This is a term that shouldn't even exist, yet here we are as cops murdering people has become so normalized.
I've been watching Live PD, which has several "suicide by cop" incidents. Most of the time, the preparator is someone with obvious mental health problems (with their family members often telling police this and begging them not to kill them). Many of these incidents are also domestic disputes that have escalated with cops called to the scene to quote on quote "de-escalate" the situation by coming out waving guns around and threatening to shoot.
This is what happens when you cut budgets for mental health and social workers. Police have replaced jobs that they would normally have in situations like this and the result of some fucked up term like "suicide by cop" coming into play.
What they are really doing is saying it's 100% A-OK for cops to murder people like this and it is the dehumanization of people with mental health concerns and the casual victims of police.
On Live PD, all they ever do is vocally defend this and make it a point to blame the victim. "They obviously were suicidal, begging to die and wanted to go out with suicide by cop".
my heart goes out to your friend... fuck involuntary hospitalization. it causes more problems than it helps (if you're lucky and it helps at all).
but yea, it's like, "spend a few days in the psych ward and come out without a job and in hella debt and worse off than before but like now at least you won't seek help in the future when you're feeling suicidal"