Law Enforcement Deemed Mentally ‘Fit To Serve’ May Not Be


Many Houston area law enforcement officers, thousands of them, are working with tainted certifications of their mental and emotional health.

Last year, Houston psychologist Dr. Carole Busick, was indicted for three counts of tampering with a government record for issuing L-3 documents without meeting the minimum professional standards. The L-3 is the certification deeming the officer or officer candidate, mentally and emotionally fit to serve.


By law, psychologists who issue the L-3 are supposed to meet face-to-face with the applicants as part of the examination. Busick only conducted face-to-face meetings if specifically requested for an individual.

While the law enforcement agencies and their governing bodies acknowledge that the insufficient exams are problematic, the licenses of the thousands of law enforcement workers who recieved L-3s through Busick have not been invalidated.

The Texas Commission On Law Enforcement (TCOLE) advises agencies in the area that it is in their best interest to have licensees certified by Busick reexamined, but because it isn’t mandatory, only a fraction of them have done so. Only 82 of the 1,860 current employees of the Harris County Sheriff’s Office originally screened by Busick, have been recertified. The Sheriff has the largest number of impacted officers.

“Obviously, there’s a system in place, an early warning system to make sure officers are mentally sound,” said Philip H. Hilder, a Houston criminal defense attorney. “They do have very stressful jobs, and the purpose of having a psych eval is to safeguard the public. And if that’s not being done, it’s really problematic.” 

TCOLE launched an investigation into Busick after it recieved a complaint from a law enforcement applicant that his evaluation by her consisted entirely of issuing a worn, marked up copy of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory, a common personality test. The would-be officer paid $100 and received an L-3, the signed document clearing him or her to be hired by any police department.

“I’m not sure this was a real ‘evaluation,’ ” the applicant said in a written complaint obtained by the Houston Chronicle. “I wondered if my experience means there are some … deputies out there carrying weapons who had similar ‘evaluations’ as mine? If so, could there be some crazy deputies in Houston carrying weapons?”


The answer is “yes”, but many law enforcement agencies aren’t moving to protect the officers or the citizens.

“At this point in time, we can’t tell them ‘you must do this,’ and obviously there are some financial implications there,” said Gretchen Grigsby, the government relations director for TCOLE. “We have worked with them to the best we can. (But) there are some liability concerns down the line if (they) don’t.”

This appears to be a risk they are willing to take.

Featured image by G20, through Flickr with Creative Commons License, SA 2.0