things that, that we know, and obviously, you know, some of them are really logical. If you're in a higher state of stress, if you've already got vulnerabilities going in, you're, you know, going through a divorce at home and unhappy on the job and drinking too much outside and you've got all these other things that are already, you know, festering underneath, and then you also are put in front of that, you know, i- it's not sh- surprising that, that maybe that would push somebody over the edge into a really troubling place. But other times, you know, it, it's really hard thing to predict. And so instead, we need to be there and be on it. And there are ... I mean, there's so many things I can add in about, you know, how we do that in, in ways that we're really falling short, which is kind of my, my passion and where I am these days, in trying to do a much better job of being on, you know, what we would call officer wellness, because we've historically done a really shitty job.

6. 10:01 – 16:18

   Critical incident debriefings: what departments do, and why it varies

   1. JRJoe Rogan10:01

      Is there a standard procedure, li- when someone comes back from, say, uh, witnessing a murder? Is there a standard way that they interact with them across all police departments or is it depending upon the department and what setup the sheriff or the, the police chief h- has put in place?

   2. NPNancy Panza10:18

      Yeah. Very much depending on the department-

   3. JRJoe Rogan10:20

      (laughs)

   4. NPNancy Panza10:20

      ... and what they've put in place.

   5. JRJoe Rogan10:21

      Mm-hmm.

   6. NPNancy Panza10:21

      So when it comes to like, the mental health and psychology, the, the things that we do with departments are ... It's, it's very standard these days. Like I w- I think the numbers show about 80, n- 90, sorry, (laughs) 98% of departments do a pre-employment, uh, psychological evaluation before they're hired. That's what I spend the majority of my time doing, is, is screening people who are starting the job. So that part is very normal to do. And I can tell you all about that process. Beyond that, what happens from there on out is very much up in the air, depends on the department. Some departments require a, what we would call a, a, you know, a critical incident debriefing. Um, so some of the agencies that I work with will, if, if somebody is involved or there's a, a major incident, every officer who was on scene there will come in and do a debriefing with me or with another psychologist, um, to check in afterwards. And a lot of that is just where are they, how are they in this, in this moment, are they okay to go home, are they safe?

   7. JRJoe Rogan11:20

      (laughs) How do you determine that?

   8. NPNancy Panza11:21

      And education. (smacks lips) And also-

   9. JRJoe Rogan11:22

      Is it just a judgment call?

   10. NPNancy Panza11:24

       It is. It's a judgment call. Um, and the ones that I've done, I would say most of the time it feels pretty clear-cut. Most of the time folks are either they're doing all right, they're a little shaken up, which is normal. I mean, anybody who experiences something life-threatening is gonna be off, off at that point. So a lot of what we do in those, in those debriefings is education. Um, I have these little handouts that I give to all the officers that go through and say, "This is what you are likely feeling right now. This is what you're likely to feel in the next couple days. And anything kinda goes." You know, w- we say, "In those first few days, whatever you're feeling is, is, is probably okay." But then over the course of the first week, we expect people to settle in and to start recovering. And if you're not, then we wanna start paying attention to the ways ... Are you still not sleeping? Are you having nightmares? Are you having flash- you know, what's going on? And, you know, again, varies by department, some of them will then also offer up to four sessions to come back and continue meeting, um, to, to see them through that kind of early adjustment phase. And then if they're still struggling at the point at the end, then we can refer them to longer term for treatment. Um, and if everything looks fine, then we say, "Okay, you know, resume duty or, or you're cleared to go back." So that, that initial meeting afterwards is us- is mandatory, at least for the departments that choose to do it.... that's a mandatory. Couple sessions afterwards are not, they're, they're if needed. And then from there, we kinda set the path, like, all good, clear, or let's carry on and keep, you know, keep working with you until you can recover.

   11. JRJoe Rogan12:59

       Do you support this idea that it should be controlled locally by each individual police department or do you think there should be a nationwide mandate, like some sort of a, a s- a standard operational procedure where they, they treat everyone the same way, train everyone the same way, deal with every single murder, suicide, child death, and they have, like, a protocol that they follow so i- it's just standard across the country-

   12. NPNancy Panza13:27

       Mm-hmm.

   13. JRJoe Rogan13:27

       ... based on science?

   14. NPNancy Panza13:29

       I- I do. I think many of these things, these fundamental pieces, should be mandatory. I think pre-employment psychological evaluation is an absolute must. And, and again, most agencies do that piece. I think the critical incident debriefings are an absolute must and should always occur, and they should be mandatory 'cause that takes away the stigma. You know?

   15. JRJoe Rogan13:48

       Right. Right.

   16. NPNancy Panza13:49

       No cop wants to come see the shrink.

   17. JRJoe Rogan13:50

       Of course.

   18. NPNancy Panza13:50

       They see you coming-

   19. JRJoe Rogan13:51

       Of course.

   20. NPNancy Panza13:51

       ... and they're like- (laughs)

   21. JRJoe Rogan13:52

       Right. Of course.

   22. NPNancy Panza13:52

       ... "I'm out of here." Like, "No, keep the shrink away."

   23. JRJoe Rogan13:55

       But they're probably-

   24. NPNancy Panza13:55

       Because-

   25. JRJoe Rogan13:55

       ... trying to deal with it their own way.

   26. NPNancy Panza13:57

       Yeah.

   27. JRJoe Rogan13:58

       And then somebody that they don't even know-

   28. NPNancy Panza14:00

       Right.

   29. JRJoe Rogan14:00

       ... who comes in and starts probing and asking questions, and they see some guy in a suit-

   30. NPNancy Panza14:04

       Yep.
7. 16:18 – 21:24

   Who decides an officer is ‘fit to return’: judgment calls, tests, and admin leave

   1. NPNancy Panza16:18

      So it kinda depends on what scenario you're making that decision. So there, and there's two different levels that are most likely. So the, the debriefing is usually ... unless the person is completely shaken. Um-

   2. JRJoe Rogan16:32

      Okay. Let's, let's, let's ru- let's do a scenario.

   3. NPNancy Panza16:34

      Okay.

   4. JRJoe Rogan16:34

      Let's say guy pulls some guy over, um, the guy, uh, reaches for a gun, shoots at the officer, the officer shoots the person, kills them. You know, big investigation, news, the whole deal, the guy's on television, they show the body cam footage. And then this guy has to do an evaluation and then go back to work again. How would one decide whether or not that guy's okay to go back to work?

   5. NPNancy Panza17:00

      Probably gonna look at multiple factors. Mental state, basic mental state is our starting point.

   6. JRJoe Rogan17:04

      And how do, how do they make that call?

   7. NPNancy Panza17:05

      So questions, um, in the debriefing, we're unlikely to pull into our bag of tests, which, you know, in the other scenarios, big psych evals, we're gonna dig into our tests, that's what we do as psychologists.

   8. JRJoe Rogan17:15

      When you say tests, you know, like, fMRIs or anything like that, you know?

   9. NPNancy Panza17:17

      No, like the, like MMPI, let me throw out other letters.

   10. JRJoe Rogan17:20

       What is that?

   11. NPNancy Panza17:20

       Like the personality tests and tests that show different levels-

   12. JRJoe Rogan17:24

       Okay.

   13. NPNancy Panza17:24

       ... of, you know, of pathology or clinical issues and problems, um, anxiety, depression, you know, bodily dysfunction.

   14. JRJoe Rogan17:31

       You do-

   15. NPNancy Panza17:32

       All those things.

   16. JRJoe Rogan17:32

       ... a physical examination, check their heart rate, blood pressure?

   17. NPNancy Panza17:36

       I wouldn't. As a psychologist, I would not.

   18. JRJoe Rogan17:37

       Okay.

   19. NPNancy Panza17:37

       So what I'm looking at is their mental state and just basically their overall functioning. So are they, are they able to go about their daily activities, you know, and, and if this is right after the scene, I won't, I won't know this yet. If it's right after the scene, I will be going and sitting down talking with them. Um, if they wanna talk about what happened and kinda run through the scenario, we have them do that. That can be very telling if they're comfortable sharing that, that detail. Are they able to describe it? Are they able to get through it without breaking down? Are they able to talk, you know, sort of g- clearly, even emotionally is, is expected and, and fine. In fact, somebody who has zero emotion after that, I would be like, "What, you know, what's happening?"

   20. JRJoe Rogan18:18

       Right.

   21. NPNancy Panza18:18

       "What are you feeling?" But in that-

   22. JRJoe Rogan18:21

       (puffs lips)

   23. NPNancy Panza18:21

       ... you know, immediate part after, it's really just looking to see what's going on, what's happening. Are they able to function? Are they able to safely go home? Are they having any thoughts about hurting themselves? Are they, you know, are, are, are they feeling like they are, you know, kinda losing their mind? Anything that just is, is completely out in left field.What we often do is, i- i- we're gonna go on the scene only if the agency wants someone to check in right there. I more often than not see them a day later. Usually it's, uh, our rule here is within the first 48 hours. Um, so I'll see them within the first couple of days afterwards, and they'll come in. And at that point, they've been able to get through at least one night of sleep. I can see if they're sleeping, if they're eating, if they've spoken to anyone, are they having any major, really strong emotional reactions. And so we're kind of looking to see what are you feeling, what are you thinking, what's happening, and, and is it kind of within the realm of what we would expect? And do you need any additional supports right now while you're in this sort of immediate short term after- aftermath? The only times that really I'm likely to say, "You're not ready to go back," are the, the ones that stand out are when, number one, the officer, him or herself, says, "I cannot do this right now. I, I need to-"

   24. JRJoe Rogan19:36

       How many times have you seen that?

   25. NPNancy Panza19:38

       It's rare. It's rare. I, I, I mean, maybe four times. (sighs)

   26. JRJoe Rogan19:45

       In how many years?

   27. NPNancy Panza19:48

       (sighs) Um, s- well, total years I've been doing this for about 15, but more recently out here in the last few is kind of what I'm thinking of, since I've been doing more then. Um, you know, uh, out of, out of a few hundred. Um, so it's not.

   28. JRJoe Rogan20:01

       And so, uh, what is the protocol? Like, how, how is that handled? Like, say, if there's an officer that can't go back, they say, "I just can't handle this right now."

   29. NPNancy Panza20:08

       Yeah.

   30. JRJoe Rogan20:08

       Maybe they see a horrific child murder or something like that.
8. 21:24 – 24:05

   Suicide risk and the ‘invisible’ officer: why the worst cases often aren’t post-incident

   1. JRJoe Rogan21:24

      That is a giant issue too.

   2. NPNancy Panza21:26

      Oh, uh, absolutely.

   3. JRJoe Rogan21:26

      I mean, suicide amongst police officers is a huge issue.

   4. NPNancy Panza21:29

      Huge. Although, it's much more likely to happen from somebody who has not recently been seen.

   5. JRJoe Rogan21:37

      What do you mean by that?

   6. NPNancy Panza21:37

      You know, these, the suicides that happen are the ones that are out there, they're still functioning on the job. We have no idea what's going on because nobody is checking in on that person's mental health.

   7. JRJoe Rogan21:47

      Okay. So it's not after seeing some horrific incident or being, uh, a part of a shooting.

   8. NPNancy Panza21:52

      Mm-hmm.

   9. JRJoe Rogan21:52

      It's just the overall stress of the job.

   10. NPNancy Panza21:55

       Right. That is one of the biggest problems out there. I feel like we do an okay job having these debriefings right afterwards 'cause we can monitor, we check back in periodically, and we keep touching, touching base until we're feeling, you know, comfortable that the person's good. We also, in those debriefings, get to educate them and say, "Hey, here are..." You know, I give them those flyers and say, "Look, here's what we know. Here's some good things to do. Here's some bad things to do. Here's what it might feel like. If any of these things are off, here's my information. Call me (laughs) and come back in."

   11. JRJoe Rogan22:26

       Is it a real problem with cops just not wanting to help? Because they're, because they're, you know-

   12. NPNancy Panza22:31

       The fear.

   13. JRJoe Rogan22:32

       The, the, the fear also and they're, they're tough guys.

   14. NPNancy Panza22:35

       Yes.

   15. JRJoe Rogan22:35

       A lot of them.

   16. NPNancy Panza22:35

       Absolutely.

   17. JRJoe Rogan22:35

       And tough girls.

   18. NPNancy Panza22:37

       They're tough.

   19. JRJoe Rogan22:37

       They're like, "I got it."

   20. NPNancy Panza22:38

       They, yes. I've, I've got this. I mean, the whole job is about being in control.

   21. JRJoe Rogan22:42

       Yeah.

   22. NPNancy Panza22:43

       Every scene you roll up on, you are in control. That command presence is necessary-

   23. JRJoe Rogan22:48

       Mm-hmm.

   24. NPNancy Panza22:48

       ... to be an officer. And so to not be in control, uh, it just feels terrible. Um, and I mean, for anybody, for any human, it's hard to make the call to a therapist and say, "I need a little help."

   25. JRJoe Rogan23:00

       Right.

   26. NPNancy Panza23:01

       Anybody who's made... who's thought, "You know what? I'm not doing so well right now. I really feel like I could use..." Picking up that phone and calling to seek help is a big deal. So for a police officer-

   27. JRJoe Rogan23:10

       There's a stigma, right?

   28. NPNancy Panza23:11

       Yeah. There's a stigma. There's a, "Do I really need this?" It just is hard to pick up and-

   29. JRJoe Rogan23:15

       You don't want to be the person that wants help all the time. Like, "Hey, figure it out yourself."

   30. NPNancy Panza23:19

       Right. And can this person really help me?
9. 24:05 – 27:35

   National standards vs local control: POST, small agencies, and “fundamentals”

   1. NPNancy Panza24:05

      Oh, there's, there's so many good things and pieces of advice and recommendation out there. One of the things that's kind of painful right now is, you know, every morning I get a, a news recap from the International Association of Chiefs of Police. They send this email out to all the, all the members of there, and they have, you know, they have psychological services group. And so I get these updates and I, I, I usually just kind of pass them over, but lately, with all the police reform, so just headlines from around the country. And the piecemeal randomness of, of this city is doing this, and this city is doing this, and this city is doing this, and this city... and it's all over the place, you know, same, that's driving me nuts.

   2. JRJoe Rogan24:44

      Mm-hmm.

   3. NPNancy Panza24:44

      'Cause I'm like, there's already been groups that have studied and reported and told us what we need to do to help the, the, the world of policing rise up and do better. We've-

   4. JRJoe Rogan24:55

      Yeah.

   5. NPNancy Panza24:55

      That information's out there from, from wonderful, brilliant people who've come together and have laid it out for us.It's there, but yet we, we don't have that national standard. Each state has certain, you know, uh, uh, most states have a group. Like in California, it's the California POST, um, you know, it's the Police Officer Standards and Training. So they set all the rules for, um, training requi- minimal training requirements for all the departments in California. So all the agencies, police agencies here in this state are, you know, need to comply with all of the POST recommendations. But they're all, you know, it's a minimum standard and our POST, California POST, is kind of heads and tails ahead of most of the country. Some, some states don't actually have that organization. Most do have something similar to like what we have. So they do set some standards, but there's so many things that are not included in that. Um-

   6. JRJoe Rogan25:50

      Mm-hmm.

   7. NPNancy Panza25:51

      And, and so it is a bit, y- you know, random. It's hard, I think, to make a one-size-fits-all, everybody must do this, because if you think about it, I think there's about 18,000 different police agencies in the US, and I think I read about 50% of those have 10 or fewer full-time officers. So, you know, when you've got podunk, tiny little town in the middle of, you know, the Midwest in a very rural county that, that's, you know, that's a whole lot different than LAPD.

   8. JRJoe Rogan26:21

      Right.

   9. NPNancy Panza26:22

      So it's, it's hard to have everybody on the same standard and the same expectations when we've got a lot of different makeups for a lot of different departments. That said, there are some fundamentals that I think every department should be held to. Um, and, and one of those is the debriefings after an incident, and the one that, that almost no one is doing that's been talked about for a while is regular mental wellness checks. You know, at this point, you get a psych eval when you're hired or before you're hired, and if you're in a critical incident, you may or may not get one. More, more are starting to do that. And then the only other time you're gonna be required to see the psychologist is if you have messed up and you're in trouble and you're referred for a fitness for duty evaluation. And at that point, your job is on the line. Someone is saying that they think you're not fit for duty, and that is a scary evaluation to have to be a, a part of. 'Cause then you're going in and, and yeah, if the psychologist judges and decides that you are not able to go back out, well then you're, then you're off duty until you can fix whatever that problem may be.

   10. JRJoe Rogan27:29

       Right. Well, uh, also, just for the public's health and welfare, it's important to do that.

   11. NPNancy Panza27:34

       Sure.

10. 27:35 – 28:35

    Preventing the next Minneapolis: annual wellness checks and catching ‘the dark path’ early

    1. JRJoe Rogan27:35

       I mean, there clearly are a lot of police officers that are unfit for duty. How, how do we stop what happened in Minneapolis? How do we stop that from, from happening or at least mitigate it?

    2. NPNancy Panza27:49

       So I mean, again, I, I see everything through my lens as a psychologist-

    3. JRJoe Rogan27:53

       Yes.

    4. NPNancy Panza27:53

       ... as a police psychologist. So I'm sure there are things beyond my realm that, that also answer this question. But for me, the things that I think we could be doing different that would really make a difference are the regular annual mental wellness checks. If, i- th- from my perspective, when I look at people like, you know, Derek Chauvin, the, the officer that, that murdered George Floyd, and we see what happened there, he... I would say, I would be willing to guess, and I, I don't know him, I've never met him, I don't know m- much about his career other than what I've read in the news and, and whatnot, police officers that get to that place become that.

    5. JRJoe Rogan28:33

       Right.

    6. NPNancy Panza28:33

       They're not that when they're hired.

    7. JRJoe Rogan28:35

       Right.

11. 28:35 – 1:00:06

    Hiring and screening: what psych evals can (and can’t) predict

    1. NPNancy Panza28:35

       To get hired as a cop, you have to go through what often takes a year-long application process where they are digging and poking into every aspect of your background, your life.

    2. JRJoe Rogan28:44

       Let's be clear though. That's in some places.

    3. NPNancy Panza28:47

       In-

    4. JRJoe Rogan28:47

       In other places, it's pretty easy.

    5. NPNancy Panza28:49

       It, again, smaller departments that don't have-

    6. JRJoe Rogan28:51

       Yeah.

    7. NPNancy Panza28:51

       ... the resources, probably-

    8. JRJoe Rogan28:52

       Right.

    9. NPNancy Panza28:52

       ... probably so.

    10. JRJoe Rogan28:53

        Yeah.

    11. NPNancy Panza28:54

        And then-

    12. JRJoe Rogan28:54

        I won't, I shouldn't say pretty easy. In comparison.

    13. NPNancy Panza28:57

        In comparison, yeah.

    14. JRJoe Rogan28:58

        Yeah.

    15. NPNancy Panza28:58

        But the vast majority of departments have a pretty, you know, have a, have a similar process-

    16. JRJoe Rogan29:02

        Mm-hmm.

    17. NPNancy Panza29:03

        ... in that you're gonna go through the application, you have to pass a written test, there's gonna be a, a background investigation-

    18. JRJoe Rogan29:09

        Mm-hmm.

    19. NPNancy Panza29:09

        ... which really I think is a hugely powerful key part, i- that it should be a well-done background investigation. Um, you know, they're talking to people who you know, people from your past, your landlord, your ex-wife, your girlfriend, your boyfriend-

    20. JRJoe Rogan29:21

        They have the resources-

    21. NPNancy Panza29:22

        ... your whoever.

    22. JRJoe Rogan29:22

        ... to do that for every single candidate?

    23. NPNancy Panza29:24

        They do. Now, some agencies take far more care than others.

    24. JRJoe Rogan29:27

        Right.

    25. NPNancy Panza29:28

        Um, the, the wide variety of people that I see that have passed their backgrounds, some agencies I work for send me the most amazingly clean candidates and others that are trying to hire a lot, uh, less squeaky clean. But they've, they've all gone through and it is, you know, gone through this background. They also do a polygraph. They do social media checks. They, you know, they make you list all your tattoos and you know, so they're, they're looking for... And if there is somebody who is just flagrantly racist, has, you know, you know, been out there toting white supremacy, like, they're gonna, they're gonna see that somewhere in that digging around.

    26. JRJoe Rogan30:03

        Mm-hmm.

    27. NPNancy Panza30:03

        So the, the, the blatant racist folks are likely weeded out during a good background process. Let's say maybe they're not as openly 'cause, you know, we all know that people know better than to admit to such things most of the time these days and it could be more subtle. So at that point, what comes next, you've got oral interviews with, you know, police administrators, um, a polygraph, you know, coming along in there. And once they pass all of that, that's when they come to the last, they get their conditional offer of employment. So they're basically like, "As long as you get through these last two steps, you're, you're good to go for the academy." And the last two steps are the medical evaluation and the psych eval. So by the time we get them, they have been heavily vetted, poked around, you know, and, and, and, and looked through in their past, and we get a, we get a pretty clean group of people. But then we get to do more digging and we get to ask questions at this point that they're not able to ask before, so about mental health and background and psychological treatment and history.And so, you know, by the ... And then if they get through these evaluations, then they go on to the academy. So for us, that vetting process, that psych eval, is a really important place. And I've had a lot of conversations with other psychologists, you know, in the past few months, like, "What are we missing?" I've had ... I, I taught a workshop a couple months ago for other police psychologists on, you know, some of the things we do in these pre-employments and had someone say, "How do we screen out the cops who kill?" And I said, "We can't." (laughs) And that was not a good answer. Uh, that we can't. We, we can't because we have to ... What we're doing here is predicting the future, right? We're, we're saying, "How do we know who is going to be that person who does that later?" Predicting the future's incredibly hard. Figuring out who may be un- uh, you know, subtly racist or biased is also incredibly hard. So y- that said, we do a whole lot of things. We've got our psychological test that we give. We ask a lot of crafty questions and we dig as deep as we can to try to, again, weed out anyone who we think could potentially become that person down the road who could be a cop who kills or who, you know, is racist and biased and is treating people improperly. So, uh, you know, that's one big thing that we wanna be very cautious and make sure we're doing a good job of screening up front. But I would say, um ... And so much more to say about the tests and the screening, but gets really nerdy and, and detailed. I would say that the officers who end up having the most problems are the ones who, once they get on, are in a department where that is the culture. That is, that, that, that those types of behaviors are acceptable. And that's bad.

    28. JRJoe Rogan32:42

        So as a young officer, they learn at that... Have you ever seen the documentary, The 7-5?

    29. NPNancy Panza32:47

        I have not.

    30. JRJoe Rogan32:48

        It's a great documentary about Michael Dowd-
12. 1:00:06 – 1:11:32

    Department culture, paramilitary hierarchy, and the code of silence

    1. NPNancy Panza1:00:06

       Um, I don't know. It sounded like... 'Cause I know they said two of the guys were pretty new on the job, um, and the other one, the one that you can see kind of standing in front had also been on the, on the force for a while. But I don't, I don't know which of the two had been on longer.

    2. JRJoe Rogan1:00:19

       The w- uh, the way the culture is... (clears throat) Excuse me. The way the culture is, the, the two that were new, if they saw him do that, it's not really... Is it... Is that a thing that they can say? If you're a new guy and you've been on the job for a couple months and there's a guy who's been on the job for 20 years and you see him doing something, is it your place-... I understand it's-

    3. NPNancy Panza1:00:41

       Yeah.

    4. JRJoe Rogan1:00:41

       ... your place as a human being.

    5. NPNancy Panza1:00:42

       Right.

    6. JRJoe Rogan1:00:43

       But w- how does the culture work?

    7. NPNancy Panza1:00:44

       It is a paramilitary environment where if someone is your superior, it is very hard to speak out against that person. So, that is m-... that is definitely a problem and something that, you know, to act out... And, and, and the culture in the department would be, yeah, if that's somebody who either is a higher rank than you or who's been on longer, mm, you know, especially if they're brand new and that's like their field training officer, um-

    8. JRJoe Rogan1:01:08

       Right.

    9. NPNancy Panza1:01:08

       ... you're, you're not gonna step in and tell them not to do that. That's not-

    10. JRJoe Rogan1:01:12

        And it kinda has to be that way.

    11. NPNancy Panza1:01:13

        It's not the way it's done. Yeah. Tha- that's, that's that paramilitary model. Um-

    12. JRJoe Rogan1:01:17

        So if you are, uh, shit out of luck and your superior officer is a psychopath-

    13. NPNancy Panza1:01:22

        Right.

    14. JRJoe Rogan1:01:22

        ... and he's doing something like that-

    15. NPNancy Panza1:01:24

        Yeah.

    16. JRJoe Rogan1:01:24

        ... if he doesn't kill that person and there's no complaint, what recourse does that person have? If they go to-

    17. NPNancy Panza1:01:33

        The person who was the victim-

    18. JRJoe Rogan1:01:34

        Yeah. (laughs)

    19. NPNancy Panza1:01:34

        ... or the other officer?

    20. JRJoe Rogan1:01:35

        The oth- um, the other officer that's there. Like, what recourse does that officer have if you're seeing someone abuse someone and you're new on the job, can you go to internal affairs? Like... And if you do, there's a stigma attached to that, correct?

    21. NPNancy Panza1:01:46

        Yeah. S- e-... There are ways to report fellow officers, yes. But would most people do that? It's a tough call. Yes, it happens, and some people do the right thing. But yeah, there's a cost that comes with that. I think one of the-

    22. JRJoe Rogan1:02:01

        The code of silence.

    23. NPNancy Panza1:02:01

        Yeah. Yeah.

    24. JRJoe Rogan1:02:02

        Yeah.

    25. NPNancy Panza1:02:02

        One o- one of the interesting reforms that lots of folks are talking about and some cities are passing is this requirement for other officers to say something. And, um, this is an interesting one. There's a lot of these piecemeal reforms that kinda make me go, "Ugh." Like, "Okay, it's fine, but I don't know that that's gonna make much change." Um, this one makes me stop and think and I, I wonder if maybe it will. Maybe it will. I, I don't know. I, I, uh, I see it could go both ways, where it could be something that's helpful if there's a safe mechanism for people to report. But, you know, i- in that situation, you know, thinking about the, the George Floyd situation, you know, if those... i- if two of those officers had said, "Hey, you need to back off," and again, still if they're inferior to him, you know-

    26. JRJoe Rogan1:02:50

        What happens in the culture?

    27. NPNancy Panza1:02:50

        ... what are the odds- Yeah. What are the odds that he's not gonna tell them, you know-

    28. JRJoe Rogan1:02:54

        Right.

    29. NPNancy Panza1:02:54

        ... "Screw you." Like, "I'm-"

    30. JRJoe Rogan1:02:55

        Right.

Episode duration: 1:54:52