Leroy N. Soetoro
2023-10-29 20:13:11 UTC
https://www.bangordailynews.com/2023/10/28/news/central-maine/police-
alerted-last-month-maine-shooters-threats/
Police across Maine were alerted just last month to veiled threats by
the U.S. Army reservist who would go on to carry out the worst mass
shooting in the states history, one of a string of missed red flags that
preceded the massacre.
Two local law enforcement chiefs told The Associated Press that a
statewide awareness alert was sent in mid-September to be on the lookout
for Robert Card after the firearms instructor made threats against his
base and fellow soldiers. But after stepped-up patrols of the base and a
visit to Cards home neither of which turned up any sign of him they
moved on.
We added extra patrols, we did that for about two weeks. The guy never
showed up, said Jack Clements, the police chief in Saco, home to the U.S.
Army Reserve base where Card trained.
Sagadahoc County Sheriff Joel Merry, whose jurisdiction includes Cards
home in Bowdoin, said the Army Reserve tipped his department in September
to the reservists threats, and the sheriff sent the awareness alert to
every law enforcement agency in the state after his deputy came back
empty-handed from a welfare check to Cards home.
We couldnt locate him, Merry said, adding that he couldnt recall if
there was any follow-up because I dont have any reports in front of me.
Military officials declined to comment further about Card, specifically
whether the threats relayed to the sheriff in September were new or the
same ones Card had made during an Army reserve training exercise near West
Point, New York, in July. Thats when police say Card was committed to a
mental health facility for two weeks after acting erratically and hearing
voices and threats to shoot up a military base.
Authorities say the 40-year-old Card opened fire with a high-powered rifle
on a bowling alley and then a bar in Lewiston Wednesday night, killing 18
people and wounding 13 more. After an intensive two-day manhunt that put
the state on edge, Card was found dead Friday from a self-inflicted
gunshot.
Cards case stands as a glaring example of missed red flags, with many
unanswered questions about what the military, police, mental health
professionals and relatives could have done to prevent the massacre.
While Maine does not have a red flag law, it does have a more limited
yellow-flag law that would still allow police to petition a judge to
take a persons firearms away if a medical practitioner deems that person
to be a threat.
For his part, Saco police Chief Clements defended his departments
response to the alert about Card, which he described as a generic thing
that came out saying, hey, you know, weve had some report that this guys
made some veiled threats.
Clements noted that his department gets many such alerts and that his
officers gave this one its due attention, keeping an eye on the base for
any sign of Card.
Never came in contact with this guy, never received any phone calls from
the reserve center saying, Hey, we got somebody who was causing a
problem,' he said. We never got anything.
Another law enforcement agency that came in contact with Card was the New
York State Police, which on July 16 was called in West Point by commanders
of the Army Reserves 3rd Battalion, 304th Infantry Regiment with concerns
about Cards erratic behavior and threats to other members of his
military unit during a training exercise, according to a State Police
document obtained by AP. State Police troopers took Card, a sergeant 1st
class, to the Keller Army Community Hospital at West Point for what would
be two weeks of mental health evaluation.
What New York State Police did about Cards threats is unclear. The agency
declined to comment to the AP on the case and did not respond to a request
for reports or possible body-camera footage of their interactions with
Card.
This is an active investigation, and the New York State Police does not
comment on active investigations, nor investigations in which we are not
the lead agency, it said in a statement Friday before Card was found
dead. A state police spokesman refused to comment Saturday.
Jonathan Crisp, an army lawyer for two decades before starting a criminal
defense practice, said when soldiers are committed involuntarily to mental
health facilities by others in the chain of command, it is a reportable
event under Army regulations that triggers a requirement to alert others.
A provost marshal enters the incident into a military database that puts
the FBI on notice so it can enter the name into a background list of
people prevented from buying weapons.
The FBI did not immediately respond to queries on whether it was made
aware of Cards threats.
If they took him and he didnt want to go and he refused to be admitted,
its a slam dunk, Crisp said. This should have been reported.
But Maine Department of Public Safety Commissioner Michael Sauschuck said
in a news conference Saturday that while Card had a history of mental
illness, there was no evidence that he had ever been involuntarily
committed.
Just because there appears to be a mental health nexus to this scenario,
the vast majority of people with mental health diagnosis will never hurt
anybody, Sauschuck said.
Jody Madeira, an Indiana University law professor who has studied gun
laws, said police in one state can alert counterparts in another state
that someone is a danger, and the military can do the same with local
police.
She said someone dropped the ball because Cards threats and medical
evaluation should have triggered a yellow flag seizure of his guns when he
returned home.
He slipped through the cracks, Madeira said. There were warning signs.
Story by Bernard Condon and Jim Mustian, The Associated Press. Condon and
Mustian reported from New York. AP reporter Patrick Whittle in Portland,
Maine, and news researcher Rhonda Shafner in New York contributed.
--
We live in a time where intelligent people are being silenced so that
stupid people won't be offended.
Durham Report: The FBI has an integrity problem. It has none.
No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.
Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
fiasco, President Trump.
Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
queer liberal democrat donors.
President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.
alerted-last-month-maine-shooters-threats/
Police across Maine were alerted just last month to veiled threats by
the U.S. Army reservist who would go on to carry out the worst mass
shooting in the states history, one of a string of missed red flags that
preceded the massacre.
Two local law enforcement chiefs told The Associated Press that a
statewide awareness alert was sent in mid-September to be on the lookout
for Robert Card after the firearms instructor made threats against his
base and fellow soldiers. But after stepped-up patrols of the base and a
visit to Cards home neither of which turned up any sign of him they
moved on.
We added extra patrols, we did that for about two weeks. The guy never
showed up, said Jack Clements, the police chief in Saco, home to the U.S.
Army Reserve base where Card trained.
Sagadahoc County Sheriff Joel Merry, whose jurisdiction includes Cards
home in Bowdoin, said the Army Reserve tipped his department in September
to the reservists threats, and the sheriff sent the awareness alert to
every law enforcement agency in the state after his deputy came back
empty-handed from a welfare check to Cards home.
We couldnt locate him, Merry said, adding that he couldnt recall if
there was any follow-up because I dont have any reports in front of me.
Military officials declined to comment further about Card, specifically
whether the threats relayed to the sheriff in September were new or the
same ones Card had made during an Army reserve training exercise near West
Point, New York, in July. Thats when police say Card was committed to a
mental health facility for two weeks after acting erratically and hearing
voices and threats to shoot up a military base.
Authorities say the 40-year-old Card opened fire with a high-powered rifle
on a bowling alley and then a bar in Lewiston Wednesday night, killing 18
people and wounding 13 more. After an intensive two-day manhunt that put
the state on edge, Card was found dead Friday from a self-inflicted
gunshot.
Cards case stands as a glaring example of missed red flags, with many
unanswered questions about what the military, police, mental health
professionals and relatives could have done to prevent the massacre.
While Maine does not have a red flag law, it does have a more limited
yellow-flag law that would still allow police to petition a judge to
take a persons firearms away if a medical practitioner deems that person
to be a threat.
For his part, Saco police Chief Clements defended his departments
response to the alert about Card, which he described as a generic thing
that came out saying, hey, you know, weve had some report that this guys
made some veiled threats.
Clements noted that his department gets many such alerts and that his
officers gave this one its due attention, keeping an eye on the base for
any sign of Card.
Never came in contact with this guy, never received any phone calls from
the reserve center saying, Hey, we got somebody who was causing a
problem,' he said. We never got anything.
Another law enforcement agency that came in contact with Card was the New
York State Police, which on July 16 was called in West Point by commanders
of the Army Reserves 3rd Battalion, 304th Infantry Regiment with concerns
about Cards erratic behavior and threats to other members of his
military unit during a training exercise, according to a State Police
document obtained by AP. State Police troopers took Card, a sergeant 1st
class, to the Keller Army Community Hospital at West Point for what would
be two weeks of mental health evaluation.
What New York State Police did about Cards threats is unclear. The agency
declined to comment to the AP on the case and did not respond to a request
for reports or possible body-camera footage of their interactions with
Card.
This is an active investigation, and the New York State Police does not
comment on active investigations, nor investigations in which we are not
the lead agency, it said in a statement Friday before Card was found
dead. A state police spokesman refused to comment Saturday.
Jonathan Crisp, an army lawyer for two decades before starting a criminal
defense practice, said when soldiers are committed involuntarily to mental
health facilities by others in the chain of command, it is a reportable
event under Army regulations that triggers a requirement to alert others.
A provost marshal enters the incident into a military database that puts
the FBI on notice so it can enter the name into a background list of
people prevented from buying weapons.
The FBI did not immediately respond to queries on whether it was made
aware of Cards threats.
If they took him and he didnt want to go and he refused to be admitted,
its a slam dunk, Crisp said. This should have been reported.
But Maine Department of Public Safety Commissioner Michael Sauschuck said
in a news conference Saturday that while Card had a history of mental
illness, there was no evidence that he had ever been involuntarily
committed.
Just because there appears to be a mental health nexus to this scenario,
the vast majority of people with mental health diagnosis will never hurt
anybody, Sauschuck said.
Jody Madeira, an Indiana University law professor who has studied gun
laws, said police in one state can alert counterparts in another state
that someone is a danger, and the military can do the same with local
police.
She said someone dropped the ball because Cards threats and medical
evaluation should have triggered a yellow flag seizure of his guns when he
returned home.
He slipped through the cracks, Madeira said. There were warning signs.
Story by Bernard Condon and Jim Mustian, The Associated Press. Condon and
Mustian reported from New York. AP reporter Patrick Whittle in Portland,
Maine, and news researcher Rhonda Shafner in New York contributed.
--
We live in a time where intelligent people are being silenced so that
stupid people won't be offended.
Durham Report: The FBI has an integrity problem. It has none.
No collusion - Special Counsel Robert Swan Mueller III, March 2019.
Officially made Nancy Pelosi a two-time impeachment loser.
Thank you for cleaning up the disaster of the 2008-2017 Obama / Biden
fiasco, President Trump.
Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
The World According To Garp. Obama sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood
queer liberal democrat donors.
President Trump boosted the economy, reduced illegal invasions, appointed
dozens of judges and three SCOTUS justices.