I agree with you so take the rest of my comments only as adding to the conversation.
We do not want to cross a line where everyone that looks funny is arrested or brought in for questioning. In this case, however, it seems something else needed to be done. What that is without infringing on the liberties your rightly point out I don't know.
Any ideas? Again, you have sounded a bold and needed reminder of the cost to freedom by overreaching.
Maybe colleges need to stop refusing to share anything about a student over 18 with his parent or guardian if a therapist recommends it
hell, the parents couldnt even get this guy’s’s grades much less reports on his medical condition or drop-out status unless he signed papers authorizing the University to share
What needed to be done that wasn’t done was to stop interfering with our Constitutional right to bear arms. As long as we have that right and can freely exercise it, it doesn’t matter much when these crazies decide to blow their top, we will just put them down with a minimum of suffering and keep the rest of our freedoms intact.
As I’ve stated in another post, I’ve been through this with three relatives. Fortunately, in our cases, no one got hurt.
Somehow families and friends need more power to force a mentally-ill person into evaluation and treatment. I have no answers, but plenty of frustration.
In the case of a first-time offender, as both Holmes and Loughner were, I don’t know how we can ever act pre-emptively. One thing we can do with those who are judged a danger and locked up temporarily is to require continual follow-up and medication and arrest anyone who does not stay in compliance.
As it is now, a demonstrably ill patient can be forced into confinement and treatment, but only until he is again mentally competent. That is often just days or, at the most, weeks. Then he’s set free without compulsory supervision, and he goes off his meds in a short time.
And it starts all over again.