Maine mass killer showed a series of dangerous mental illness symptoms

Investigative report: Why did no one even try to implement Maine's Yellow Flag law, to help prevent the mass killer from murdering 18 innocent people in Lewiston, Maine on October 25, 2023? 

How Maine can start fixing its gun laws echo editorial opinion published in the Boston Globe:

Last week’s Lewiston bloodbath is fast becoming a national case study in how one state’s porous system about firearms regulation made it far too easy for a gunman to kill 18 people.
By The Editorial Board November 3, 2023

As details about last week’s massacre of 18 innocent people in Lewiston, Maine, continue to trickle out, one fact stands out with piercing clarity: Just how many people believed the shooter was in deteriorating mental health and a potential danger to himself or others.

And one other: The shooter, Robert Card, was a skilled marksman who owned numerous guns, among them powerful assault weapons.

The Lewiston bloodbath is fast becoming a national case study in how one state’s porous system of firearms regulation — the most lax in the Northeast — made it far too easy for a demonstrably threatening man to bring an assault weapon into a restaurant and bowling alley to kill 18 fellow citizens.

Maine Governor Janet T. Mills announced Wednesday she will form an independent commission to investigate “what more could have been done to prevent this tragedy from occurring.” 

Meanwhile, strengthening Maine’s gun laws — and in particular, enacting a so-called red flag law allowing authorities to temporarily remove firearms from people deemed threats to themselves or others — should be the first order of business for the Maine Legislature when it returns to business early next year.

In May, Card’s teenage son and former wife told a deputy in the Sagadahoc County Sheriff’s Department that the shooter was hearing voices and had recently picked up 10 to 15 guns that had been stored with his brother. Card’s brother told the same deputy that Card seemed angry and paranoid. Several people in Card’s Army Reserve unit also told the deputy that they were concerned about his mental health and wanted him to get care.

In July, Card got into fights with fellow reservists because he thought they were insulting him, prompting unit commanders to have Card involuntarily committed to a mental health hospital in New York. After that commitment, the Army told Card’s commander that he should not have a weapon, handle ammunition, or participate in live-fire activity while on duty. 

That order does not appear to have prevented Card from purchasing or possessing guns as a civilian, the Globe reported.

In September, Card’s Army Reserve commanders requested a “wellness check” from the Sagadahoc County Sheriff’s Department after Card punched a fellow reservist who had warned him “he was going to get into trouble talking about shooting up places and people.” That fellow reservist also sent texts to a training supervisor warning that Card “has guns and is going to shoot up the drill center at Saco and other places.” The reservist urged the Reserve to change a base passcode so that Card could not get access to firearms.

Sheriff’s deputies did visit Card’s home twice, but he did not answer the door. And that, apparently, was that. But what is uniquely galling here is that the sheriff’s department or other law enforcement officials could have done more, even under Maine’s weak gun laws.

Indeed, Card seems a textbook example for using the state’s yellow flag law, under which officials could have taken him into custody, sought a mental health determination about his threatening nature, and had a judge order the temporary confiscation of his firearms. Why those authorities chose not to use that law — did they even know it exists? — should be part of the commission’s review of this case.

But beyond the halting response to the brightly flashing warning signs about Card, this massacre underscores the need for Maine to enact stronger measures, starting with a red flag law. Those laws, which have been passed in 21 states plus the District of Columbia, allow law enforcement agencies, and sometimes others including relatives, prosecutors, and health care providers, to petition courts to have firearms temporarily confiscated from people deemed by a judge to be a threat to themselves or others.

The laws require fewer steps than Maine’s yellow flag law and have been found by researchers to prevent both suicides and mass shootings, according to studies compiled by the Center for Gun Violence Solutions at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

Lisa Geller, the senior advisor for implementation at the center, said the yellow flag law is not only ineffective for addressing imminent risks but also doesn’t address the fact that many potentially violent people do not have diagnosable mental health problems. “We argue it should be based on risk factors for violent behavior, not mental health diagnoses,” she told the Globe editorial board.

There are many other important gun safety measures that Maine needs, none of which would seriously limit the ability of law-abiding, qualified people to purchase or possess firearms. Those include universal background checks, limits on the size of magazines, waiting periods for purchasing weapons, and a ban on assault weapons, the military-style firearms designed for swift and efficient mass killing.

Under Maine’s legislative rules, the Democratic-controlled Legislature next year cannot take up bills that were disposed of during their session earlier this year, a category that includes some of the above measures.

But Governor Janet Mills, also a Democrat, can introduce any legislation she chooses, and she absolutely should exercise that power come the new year to propose major gun safety measures, including a red flag law. She has opposed many of these measures in the past, but post-Lewiston, she has said that she is “not taking anything off the table.”

“I believe action is needed — what that action will be must be the product of a broad discussion among a diverse group of voices,” the governor said this week. “The people of Maine deserve this.”

Supporters of gun rights in the Maine Legislature — and there are many of them — would do well to listen to the governor and to heed the change of heart shown by Representative Jared Golden, who announced his support for an assault weapon ban after the massacre in Lewiston, his hometown. The facts on the ground demand as much. The families of the victims are owed much more.

Editorials represent the views of the Boston Globe Editorial Board. Follow us @GlobeOpinion.

Mental illness did not prevent the Lewiston shooter from getting access to multiple guns

Echo report published in The Maine Monitor by Samantha Hogan, David Dahl and Rose Lundy:

Mass shootings at a bowling alley and bar that left 18 people dead in Lewiston on Wednesday (October 25) evening have brought Maine’s complicated relationship with guns and how to regulate them to the forefront once again.

In the past three years, state lawmakers proposed nearly four dozen bills to regulate the sale, carry and liability of guns in Maine, but most have not passed the Legislature. A “yellow flag” law enacted in 2019, lets law enforcement take guns away from someone they suspect of posing a threat to themselves or others, but officials concede it is underutilized.

Maine ranks in the middle of the pack among other states when it comes to gun safety laws, according to Everytown for Gun Safety, a gun control group, and the laws in place appeared to have done little to stop the suspect in the mass shooting in Lewiston.

Maine does not require a permit to carry a firearm in most cases. State lawmakers have rejected proposals for background checks and limits on accessories that make guns more easy to shoot. It also does not have a ban on assault weapons, unlike two other New England states.

Kristen Cloutier (Democrat), who lives in Lewiston and is the Assistant House Majority Leader, said the shooting in her hometown was “surreal and heartbreaking,” and called for “bold” legislative action to address gun violence.

“This has only strengthened my own resolve to do whatever I can to help prevent similar tragedies like this from happening again in other communities. As a state, we must do more to address gun violence and keep ourselves, our families, our friends and our neighbors safe,” Cloutier wrote in a statement to the press.

“Words are not enough — they never have been. We must take bold action,” she added.

The Maine Gun Safety Coalition immediately called on state lawmakers to pass an assault weapons ban calling the events in Lewiston “horrific, senseless tragedies.”

Rep. Rebecca Millett (D-Cape Elizabeth), a member of the state’s Gun Safety Caucus, said it was very difficult to talk about the mass shooting in Lewiston, after spending years fighting “bad gun bills” and trying to advance gun safety laws.

“The years I had to listen to my colleagues stand and say we don’t need gun safety legislation and Maine is the safest place in the country. To have my worst nightmares happen, is just devastating,” Millett said in an interview with The Maine Monitor.

Rep. Jared Golden (D) Maine second district Congressman

In another development, US Rep. Jared Golden, a Lewiston Democrat, told a news conference Thursday evening he would drop his opposition to an assault weapons ban that has stalled in Congress.

“I have opposed efforts to ban deadly weapons of war, like the assault rifle used to carry out this crime,” Golden said. “The time has now come for me to take responsibility for this failure, which is why I now call on the U.S. Congress to ban assault rifles, like the one used by the sick perpetrator of this mass killing in my hometown of Lewiston, Maine.”

Details emerge about man alleged to have shot 18 people:

A manhunt was underway Thursday by police to find the man suspected of firing multiple shots at two locations, killing 18 and wounding 13. Photos released by law enforcement show a man carrying a semiautomatic style rifle.

The suspect, Robert R. Card, 40, of Bowdoin, has a history of mental health problems and is a trained firearms instructor, according to the Associated Press.

Card is a petroleum supply specialist and Sgt. 1st Class in the Army Reserve, a spokesperson for the U.S. Army confirmed to the Portland Press Herald Thursday. The spokesperson told the newspaper that Card enlisted in 2002 and has received multiple awards but has not been deployed in combat.

The Sun Journal reported that Card had spent two weeks at a mental health facility this summer. It is unknown if Card was voluntarily admitted or involuntarily committed to the facility.

People who are involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital by a district court may not own or possess firearms in Maine, according to state law. Violating the law is a class D misdemeanor crime.

The Associated Press reported Thursday that police took Card for an evaluation in mid-July after military officials grew concerned about his erratic behavior while he was training with the U.S. Army Reserves at the Military Academy at West Point in New York, according to an official who spoke to the AP, on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the information. The official told the AP that military commanders called the New York state police, who took Card to the Keller Army Community Hospital for evaluation.

When asked at a press briefing why Card was able to access a gun despite his reported history of mental health challenges, Mike Sauschuck, commissioner of the Maine Department of Public Safety, said “those are all valid questions and certainly questions that we are looking into now, but not questions that we can answer today,” given the ongoing manhunt.

Maine grapples with foreseeable harm

Maine legislators passed the “yellow flag” law in 2019, that allows police to petition a court to remove guns from a person that a medical expert says presents “a likelihood of foreseeable harm” to themselves or others either because of suicidal or violent threats against others.

The Associated Press reported that Maine’s yellow flag law is weaker than so-called “red flag” laws found in some 20 other states. The Maine law requires police first to get a medical practitioner to evaluate the person and find them to be a threat before police can petition a judge to order the person’s firearms to be seized, the AP said.

It was not clear Thursday if the law came into play regarding the suspect in the Lewiston shooting.

Maine’s yellow flag law is underused, police acknowledge. Maine Public Radio reported that the law was used two dozen times in the first two years it was in effect. Earlier this year, law enforcement noted that the law is “not being used on a regular and responsive basis” and cited a lack of available medical professionals to complete the assessments, according to a report.

Barbara Cardone, spokeswoman for the state judicial branch, said Thursday involuntary commitment orders and petitions under the “yellow flag” law are confidential court records. She declined to say whether any such court records existed for Card.

“All of these kinds of records are confidential, so I cannot provide you with any information,” Cardone wrote.

Edward Davis, who was Boston’s police commissioner during 2013 Marathon bombings, said the weapon in photos released by police appeared to be an assault-style rifle, most likely an AR-15 or an M-4, which is the military version of the AR-15.

Davis, who now runs his own security company, noted that he spends time in Maine and has had tense conversations with Mainers about gun ownership.

“I have guns, but they need to be regulated,” Davis said in an interview with The Maine Monitor.

The suspect in the shootings, Card, has a history of mental health problems. “We should have an absolute prohibition on anybody like that having guns,” Davis said.

Maine will now grapple with how to respond to one of its worst mass casualty events.

Similar shootings have shaken the country, including the 2022, Buffalo grocery store shooting that killed 10, and the 2021, spa shooting spree in Atlanta that killed eight people.

“We continue to monitor the horrific situation in the greater Lewiston area as the manhunt is underway for the person of interest in the Lewiston mass shooting. We grieve for the families of the 18 who were killed and 13 injured in this senseless tragedy,” Maine House Republicans said in a news release on Thursday.

Stephen King, famous Maine horror and science fiction author, said on X, formerly known as Twitter, Thursday morning that these kinds of shootings don’t happen in other countries.

“The shootings occurred less than 50 miles from where I live,” he wrote to his 7 million followers. “I went to high school in Lisbon. It’s the rapid-fire killing machines, people. This is madness in the name of freedom. Stop electing apologists for murder.”

A tired fight for change

Everytown For Gun Safety, a gun safety advocacy group, ranked Maine 25th in the nation in terms of gun laws.

Maine law prohibits any person convicted of a crime and sentenced to a year or more in prison from possessing a firearm. People under a protection from abuse order for harassing, stalking or threatening an intimate partner or child also may not possess a gun.

State lawmakers in recent years have rejected ideas to prohibit people from possessing “rapid-fire modification” devices for guns that increase the number of bullets that can be shot at one time or to require background checks for purchasers at private gun shows.

Maine lawmakers also rejected a proposed background check exemption for people with concealed weapons permits when they go to purchase a firearm, and legislation that would regulate the manufacture, distribution and possession of “untraceable and undetectable” firearms.

A proposal that would allow certain people to carry concealed handguns on school property narrowly failed in the Maine Legislature in June.

Several more pieces of gun legislation are expected to be discussed by lawmakers next year when the Legislature reconvenes in January.

Millett, the lawmaker from Cape Elizabeth, has a bill that would allow a person to bring a civil lawsuit against gun manufacturers for selling “abnormally dangerous” guns, because the product was “most suitable for assaultive purposes” rather than hunting, self-defense or sport, or because it converts a legal firearm into an illegal firearm, or is marketed to minors.

She said in an interview Thursday it is time for legislators to listen to the people they represent and to be proactive about gun safety.

Still, lawmakers will face barriers to getting substantial legislation passed next year while they meet for a short time and with restrictions on the kinds of bills that can be worked on.

“We had a host of bills this past session and a good deal of them didn’t go anywhere,” Millett said. “And now that we’re in the short session there’s a lot less latitude for legislators to put in any new legislation for consideration.”

At least one proposed bill that will go to lawmakers next year would restore gun rights to some people convicted of nonviolent crimes if they are not convicted or any additional crimes and 10 years have passed. Criminal law experts have already raised multiple concerns about how the bill is written.

Ten states, including Massachusetts, Connecticut, and New York, have assault weapons bans.

On the federal level, President Joe Biden again called for a ban on assault weapons following the shooting in Lewiston.

Biden urged Congressional Republicans to work with Democrats to pass a bill that would ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines. He also called for universal background checks, safe storage of guns and an end to liability immunity for gun manufacturers.