CNN.com:
Next time there's a mass shooting, don't jump to blame the National
Rifle Association and lax gun laws. Look first at the shooter and the
mental health services he did or didn't get, and the commitment laws in
the state where the shooting took place.
Strengthening gun control
won't stop the next mass shooter, but changing our attitudes, the
treatment options we offer and the laws for holding the mentally
unstable and mentally ill for treatment just might.
Take the case of the
recent mass shooting incident in Isla Vista, California. Police say
Elliot Rodger went on a killing spree near the University of California
campus in Santa Barbara, shooting and stabbing victims, killing six and
wounding 13 before he killed himself.
He had legally purchased
three guns, passed a federal background check and met several other
requirements in one of the most liberal states with the toughest gun
control laws in the country. California was one of eight states that
passed major gun reforms in the wake of 2012's Sandy Hook Elementary
School shooting, in which a lone gunman killed 20 children and six
adults.
In fact California's gun control laws received an "A-"
grade from both The Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence and the Law
Center to Prevent Gun Violence, the Los Angeles Times reported.
In this climate, how did
Rodger succeed in his lethal plan? It wasn't the gun laws, it was the
lack of common sense mental commitment laws.
A 2014 report by the
Treatment Advocacy Center, a nonprofit aimed at removing the stigma of
mental illness and barriers to treatment, analyzed the state of mental commitment laws state
by state, looking at both the "quality of involuntary treatment (civil
commitment) laws which facilitate emergency hospitalization during a
psychiatric emergency and the availability of court orders mandating
continued treatment as a condition of living in a community."
On virtually all counts,
California received an "F" (it got a "C" on emergency evaluation). In
Rodger's case, a friend concerned about alarming videos he'd posted on
YouTube had alerted a county mental health staff member, and police had
conferred with his mother, but this was not enough to get him committed.
Under California's Welfare and Institutions Code Section 5150,
a person must be a danger to himself or others before he can be held
for 72 hours for evaluation, and the standard is even higher to mandate
treatment. Police visiting Rodger
found him to be "polite and courteous" and not an apparent danger, so
they had no authority to detain him or search his home for weapons to
seize. The reason had nothing to do with gun laws. It had to do with the
commitment laws in California.
We need to adopt a
nationwide standard for involuntary civil commitment, and that standard
should be "need for treatment." If a family member, law enforcement
officer or mental health professional is concerned about the well-being
of an individual, they should be able to have that individual held for a
mental health evaluation.
