Walmart sued over suicide
Here we go. The basic story here is that some woman was causing a rucus at one Walmart where she had a prescription for anti-psychotic medication, she leaves there, goes to another Walmart and buys a shotgun. Then she shoots herself. So, the mother’s suing Walmart for not knowing about their customers. Basically, it’s all about firearm sales background checks. Once again, another liability lawsuit because the company is supposed to know everything that gun may eventually be used for even though the sale itself is lawful.
Now, I remember the last time I bought a gun, the little form I filled out asked me about mental health. Being the moderately sane individual I am (about the best anyone can expect these days), I haven’t seen any ‘professional’ (we’ll get into that later) help, and so my purchase wasn’t even delayed. Now, this woman had a history of mental health issues and was apparently cleared to purchase the firearm by that background check. Legally, that should clear Walmart automatically, but the woman’s mother is suing because Walmart should have checked their own pharmacy prescription records in her opinion (regardless of the fact that they’re confidential under federal law).
Of course, we get into another issue here, because Texas law doesn’t require the mental health ‘professional’ to inform the government that this person is a potential threat and should not be cleared to purchase a firearm. But, wait, if that’s the case… then why bother asking on the bloody form to begin with? Is it just to make honest people answer honestly? We all know criminals don’t follow laws, so why would a lie on a form be an issue?
Somehow, I think the wrong people are getting sued here… she should be suing the State of Texas if she really wants to change anything. But then, the State of Texas won’t settle out of court either, so she likely just wants money.
Opinions?
December 22nd, 2004 at 9:54 am
I think it’s someone hoping wal-mart will settle.
December 22nd, 2004 at 10:04 am
As I understand it, Walmart is sued every few hours.
They will most likely toss her some cash and tell her to shut the hell up.
As per Kim’s suggestion, I try not to buy gun related stuff at walmart as it is just a stocking item to them, if the heat gets on they would not be going to bat for gun rights.
December 22nd, 2004 at 10:11 am
Very sad…I really don’t like Wal-Mart, but regardless, they done everything by the books. Case closed.
December 22nd, 2004 at 10:45 am
Actually suing the state of Texas could be bad. namely it could cause them to adopt a law that makes mental health records available for background checks.
Now w/o going into my opposition of background checks on general principles speech, it’s a bad idea for a very practical reason:
Only a small fraction of people who would be denied would have posed a problem in the first place. & that’s using what you (not I) would think is a reaosnable standard. But you know damn well it won’t stay reasonable for long, & just like people sentenced to one day of a paperwork crime that carries a 1 year + penalty are denied arms, so would anyone who went to a marraige counselor. In other words there’d be too little net gain to justify the very real slide down that particualr slope.
as an aside incident slike this have caused some wal marts (& other stores) to not seel ammo to you when you purchase a gun. Last time I bought from wallyworld I even got the “you’re a toddler again” escort out of the store & couldn’t actually hold the box until I wa sin the parking lot. Got into a nice little chat with the escorter over it but other than causing the at the time g/f to roll her eyes at both of us it didn’t do much good. company policy & all.
ut at the least look for a change for the worse in how wal mart conducts transactions because of this.
December 22nd, 2004 at 3:37 pm
I gather there’s another part to this; this woman assaulted a customer in the other Walmart. I don’t know why that didn’t result in charges that showed up in the background check. But this claim also opens up some nasty cans of worms.
If I was sole proprietor of a gun shop, and I saw someone commit an assault somewhere else, I might conclude that whether or not this resulted in a court record that would cause the instant-check to reject her, I thought she was too violent or unstable and I wouldn’t sell her any gun. But after I banned her from my shop, I wouldn’t pass notes around to other gun shops like, “Jane Doe is psycho and shouldn’t have a gun.” That would likely be slander, unless and until there was a court felony conviction or other finding that she was dangerous and couldn’t own a gun. Not to mention that it would be conspiring with other shop owners to deny her a constitutional right…
In this case, the lawsuit implies they not only want possibly slanderous notes passed around, but they want a clerk in another department to pass the notes to gun shops in thousands of Walmart stores, with or without any indication that she would ever attempt to buy a gun. That is, this lawsuit is an attempt to use governmental power to coerce a private business into doing something that the government shouldn’t be able to do without a court hearing and private individuals shouldn’t do at all.