I get narky when "the system' is blamed, without anyone being specific. It is too easy to apportion blame, often superficially. We have heard from one another on this site just how difficult it is to get the necessary mental health resources for our kids, especial;y when they believe they don't need it. And this is not simply a US lack of decent health care issue - this is a human rights issue, it is where human rights of the individual clash with the right of the individual to be given much-needed treatment.
Someone who is having a psychotic break is not generally in a fit state to make their own health care choices. Too often, however, the laws that we need in so many other parts of society intervene and prevent the vital medical treatment these people need.
We have a really good health care system in Australia, but this could have happened here too. In fact, it did happen here - the Port Arthur massacre was carried out by someone mentally ill who decided one day to go hunting people. His name is known but not mentioned. I won't post a link - I found one but it is too painfully detailed.
My point is - the warning signs were there, we have a great health system, but this still happened. It was about as political as this Arizona shooting (ie not at all).
I was glad the killer at Port Arthur was taken alive - people needed answers. For what they were worth. Same story here - this is a very sick young man who should have got help but was really in no condition to get it himself. And the law that gives people the right to choose, can not take away a person's right to refuse treatment even if they are not sane enough to make such a choice.
The Port Arthur massacre is the reason we have strict gun laws in Australia. Ironically, it was our most conservative leader in recent decades who brought in those gun laws. At the time a lot of people said these laws would be a disaster and infringed on human rights, but I personally think they work. They certainly make it more difficult for people who are obviously unstable, to get their hands on a gun. However, people who need guns for their livelihood (and this includes farmers) can still get guns. But records are now kept, crime using guns has greatly reduced. People here use guns for legitimate purposes. But this is Australia - what worked here may not necessarily work so well somewhere else.
I am glad they have this guy alive. Perhaps the worst punishment of all for him, is to be treated, helped back to sanity, and then made aware of what he did. A lifetime of guilt will hurt far more than a police bullet.
These tragedies will continue to happen while ever people with psychosis are unable to be helped when they need to be. But if we help them by imposing our wills, then it is at the expense of human rights. Whatever way you go, something gets broken.
One of my best friends had a husband who became psychotic and tried to kill her. She had to go into hiding, it was known he had threatened her. He really was psychotic, he believed she was trying to kill him (by slow poisoning - ie his medications) and so he was trying to get her first. The police knew. Doctors knew. But to have him committed, they had to arrive with two doctors with paperwork ready plus police while he was threatening his wife, but before he actually killed anyone. And despite his psychosis, he was too smart for that - he would turn up, threaten for fifteen minutes, then scarper as soon as he heard the sirens. I am amazed my friend wasn't killed. I know if he started killing, he wouldn't have been able to stop. The kids would have been killed, and my friend's parents (who also lived there).
My friend's husband recovered. It took ten years or more, but in that time she unbelievably allowed him access to the kids, eventually he had unsupervised visitation. And they both remarried and have been very good friends. He is stable, functioning and has not had any problems for nearly 20 years now.
The tragedy is that this happened. But I'm sure that if/when they go back into it, although there were plenty of warning signs, at what point could anyone have stepped in and said, "You have grounds to have him involuntarily committed."?
So I hope that the blame game won't result in the plot being lost. If some good can come of this, then perhaps some strategies can be put in place to perhaps help such patients get medical treatment before this sort of thing happens.
I feel for his parents right now. All the guilt he should be feeling, will be on them. But I'm betting when it all comes down - what more could they have done?
So very, very sad.
Marg