Why was Maine shooter allowed to have guns? Questions swirl in wake of massacre

LEWISTON, Maine — A history of mental illness. An array of weapons. Law enforcement knew about his potential for violence. But he was still able to own guns and commit the deadliest mass shooting in Maine’s history.

One week later, many in Lewiston and nationwide are asking: Why did he have guns at all?

Robert Card was identified by authorities as a person of interest four hours after he shot and killed 18 people and wounded 13 others at a bowling alley and a bar in Maine’s second-largest city. But Card, who was found dead two days after his rampage, had been well known to law enforcement for months.

“This is the clearest-cut case I’ve seen where an extreme risk protection order could have saved all these lives,” said Mark Collins, federal policy director at the gun-violence prevention group Brady, referring to measures often called “ red flag” laws, which Maine does not have.

“This guy did everything short of taking out a front-page ad in the newspaper saying he was going to commit an atrocity,” Collins said.

The intensifying scrutiny over Card’s access to firearms underscores the difficulty in seizing guns from potentially dangerous people with mental illness — especially when numerous states and jurisdictions are involved, as was the case with Card.

The U.S. Army reservist spent time in a psychiatric facility in New York this summer and he reportedly blamed fellow military officials for his hospitalization, according to a letter an unidentified member of the unit wrote to a Maine sheriff’s deputy.

It’s unclear when the letter was sent, but the writer describes getting a call from a friend of Card’s who was concerned Card was “going to snap and commit a mass shooting.” The letter was included in the deputy’s Sept. 15 report about efforts to contact Card.

Card threatened to shoot up the Army reserve drill center in Saco, Maine, and other places, and said that he was going to get “them.”

“Since the commander and I are the ones who had him committed we are the ‘them,’” wrote the unidentified letter writer. “He also said I was the reason he can’t buy guns anymore because of the commitment.”

Authorities at the state and federal level have not said that Card’s history of mental illness should have triggered laws that kept him from owning guns. There was nothing on Card’s record before the shooting that would have kept him from passing a federal background check to buy a gun, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives said in a statement.

Involuntary commitments are reported to federal authorities differently from state to state, said Collins.

Generally, though, not everyone who gets mental health treatment at a facility is considered involuntarily committed. That’s a determination legally made by a court or a board, which then communicates it to another state body tasked with sending that information to the federal background-check system maintained by the FBI.

Each state has an agency that should report it, but it’s not legally required everywhere, he said. Maine does require the State Bureau of Identification to report commitments to the FBI database.