FirstFreedom
Moderator
Vote in the poll please.
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So where are gun owners' opinions on the NICS & mental illness, now after VT?
- Thread starter FirstFreedom
- Start date
FirstFreedom
Moderator
Well crap man - stupid software made me limit each choice to under 100 words - 4 of my 7 were way over; had to edit 4 thousand times to get 2, 3, & 4 to come in under 100; now you can vote, badbod; thank you for your interest. 
FirstFreedom
Moderator
OR,
Perhaps one might even advocate a hybrid system, such as:
1. "Adjudicated mentally defective" means no gun for you, period. This will be after you've gotten your day in court and had a lawyer and presented your defense to the fullest extent you choose to. You should get a second bite at the apple in court to prove you're not whacko, if you are initially adjudicated when under age 21. Or perhaps get a new hearing, if you choose to, every 5 years or 10 years; that would be even fairer. The national standards for state reporting will be set and mandated to the federal NICS system; the feds must fund this mandate; no unfunded mandates.
BUT
2. "A Psychiatrist (an M.D., not someone with a bachelor's degree) has certified you a danger to others", whether through voluntary or involuntary examination, means you're delayed 15 days before you can get the gun, during which time the FBI, local police, or any other party in interest can attempt to begin a proceeding to get you adjudicated mentally defective by a court, but if they fail to start such proceedings within 15 days, then you get your gun. If they do start such a proceeding, then you are delayed until the conclusion of the adjudication; then you're either cleared or not, based on the outcome. The Psych can NOT certify you a danger to others without interviewing you at least once; i.e. he/she cannot do an ex parte shaft job on someone, based merely on the "tattling" of others.
How's about that? Too onerous and violative of 2A?
Perhaps one might even advocate a hybrid system, such as:
1. "Adjudicated mentally defective" means no gun for you, period. This will be after you've gotten your day in court and had a lawyer and presented your defense to the fullest extent you choose to. You should get a second bite at the apple in court to prove you're not whacko, if you are initially adjudicated when under age 21. Or perhaps get a new hearing, if you choose to, every 5 years or 10 years; that would be even fairer. The national standards for state reporting will be set and mandated to the federal NICS system; the feds must fund this mandate; no unfunded mandates.
BUT
2. "A Psychiatrist (an M.D., not someone with a bachelor's degree) has certified you a danger to others", whether through voluntary or involuntary examination, means you're delayed 15 days before you can get the gun, during which time the FBI, local police, or any other party in interest can attempt to begin a proceeding to get you adjudicated mentally defective by a court, but if they fail to start such proceedings within 15 days, then you get your gun. If they do start such a proceeding, then you are delayed until the conclusion of the adjudication; then you're either cleared or not, based on the outcome. The Psych can NOT certify you a danger to others without interviewing you at least once; i.e. he/she cannot do an ex parte shaft job on someone, based merely on the "tattling" of others.
How's about that? Too onerous and violative of 2A?
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TheBluesMan
Moderator Emeritus
As stated in this thread: http://www.thefiringline.com/forums/showthread.php?t=245678 the issue is NOT about keeping guns out of the hands of the mentally unstable, but rather keeping guns in the hands of the general population so the unstable cannot kill without opposition like at VT.
-Dave
-Dave
FirstFreedom
Moderator
I totally agree with that, as a separate matter. The first and most important thing is to arm folks, and eliminate gun-free zones. But it doesn't hurt to attack the problem from multiple angles - they are not mutually exclusive. Provided, of course, that the 2A is not violated.
There are a few problems with adding a mental health check to a NICS type check.
1. I suspect there is not a central U.S. Database of mentally ill people. Not sure, but I suspect there isn't.
2. Lots of mental illness never gets treated/reported.
3. Episodes of mental illness can occur at any point in life. That person may own a gun already, or have never gotten help and still be eligible to buy one.
If you want to go down a slippery slope, get into mental illness stuff. There are degrees of it. Where do you draw the line? Medication can fix a lot of it. What if they don't take their meds? And the biggest issue of all, who is going to pay to have everyone evaluated? I happen to have a close relative who is mentally ill and indigent. Let me tell you that the systems in place to help people like that are pathetic. You'd be better off certifying people who COULD own guns... But wait, isn't that gun control?
There's not an easy answer to this.
1. I suspect there is not a central U.S. Database of mentally ill people. Not sure, but I suspect there isn't.
2. Lots of mental illness never gets treated/reported.
3. Episodes of mental illness can occur at any point in life. That person may own a gun already, or have never gotten help and still be eligible to buy one.
If you want to go down a slippery slope, get into mental illness stuff. There are degrees of it. Where do you draw the line? Medication can fix a lot of it. What if they don't take their meds? And the biggest issue of all, who is going to pay to have everyone evaluated? I happen to have a close relative who is mentally ill and indigent. Let me tell you that the systems in place to help people like that are pathetic. You'd be better off certifying people who COULD own guns... But wait, isn't that gun control?
There's not an easy answer to this.
I classify these kind of arguments as "Wally" reasons. (from Dilbert).
In other words, if we can do something that will cure say, 90% of a problem, but because of the 10% it won't help, it's just not worth doing anything.
I used to work with a guy that would spend hours coming up with reasons why he shoudn't do something that would only take him an hour to just do in the first place.
mikejonestkd
New member
The mental health system has gaps and flaws, there are too many instances where mentally ill people are allowed to remain a danger to themselves and others without any standardized reporting to health care agencies and to NICS. My opinon goes beyond the NICS reporting, too othen these people are not given proper care and monitoring and tradegies like VT end up happening.
less than half of the states report their mental health data to NICS? Time to close to gap, IMO...
less than half of the states report their mental health data to NICS? Time to close to gap, IMO...
One thing that your poll does not take into consideration is that the NICS check did not fail
The Va reporting system did (assuming that we will agree that the check is valid, nother debate all together)
As explained by Bartholomew Roberts
On a national standard the shooter had been declared mentally defective but not under Va rules
Va cannot be forced to comply with federal reporting regulations
The National IC would have worked as it was designed to work if Virginia had followed National disqualifier standards
The Va reporting system did (assuming that we will agree that the check is valid, nother debate all together)
As explained by Bartholomew Roberts
On a national standard the shooter had been declared mentally defective but not under Va rules
Va cannot be forced to comply with federal reporting regulations
The National IC would have worked as it was designed to work if Virginia had followed National disqualifier standards
FirstFreedom
Moderator
I see what you're saying joab, and you're right, but implicit in choice #3 is that the new law would set standards of reporting and require accurate reporting both at the state level and to the federal NICS system. HOWEVER, I still do not think that choice #3 would have kicked in for the VT shooting, because he was NOT "adjudicated mentally ill", and I personally don't like choice #4 ("certified as danger to other by psych") - I think that it's too ripe for abuse and violative of the 2A, absent the 15 day default hybrid system I described in my post #4 above. Read my hybrid system proposal carefully and tell me what you think.
104 views; 23 votes. Less than 25% participation from forum members. With that level of apathy among gun owners, it's no wonder gun bans get passed.
I thought that originally we had a law like #3 and the argument was over who was going to foot the costs involved. The Court (USSC?) found that the Feds couldn't pass/enforce a regulation/law without funding its cost.
IOW, the individual States were expected to pay for the reporting. Maybe this needs to be revisited......
IOW, the individual States were expected to pay for the reporting. Maybe this needs to be revisited......
It is great to want to allow everyone arms first and foremeost to provide for their own defense. That will not happen. Human nature is that the vast majority of people will not go through the effort to arm and prepare them selves for a posible nightmare scenario like VT. Even in the most "liberal" meaning free, gun states the amount of people who CCW is a very small percentage of the population. Even in the old west not everybody walked around with a gun on their hip.
Understanding the above I see no reasoin in not embracing a system that will work to prevent the legal transfer of a firearm to a person who has been adjucated as mentally defective and a danger to others. Could they get something illegaly? Certainly. We know the VT shooter was able to buy the weapons legally, and that just shouldn't have been possible.
There must be a set system and it must be challengable in court.
Understanding the above I see no reasoin in not embracing a system that will work to prevent the legal transfer of a firearm to a person who has been adjucated as mentally defective and a danger to others. Could they get something illegaly? Certainly. We know the VT shooter was able to buy the weapons legally, and that just shouldn't have been possible.
There must be a set system and it must be challengable in court.
I think that's the most benign check you can have to any restriction on our freedoms. If NICS is necessary, then we must certainly make our status in it reviewable. IMO, because you threatened to commit suicide at 18 shouldn't disqualify you from buying a firearm when you're 68 and have lead a normal life. (Fine to me, if you're like Cho and threatened to commit suicide last week or last month or sometime recently, and were "committed" or whatnot).
I still don't think any check would have prevented this, he could just as well have gone to a website that showed how to make pipe bombs from kitchen chemicals, but
If we must have a National Instant Check System it should have National standards with no loopholes
He was adjudicated mentally ill by those unenforceable national standards but not by the reported Virginia standards
The only way I see to prevent this in the future while still allowing the states to run their own check system is for the states to be required to access a national data base for their checks
So I'll go with #3 for the purposes of this discussion
But no check system will be effective if the government does not prosecute those that lie to get around it.
To date I don't believe that anyone has ever been prosecuted for providing false information on a 4473
One more thing
The ratio of participation may be skewed by people like me who typically just check the User CP and check in on discussion that they are involved with if nothing new or pertinent has been added to their comment or nothing that they can add to a new comment they just go away.
I think I have been back three or four times without posting
If we must have a National Instant Check System it should have National standards with no loopholes
He was adjudicated mentally ill by those unenforceable national standards but not by the reported Virginia standards
The only way I see to prevent this in the future while still allowing the states to run their own check system is for the states to be required to access a national data base for their checks
So I'll go with #3 for the purposes of this discussion
But no check system will be effective if the government does not prosecute those that lie to get around it.
To date I don't believe that anyone has ever been prosecuted for providing false information on a 4473
One more thing
The ratio of participation may be skewed by people like me who typically just check the User CP and check in on discussion that they are involved with if nothing new or pertinent has been added to their comment or nothing that they can add to a new comment they just go away.
I think I have been back three or four times without posting
JuanCarlos
New member
Yes and no. Since a majority of people still wouldn't have bothered to carry he'd still have been able to kill quite a few people before somebody intervened...and I'd say 12 people dead, while better than 30, isn't so great.
As for the standard that should result in a "flag" in an instant background check...any psych dealing with somebody should have to answer a simple question, which is really only a modification of the current question: If this person was trying to buy a gun, would you consider them a threat to themselves or others. If yes, you fail an instant background check and must instead undergo further examination/screening before being able to purchase one (so not outright barred from doing so, just denied "instant" access).
As for what to do if we run into anti-gun shrinks who just flag everybody? I don't know, sue them for malpractice? Shoot them?
I don't have all the answers, but I do know that I don't think this particular kid should have been able to walk into a store and buy a gun. I think any of the mental health professionals who dealt with him, had they known he was walking into a store to buy a gun, would probably have tried to stop him.
I disagree.
A person should not have his rights denied ( anymore than now)without due process. One person's opinion, no matter how educated is not due process.
The system works as it is as far as denying those that have been adjudicated mentally unstable.
The failure here is that the state did not consider this guy adjudicated.
Same old story
There is no need for more gun laws when all they have to do is enforce the ones they already inflict upon us
***That's the problem, drawing the line. Obviously no one wants insane people to have firearms, but how and by whom is insanity defined?
"Mental illness" can be anything from washing your hands too much to being a raving violent maniac. From what I've read so far, Cho had no history of violence or threatening behavior. He was quiet, unsocial, strange, and pestered a couple girls who found him "annoying" but not scary. This wasn't deemed crazy enough to be involuntarily committed to a locked asylum and forcibly medicated, maybe for life. Would it be now?
Personally, I don't see how a free society can be guaranteed that nothing like the VA Tech shooting will ever happen again, even with draconian gun laws, short of taking guns away from absolutely everyone.