Threat Reported Before Colorado Shooting

Campus police are different beasts from the regular police. They have a hidden agenda in some institutions to try to minimize what might be negative publicity for the institution. This has been discussed in the campus safety world. While seemingly shocking for rampages, it is common for valued athletes or kids of the important.
 
It looks like what is missing is a clear protocol to be followed by law enforcement upon receiving information from a mental health professional that someone appears to be a danger to himself or others.
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Yes, this was sort of my point with the OP. Instead of focusing on this admittedly difficult issue they opted to implement additional restrictions on law abiding citizens.

It seems some in our society are much more comfortable implementing regulations that impact everyone instead of focusing on the limited number of citizens that actually cause problems.
 
Glenn, that is often true for rapes. In one central Florida case, an obvious rape-murder was even initially ruled a suicide, because the college in question did not want to scare away female students or financial patrons.
 
Glenn E. Meyer said:
Campus police are different beasts from the regular police. They have a hidden agenda in some institutions to try to minimize what might be negative publicity for the institution. This has been discussed in the campus safety world. While seemingly shocking for rampages, it is common for valued athletes or kids of the important.
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This is what I was alluding to in post #11. I live in a multi-university area and I shoot at a range where campus cops shoot and train. Despite being sworn law enforcement, they simply do not have the same outlook regarding general duty to society as municipal, county, or state LEOs.
 
Has the presidents executive orders been published yet ? It's my understanding one of them and maybe more will effect this very issue . I know one was reported to be a way to make it easier for health officials to report these things and a letter explaining that they can do this ( report mentally unstable or dangerous people ) . I may be a little off on this but I do remember a couple of them relating to this issue .
 
They had no force of law. Some states like NY have passed laws that have mental health reporting provisions that seem to be unconstitutional. Such as seizure of property based on mental health reports. Quite a few mental health professionals worry about confidentiality, informed consent to clients before starting therapy and legal liability.

This conflicts with most therapists probably being antigun.

Hasn't played out yet.
 
It looks like what is missing is a clear protocol to be followed by law enforcement upon receiving information from a mental health professional that someone appears to be a danger to himself or others.
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While I think law enforcement could have done more, I don't know how much of a threat to society that occurred. In other words, that Holmes shot up a theater wasn't something seen coming by anybody, even Fenton. I am sure that Holmes was not the first patient that she had that expressed homicidal thoughts. However, the fear of homicide wasn't a sufficient concern for Fenton to report Holmes to the police as a danger to himself or others. It was not until receiving the texts threatening her at which time she was obligated to report the problem.

"Dr. Fenton advised that through her contact with James Holmes she was reporting, per her requirement, his danger to the public due to homicidal statements he had made. Additionally, Dr. Fenton was advising that she had been treating Holmes, and that Holmes had stopped seeing her and had begun threatening her via text messages."
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http://www.slate.com/articles/news_...es_holmes_psychiatrist_warned_university.html

And if the affidavits are correct, information about Holmes’ homicidal statements and danger to the public were deemed sufficient to trigger a warning to the university police, but not to the police who protect the rest of us. Why not?
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This is the crux of the problem, I think. If I am reading the course of events correctly, we have multiple things going on that in hindsight look really terrible, but would not have looked the same at the time and projecting forward. The threat, as being reported, really wasn't to society at large, but to Dr. Fenton. Dr. Fenton didn't report to the police that Holmes was a danger to society per se, but to her, and only after threatened texts were sent to her after Holmes stopped seeing her. It isn't that the rest of us weren't being protected because that sort of society concern was not what triggered the call to police. With that said, it doesn't sound like the police did much to deal with the threat to Fenton, herself

So was protocol missed in protecting society? Maybe-maybe not from the "society" perspective. Police took a report from a mental health professional about a threat to her with supporting information that backed her concerns, but she, as the mental health professional didn't report that she thought society was at risk or indicated that mass murder was a concern. So we have warning signs, but not warning signs for what happened. Holmes didn't even act against Fenton...for which there were definite warning signs.

Maybe somebody else has found testimony that she reported that Holmes threatened mass murder, spree killing, or the like in the therapy sessions and that she reported this to the police, but I have not found such information thus far.
 
Double Naught Spy said:
While I think law enforcement could have done more, I don't know how much of a threat to society that occurred...
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That's where the process apparently fell short.

The first step was to get him on the radar. That apparently took place. The second step would have been some preliminary evaluation to decide if some intervention was called for. It's not clear whether anyone really considered that question. Either someone did and [mistakenly] concluded that a warning was sufficient; or no one did, and the campus police just went through the "warning" motions because they didn't know what else to do.
 
Has there ever been a definitive answer to the question of that package of drawings (or whatever they were) that were mailed to Dr. Fenton shortly before the theater attack, and after Holmes had stopped being treated by Dr. Fenton? At the time just after the shooting, my recollection is that it was being claimed that the package arrived at the university but was not delieverd to Dr. Fenton -- or that she had received it but not opened it -- or that she opened it but hadn't read it -- or ...

This, I believe, is the information that was "leaked" by the authorities and is the package of material that is now in the possession of Holmes' defense team. Has there ever been a straight answer as to just where that package went, and when?
 
Sheer speculation - but as I said before - they knew what to do overtly or as a subconscious paradigm - don't do anything that might embarass the school UNLESS you have a true, active threat (the guy is on his way).

Hope it will blow over and if he goes nuts, it will be elsewhere.

The legions of reports on how campuses cover up misbehavior is simply the best answer.
 
I think this is a really good point, Glenn, and deserves a lot more attention. Didn't something similar happen with Jared Loughner at Pima Community College? As I recall, both faculty and students expressed concern about his behavior, including that he was someone with potential for violence -- and he had several run-ins with campus police before school officials finally took action. They just suspended him and told him he needed a shrink to sign off on him before he could come back.

Make him someone else's problem, all they wanted was that he shouldn't be theirs... :mad:
 
The legions of reports on how campuses cover up misbehavior is simply the best answer.
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Kinda where I am with this. The protect the reputation of the institution first and the safety of others second attitude. This is hopefully a case of learning from our mistakes and not letting it happen again.
 
2 different cases but is this not the order things should happen . (- the police doing nothing ) . I would think this order would be what we as citizens would want . No one person or group can arbitrarily commit someone . If each person and or group did there part things may have turned out different in both cases . I place the blame on the police in CO for not even interviewing him , but as has been said many many time on this forum . The cops are not here to prevent crimes . They are here to show up five or ten minutes after . (hmm) If there was only a law out there that makes it illegal to kill somebody , maybe this would not have happened :rolleyes:

They just suspended him and told him he needed a shrink to sign off on him before he could come back.
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She reported him to Police and University Officials as required by law.
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There is a reason it is required by law . Its so law enforcement can do something to stop it . Not so she can cover her or keep banging on the drum till someone does something about it . Blaming her in any way is bull IMO she did her part .

Apparently the Police took no action
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This whole thing stinks of it's everybody's fault , there fore there is nobody to blame for dropping the ball .
 
I attended a small, private college in the early 1960s. We didn't have campus cops in the sense of sworn law enforcement officers with guns and arrest power. We had campus "security," which was an elderly guy wandering around the campus at night and sticking a key in his clock thing on each floor of each dorm to show that he had performed his duly appointed rounds. I guess if he saw anything going down his job was to call the city cops, because he couldn't have taken on a trio of kindergartners.

But even that campus now has sworn officers as campus police. So perhaps the answer lies with the state legislatures and police accrediting agencies, who allow campus cops to perform the way they do (ignoring problems as long as they don't bring attention to the employer university). Maybe when things like this come to light the states should revoke the certifications of the campus forces involved. If you're not going to do the job, you shouldn't be wearing the badge and carrying the gun.
 
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