Her testimony alone would have established probable cause to arrest this guy and search his premises. They could have put him on ice for couple of days and kept an eye on him to see if he was showing the severe signs of violent mental illness they kept hearing about. Gieven what everyone else who met him over the last two months has said, they could have filed for a civil commitment and restraining order regarding guns. Once they notified the Feds of just the filing of these documents and the return of the warrant this should prevent him from passing a background test. They could have also held the guns they got in the search until the civil mental health hearings had run their course. No school shooting. I’ve been practicing law over 30 years and that’s always how you dealt with violent nutcases - it’s even easier now with regard to righteously taking their guns because of all the new laws and regulations that didn’t exist in the old days. And this isn’t some novel smart procedure done only in Indianapolis, it’s how they did it and have always done it everywhere, it’s like Law enforcement 101. Any old time street cops on FR are invited to chime in here. With the incredible amount of specific directed threats, threat of firearms violence and reports of severe mental psychosis, Broward County Sheriffs Department, and the FBI, displayed incompetence on a truly breathtaking scale. If it was incompetence.
At IU med Center Wishard Hospital in Indianapolis in the 80’s we had a judge on the Psych ward each day. People were “arrested” by the police on a DOC? “charge” so they could be remanded to the hospital for disposition after being held for psych evaluation (instead of being thrown in jail). It worked reasonably well. However, apparently a police officer had his ex-wife arrested on that charge so as to harass her, leading to it eventually being thrown out...and so was the court closed. It spared many mentally disturbed individuals (including demented old grandmas and grandpas) from having to be thrown in with criminals.
Lessons to be learned as a concerned citizen with a tip:
1. Call the FBI, tell that that you are recording the call and will be forwarding the tape to your ‘legal team’, city, county, and state officials.
2. If you fear that a person(s) life is in danger, contact them immediately and more directly through their school or workplace. Tell them the same, that you are on the record, sharing with multiple authorities.
3. Employers and institutions do not want to be held liable and will act out of self preservation and from a stance of risk management.
More importantly, do we suspect that the bureau can’t possibly have been this incompetent and that they chose to ‘stand down’ and allow Cruz to make good on his umpteen promises to kill?