There was a discussion here about shaming parents of juvenile felons.
I argued strenuously against it and I feel like the Crumbleys and the Grays bear that out. We already have laws about being an accomplice. If we can prove they were broken, we can arrest them.
Don't create a blame society for perceived moral failures. 🤷🏻♀️
Oh yeah, and red flag laws would have given the FBI and GSP a lever to pull when the first threat was made a year before.
Full CNN article.
If GA had red flag laws, the guns would not have been available. Documented history of domestic violence.
For homicides, domestic abuse is the overwhelming indicator.
https://www.cnn.com/2024/09/05/us/colt-gray-suspect-georgia-shooter/index.html
Also, Colt was removed from Discord for violating their policies on extremist speech.
I'm on Discord. It takes quite a bit to get reported, much less banned.
Georgia's lack of basic common sense laws to identify a man known to be violent and abusive and remove his guns killed those teachers and students.
Everyone on social media who is still wondering how this could have been prevented, make a time-line on this family's spiral and all the missed opportunities and holes in the net.
Without even digging hard I can find healthcare, housing, employment, social services, family court, law enforcement, and I'd bet there are some opiates thrown in.
Domestic abuse.
And the occupation with a 40% rate of that is law enforcement. 😐
TL;DR
We don't need to look for novel ideas about guns or gun owners.
Red flag laws
Background checks
Waiting periods
And we fucking need to focus on domestic abuse.
Which has roots in:
Addiction
Unstable housing
Unstable employment
Lack of healthcare (mental and physical)
Lack of enforcement
If we want to reduce gun deaths impactfully - and I'm using the shitty NRA/Congress limited numbers.
1. Waiting periods - Suicides are more than 50% of gun deaths. 20% decrease.
2. Red flag laws - Homicides by domestic partner would decrease another 20%.
That's a 20% decrease across the board in total gun deaths. I promise transparent numbers will increase that because reporting, analytics, and enforcement will improve.
20% is huge. And we identify homes that need early support.
If I were in charge of the world, BTW, I would make one change that I think would have the biggest impact, were the back end services in place.
A social worker or specially trained LEO should be at every DV call and empowered to remove:
1. Guns
2. Children
3. Abused Partners
72 hours in a safe environment for a REAL evaluation. A special SRO procedure.
Domestic violence calls are dangerous for officers and often get less experienced LEOs due to the high repeats and the low convictions.
Success here is actually about safe spaces - creating distance, providing alternatives, analyzing each situation, putting services in place.
Trained DV officers (programs do exist) or adding social workers to calls and empowering them to act on that training will make everyone involved safer.
@Cosmichomicide I’m speaking of things that could be done to help someone avoid becoming an abuser. I am personally aware of the reality of domestic abuse having grown up in it and studied it for a short time.
@Cosmichomicide I agree. We expect police to handle situations they were never trained to handle. Domestic abuse is a lot like handling old dynamite, you need to tread lightly and know what you are doing. Even then it could all go to hell.
@Cosmichomicide We might be able to drop the number of domestic abusers if we made sure children who grow up in abusive households get the help they need. Including, if necessary, removal from abusive homes.