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Illinois gun law too little, too late?
Michael Tarm (AP)
Issue date: 2/20/08 Section: News
CHICAGO (AP) -- Illinois lawmakers moved swiftly after last year's massacre at Virginia Tech to make it harder for anyone with a history of mental illness to buy guns, fortifying what already were some of the nation's toughest weapons laws.
But the new measure does not take effect until June. And whether it would have prevented last week's bloodbath at Northern Illinois University is far from clear.
Steven Kazmierczak, the 27-year-old grad student who bought an arsenal of guns in recent months and used them to kill five people and commit suicide, had been on medication and was said to have spent time in a psychiatric center as a teen in the late 1990s.
But state Sen. Dan Kotowski, a sponsor of the law that will require more detailed reporting to state officials about those who have received mental health treatment, said the sketchy information about Kazmierczak's medical history makes it impossible to know if he would have fallen under the law.
"This law is more comprehensive than most," the Democrat said Monday. "But everything needs to be evaluated and reviewed to address the problem so that something like this never happens again. This is the promise we have to make."
The measure, when it takes effect, will require health professionals to inform state authorities about patients who display violent, suicidal or threatening behavior. Right now, such information is reported to state officials only on people who have been institutionalized, not on those who receive only outpatient treatment.
Illinois adopted the law last June, and the governor signed it in August.
Last month, President George W. Bush signed new federal legislation requiring that states provide the mental-health information they do gather for use in a national background-check system.
Virginia lawmakers, meanwhile, still are considering a package of bills to reform that state's mental health system in the wake of the Virginia Tech tragedy, including one that would write into law an executive order from Gov. Timothy M. Kaine that now requires names of people ordered into outpatient treatment also be reported to state authorities.
But the new measure does not take effect until June. And whether it would have prevented last week's bloodbath at Northern Illinois University is far from clear.
Steven Kazmierczak, the 27-year-old grad student who bought an arsenal of guns in recent months and used them to kill five people and commit suicide, had been on medication and was said to have spent time in a psychiatric center as a teen in the late 1990s.
But state Sen. Dan Kotowski, a sponsor of the law that will require more detailed reporting to state officials about those who have received mental health treatment, said the sketchy information about Kazmierczak's medical history makes it impossible to know if he would have fallen under the law.
"This law is more comprehensive than most," the Democrat said Monday. "But everything needs to be evaluated and reviewed to address the problem so that something like this never happens again. This is the promise we have to make."
The measure, when it takes effect, will require health professionals to inform state authorities about patients who display violent, suicidal or threatening behavior. Right now, such information is reported to state officials only on people who have been institutionalized, not on those who receive only outpatient treatment.
Illinois adopted the law last June, and the governor signed it in August.
Last month, President George W. Bush signed new federal legislation requiring that states provide the mental-health information they do gather for use in a national background-check system.
Virginia lawmakers, meanwhile, still are considering a package of bills to reform that state's mental health system in the wake of the Virginia Tech tragedy, including one that would write into law an executive order from Gov. Timothy M. Kaine that now requires names of people ordered into outpatient treatment also be reported to state authorities.
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Wonk Out
posted 2/20/08 @ 9:06 PM CST
How come nobody's taking up this point:
1. How a kid who'd cut himself as a teen and was institutionalized was even TAKEN into the U.S. Military for weapons training?
2. (Continued…)
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