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and human services in their area, is easier to remember. In North Dakota the 211 service is available statewide, but in South Dakota, 211 only works in metro areas and the Black Hills; the alternate number is (605) 339-4357.
• Those numbers are for prevention before a crisis. If the situation gets to the point that a person says, "I want to die, and I have a plan," 911 is the number to call.
• Owen explained that often both law enforcement and an ambulance are dispatched to respond to a threat of suicide. The ambulance is for the most part there as support to the efforts to help the person and as backup in case the person does do harm to him- or herself, but if there is no medical need yet, their authority in the situation is limited.
• "EMS cannot transport someone against their will if they are competent to make their own decisions," Owen said. 
• But law enforcement can--they can put the person into protective custody and transport him or her to an appropriate facility if that is deemed necessary.
• Jeremy Wellnitz, chief of police in Clark, S.D., said they will go to the place where the person is and see if he or she will talk to them.
• "We will try and find out what's going on and why they are feeling the way they are," Wellnitz said. "We will do what we can to get the person the help they need."
• "Generally what happens in a case like this is that we get a phone call from a friend, a neighbor or a family member, and they tell us, hey, this person is having some real problems," said Faulk County (S.D.) Sheriff Kurt Hall. "So we go out to see them (and) try to figure out what has brought the friend or the neighbor to this point where they've thought that they should call us to the scene, and talk to that

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