Posted on 04/09/2013 9:41:30 PM PDT by neverdem
AMHERST, N.Y. (WIVB) - The NYS SAFE Act is billed as a necessary law to protect the public and keep guns out of the hands of the wrong people.
But Hamburg attorney Jim Tresmond says his client was notified by letter that his gun permit was suspended upon the recommendation of State Police, who learned the man is on anti-anxiety medication.
"Claiming that he had taken some psychotropic medications, and that he no longer could be eligible for the pistol permit," Tresmond said.
The permit holder lives in Amherst and Tresmond accompanied the man as he turned in his seven handguns used for target-shooting to Amherst Police.
"A law-abiding, honest, hard working professional, who never had one wit of scandal associated with him, criminal or otherwise. And they took his guns away," Tresmond said.
Tresmond is one of the attorneys already suing the state over passage of the SAFE ACT, which at the time was the toughest gun control law in the country.
Tresmond says his client once took a prescribed medication for his anxiety but he is not mentally ill. The Amherst man ended his prescription use within the last year.
"He is a law-abiding citizen, no record. He is a stellar member of the community, I would say. Not an ex-felon. He is one of the nicest young men I have met in a long time," Tresmond said.
Officials confirmed state law permits the suspension of a gun permit before the permit holder even gets a chance to state their case.
We have not been able to reach State Police to comment on this case but we do know Erie County officials have only taken action against one pistol permit holder on mental health grounds since the SAFE Act was passed last month.
Copyright WIVB.com
This case could be the opening gun-owners are looking for re a test case about the use of certain types of perscription drugs.
I can see s whole battery of pharmacists and doctors on the witness stand explaining the whole gamut of mental problems and illnesses, as well as pharmocology to the judge and jury and the public.
It is a matter that needs to be brought out into the open so that a serious debate can be started on what kind of mental conditions and what kind of drugs can be dangerous re someone who owns a firearm, and which ones are not.
Also, how much time is involved in someone resolving their mental issues and getting off of the drugs involved.
If our side plays it cards right, it will be able to educate the whole illiterate country as to what is real and what is false.
The meds which come under fire most often are SSRIs (Selective Seratonin Reuptake Inhibitors) which are something people shouldn't just quit, but should taper off usage under a physician's supervision.
Whether the involvement of patients in mass shootings who have taken these or were taking them at the time of the shooting is coincidental (correlation) or whether the medication contributed directly or indirectly (causation) to the mental state of the shooters is something which should be investigated. The consistent presence of those medications in the pharmacological history of the shooters raises valid questions.
Should all psychoactive drug history be considered a disqualifier for firearms ownership? Probably not, but whether the meds are to blame or the condition which led to their prescription is, it is a flag for the moment.
This is one of the problems with blanket policies--people who don't deserve it are going to be hurt by them.
Besides, none of this will stop anyone who wants a gun regardless of the rules from obtaining one.
Only the law-abiding will suffer, and they are likely not going to be a problem in the first place.
Most doctors thanks to media scaremongering are scared to write scripts Benzodiazapenes especially long term. Anxiety can have many origins including phobic, neurological, and chemical origins. Each origin requires a different medication class. Not doing so is wreaking havoc in patients lives. The danger here with SSRI's is the doctors are not educating the patient and family enough about things too look for including believe it or not bladder blockage in males. Yea SSRI's can do that also. A Benzo is out of your bloodstream in less than 24 hours with most of them. SSRI's can stay in your system for weeks. What I am talking about is a rare but possible reaction.
You need to understand that gun laws are not about and have never been about “keeping guns away from criminals”.
The career politicians and big Govt. types (in other words, our Government) wants to disarm YOU.
The gun grabber laws are about making the Government safer, not you. Not me. Not children.
The real reason is because they know they can’t get away with what they have in mind if we are armed.
It has nothing to do with safety, criminals, children, hunting, or any of the other distractions that people keep falling for.
If anyone has ever had a prescription for any kind of psychotropic drug, it will probably be used against you sooner or later to deny 2nd Amendment rights. Larry Pratt warned us about this a few years ago.
You should read the U S Army Medical Command memo of
April, 2012 which details how benzos are contra indicated for soldiers with PTSD as they exacerbate the trauma, not cure it.
My personal experience has been that the vestibular and occular processing problems are often psychologically based.
When you consider that there are probably tens of thousands of people who do not have major adverse effects from the drugs versus the few who do, (and keeping in mind we do not know what forms of self-medication people may have added to their systems), the people who have a violent psychotic moment and end up becoming mass murderers are likely a rare segment of the total population taking the drugs.
In this case, the question is one of correlation, causation, or both, and that determination is made more problematical by the underlying conditions which led to the prescription in the first place.
Unfortunately, the high profile crimes that those few commit are very destructive, at least in the case of those we do hear about.
Admittedly, we are dealing with a skewed data set, in that people who are prescribed these drugs who do not have complications or interactions just don't make the news.
That is the specific reason I don't like blanket suppositions based on pharmacological history.
Furthermore, if people can be deprived of a right because they have had a problem, one of the effects of that will be to deter people who should seek help for a small problem until it becomes far more difficult to manage. Additionally, the bar can be raised at the whim of the medical and psych establishment at any time. The effect is that a fundamental right lies at the mercy of people who have been known to follow political agendae in the past, while ignoring sound science to do so.
Here is a link to the memo I referred to above: http://cdn.govexec.com/media/gbc/docs/pdfs_edit/042312bb1.pdf
“I think you may have nailed the problem, in that the Doctors prescribing the drugs do not know the pharmacology or the patient well enough (or both), and are failing to educate the patient and family sufficiently.”
I totally agree with you. A good example is to try and understand the psychopharmacology of the atypical antipsychotics.
This is what the NRA and GOA must keep harping on. Allowing background checks will bring gun registration. Registration brings confiscation. HIPPA laws were there to keep everything quiet so we could allow the government to digitize our health records. Now they can thumb through them at their leisure. Background checks will do no good if they don’t know who has what.
Nope just the opposite. Vestibular and optical disorders can trigger anxiety. Anxiety is a secondary symptom. Many doctors don't do extensive enough medical histories. A guy made the link to Cerebellar/Vestibular induced anxiety and even ADD ADHD back in the 1970's. His name is Harold Levison. His book Phobia Free describes it. I was born one eye functional. I have vision in both eyes never at the same time. My eye/muscle coordination has always been off. So much so I had to take Occupational Therapy to walk a straight line. What controls balance? The Inner Ear.
I can go into a place like Walmart or Home Depot and I can pick out the persons who have this and don't even realize it. P> BTW Vestibular disorders seem to run in families. I also had as a toddler and still have severe sinus allergies. That too is linked to Vestibular Damage. I'm now over 50% deaf in both ears. The older General Practitioners understood some of this stuff. My eye issues were caught when I was about 7. But I had other sensory symptoms from as far back as Toddler. If you want to check back this evening and I'll post some links from some credible sources.
Everyone on this thread, needs to be investigated. Except me, and anyone investigating, and their friends also. See, that’s how it works. Right?
I’ve been saying for quite a while now this would happen. It will be especially easier to do this now that the Affordable Care Act (ha) is in force.
For you parents out there with children you think had ADHD, remember that their Ritalin Prescriptions will also be used against their right to own a weapon one day.
The Affordable Care Act will consolidate all medical records in a digital repository. It will be a simple name/SSN cross reference to find out who has been prescribed ooga-booga drugs. Look for all sorts of unintended (intended on their part) consequences....
High blood pressure medicine,
Ritalin and equivalents,
Sleep disorder medicines,
Weight loss medicines,
a whole host of disqualifiers.
Bump
Get them to an Audiologist or Speech Pathologist to be tested for Central Auditory Processing Disorders. It's not ADD ADHD but many of the same symptoms. No Ritalin needed.
I’ll go for that. Today’s school-based diagnosis of this and a suggested accompanying prescription of behavior control medicine like Ritalin used as a control crutch in schools could end up with very, very unintended consequences.
If he had just smoked a little dope instead he wouldn’t be in this situation. /s
I KNOW there are many lawmakers that take Xanax, Ativan and other Benzodiazapenes to relax,
Hmmm...if true, they should not be able to pass any legislation because of their altered mental states...
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