Andy O'Hara

Executive Director, the Badge of Life

Andy O'Hara is a military veteran and 24-year officer and sergeant of the California Highway Patrol who spent his last day of law enforcement sitting on the bedroom floor with his gun, trying to decide whether to shoot himself in the mouth or side of the head. Hospitalized twice with the effects of his post-traumatic stress, he has written on this topic and spoken to numerous groups about the importance of this new program. Through those presentations, he has realized how well received and effective the message truly is. He is a member of the California Peer Support Association, the International Police Association, the Association of Traumatic Stress Specialists (ATSS), and works as a peer volunteer with the West Coast Post-Trauma Retreat (WCPR).

The Badge of Life (BOL), a psychological survival program for police officers, is a nonprofit charitable organization dedicated to assisting departments in both the United States and Canada with their suicide prevention programs. It is a gathering of retired police trauma survivors from both countries, joined with medical experts and researchers in the field, borrowing upon personal experiences and knowledge to promote new mental healthcare tactics for individual officers and departments.

The BOL website includes the tracking and actual profiling of current police suicides with the goal of assisting researchers and planners in identifying causes and patterns that can further prevention programs. The focus of BOL goes beyond "just" suicide and into the realm of "mental health for all officers" by inviting and encouraging new ideas and enhancements to improve the quality of life for law enforcement officers everywhere.

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