Well-intentioned gun bill isn’t constitutional

Under current law, Nevadans can be put on the list of folks who aren’t allowed to purchase firearms if they’ve been involuntarily committed to a psychiatric hospital — a process that involves a hearing before a judge, where the “accused” has a due process right to counsel, and to present evidence that he or she is not dangerously insane.

But well-meaning folks, responding emotionally to mass shootings at a Colorado movie theater last summer and a Connecticut elementary school late last year, say that’s not enough. Both those accused killers appear to have been mentally ill. So, we’re told, we need to expand the number of people who aren’t allowed to buy guns because they might be crazy.

Under Senate Bill 277, the mere filing of a legal petition to commit someone would be enough to place that person’s name in the database of those forbidden to buy firearms — whether or not they’re actually committed to psychiatric care by a judge.

The first problem is purely pragmatic — it wouldn’t have stopped any of the shooters in question. Although Colorado shooting suspect James Holmes had consulted a psychiatrist, who had expressed concern to University of Colorado police, there’s no evidence she’d filed the kind of legal petition specified here.

It’s not even clear such a petition had been filed in the case of Connecticut school shooter Adam Lanza. Furthermore, no possible change in background check regulations would have prevented Lanza from acquiring his semi-automatic rifle — he murdered his mother and stole her gun, which she had acquired after passing a rigorous background check with flying colors.

But beyond that, the short-cutting of due process by SB 277 would appear to be a fatal flaw, Christopher Frey of the Washoe County public defender’s office pointed out at a hearing in Carson City this week. The Nevada Libertarian Party agrees: “This bill is flawed because it denies due process and subjects a person to arbitrary standards, as a petition that can be filed by anyone without a trial or evidence.”

In response, sponsor Ben. Kieckhefer, R-Reno, amended the bill this week to short-circuit the database listing in cases where a judge moves quickly to dismiss the petition to commit. But since the lengthy time required for adjudication is the whole rationale for this bill, that would appear to be largely cosmetic.

This bill was prompted by emotion, wouldn’t solve the problem it’s intended to solve, and would strip away a constitutional right from many Nevadans who are neither guilty of a crime nor demonstrably mentally ill. It likely would be thrown out by the first court to get a look at it.

The goal of preventing mass shootings is admirable. But SB 277 isn’t the answer.