Community | February 06, 2011 | 5 comments

States Struggle to Disarm People Who’ve Lost Right to Own Guns

source: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/06/us/06guns.html?_r=2&smid=tw-nytimespolitics

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WakeUpPeople

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/06/us/06guns.html?_r=2&smid=tw-nytimes...

By law, Roy Perez should not have had a gun three years ago when he shot his mother 16 times in their home in Baldwin Park, Calif., killing her, and then went next door and killed a woman and her 4-year-old daughter.

Mr. Perez, who pleaded guilty to three counts of murder and was sentenced last year to life in prison, had a history of mental health issues. As a result, even though in 2004 he legally bought the 9-millimeter Glock 26 handgun he used, at the time of the shootings his name was in a statewide law enforcement database as someone whose gun should be taken away, according to the authorities.

The case highlights a serious vulnerability when it comes to keeping guns out of the hands of the mentally unstable and others, not just in California but across the country.

In the wake of the Tucson shootings, much attention has been paid to various categories of people who are legally barred from buying handguns — those who have been “adjudicated as a mental defective,” have felony convictions, have committed domestic violence misdemeanors and so on. The focus has almost entirely been on gaps in the federal background check system that is supposed to deny guns to these prohibited buyers.

There is, however, another major blind spot in the system.

Tens of thousands of gun owners, like Mr. Perez, bought their weapons legally but under the law should no longer have them because of subsequent mental health or criminal issues. In Mr. Perez’s case, he had been held involuntarily by the authorities several times for psychiatric evaluation, which in California bars a person from possessing a gun for five years.

Policing these prohibitions is difficult, however, in most states. The authorities usually have to stumble upon the weapon in, say, a traffic stop or some other encounter, and run the person’s name through various record checks.
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5 comments // States Struggle to Disarm People Who’ve Lost Right to Own Guns

  • good_stuff
    • +1
      good_stuff  

    • Could this guy not have done the exact same thing with a knife, ax, sledge hammer, etc.? In reality, it probably saved more lives since he was using a gun which alerted police to the fact that he was killing people (i.e. sombody heard the gunshots).

      I agree that crazy people are scarey, but I don't think anything here indicated that without the gun the deaths would not have occurred. Crazy people do crazy things regardless of how much you, I, or the government try to stop them.

    • 2 years ago
  • WakeUpPeople
    • 0
      WakeUpPeople  
    • good_stuff:

      In essence we could kill each other with rocks, but that doesn't mean that we should eliminate all gun control laws. I can't back this up, but I imagine that it is easier to shoot someone from across the room rather than charging at them with a knife and killing someone in close proximity. I personally feel that it is a good idea to take guns away from those who are CLEARLY unfit and unworthy members of society. This article just highlights the issue of guns that were legally bought, but afterward the owners were proven to be dangerous. What then? Are laws being enforced to relinquish them of their firearms?

    • 2 years ago
  • bking74
    • 0
      bking74  

    • Of course it's no surprise that I am extremely pro-gun. I have several fire arms in my home and of course weapons are a tool of my trade. I have always practiced safe gun safety in my home and I have trained my young wife in the use and safety of fire arms. While we live on an Army base and she should be safer there the any other communty. I spend a lot of time away from home. But, being pro-fire arm and surrounding myself both in my personal and professional life with fire arms I firmly believe in strict fire arm laws, over sight and the right to owe fire arm is a right and as a right it should be revoked if needed. Local law enfrocement lacks the rescources to properly track down those fire owners who no longer should have access to their fire arms. Is the American public willing to pay higher taxes to increase the proper law enforcement over sight it would be needed to remove fire arms from those once legal owners who have lost the RIGHT to legally own firearms.

    • 2 years ago
  • Paratus
    • +1
      Paratus  

    • Yeah and in some states if you are involuntarily committed to a 72 hour psych eval which ANY law enforcement or family member can do will loose your 2A rights. In Maryland, merely being charged with a crime regardless of disposition can get you disbarred, being a respondent to a domestic stay away order will guarantee you a visit from the local storm troopers. How about we apply the same logic to the right against self incrimination or the Fourth Amendment rights. "Shall not be infringed" means exactly that.

    • 2 years ago
  • kennymotown

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