And Illinois state judge denied bail today for the gunman who police
say confessed to the July 4th massacre in Highland Park that left
seven people dead. Authorities revealed that the gunman considered
starting another shooting spree in Madison, Wisconsin, where he drove
while he was avoiding police in Illinois.
And there were more questions about how he was able to get his guns
in the first place on the Nevadas has the latest
Today in a closed hearing the first quarter appearance for the 21
year old alleged gunman behind Monday's attack charged with killing
seven people and injuring more than three dozen. At a July 4th parade
in Highland Park, Illinois. The judge ruled that Robert Cremo, the
third
Would be held without bond and that there was probable cause to hold
him at this time.
Sport, seven counts of first degree murder. Most planned. Deputy
chief Christopher Covelli of the Lake County Sheriff's Office shared
new details of cream. Moe's plans as he fled to Wisconsin after the
shooting did see a celebration that was occurring in Madison.
And he seriously contemplated using the fire army and his vehicle
to commit another shooting. The gunman had about 60 rounds left at
that point, but hadn't planned enough to carry out a second attack.
The Highland Park attack, however, had been planned for several weeks
He'd legally purchased five guns, including the Smith and Wesson
semiautomatic rifle used in the shooting, which was bought in Illinois
in the last year That despite two encounters with police in 2019
1 after he attempted suicide, the second after he threatened to kill
family.
Leading officers to confiscate 16 knives, a dagger and sword from
the home. There were no charges or arrests. In either case, authorities
recovered. 83 spent bullet shells from the rooftop where Cremo took
aim at parade goers.
Investigators are still reviewing the gunman's social media posts
and conducting interviews to determine a motive. Meanwhile, another
American community grieves authorities today identified the seventh
victim as Eduardo. You've Aldo, a 69 year old grandfather.
And Highland Park's loss rebels far beyond this neighborhood.
Among yesterday's visitors. Vice President Kamala Harris meeting
with first responders and local leaders at the parade site, officials
say nine people ranging from ages 14 to 70 are still hospitalist
as of yesterday.
Let's focus now on some of the questions being raised about how the
gunman was able to obtain weapons after those 2019 incidents and
what red flag laws can and cannot do.
Jeffrey Swanson studies these issues. He's a professor of psychiatry
and behavioral sciences at Duke University who looks closely at shootings.
Professor Swanson. Welcome back to the news hour. Thank you for joining
us. I want to ask you about these details were learning here. You
have a young man who was twice flagged to authorities.
He was still able to get a firearm owner's ID card. He passed background
checks illegally bought his weapons. Illinois has a red flag laws
on the books. Why didn't it work?
But it is concerning, you know, warning signs always look more obvious
and worse when we view them through this remarkable device called
a retrospective scope.
When we're looking forward, you know, there are a lot of people who
have contacts with law enforcement. A lot of people who look like
they should you know they pose a risk of harm to self or others.
So, yes. And if people see something like this, if people somebody,
somebody around you is of concern. Uh, you know, you should take
action and calling the police in this case is what they what they
did. Question is, what can the police actually do?
The red flag laws designed to give police officers authority to remove
firearms in the civil restraining order is someone who poses a risk.
Usually it's an imminent risk of harm to self or others. They can
remove those guns with a court order and it's time limited.
But you know, otherwise, there's not much they could do if the person
poses a risk, uh, in a mental health crisis. Police officers have
the authority to take that person in
Ah, detain them for usually about 72 hours for evaluation. And if
they meet the criteria if they're dangerous and mentally ill, they
can be a million voluntarily to a hospital to mitigate that risk
that would have conferred a gun disqualifying records. The red flag
walk can work.
But if people don't know about it don't know how to use it. There's
no protocol in place. It's not routine that scaled up to where officers
or others know to use it. It's not going to do much good anyway,
As you say, Of course, things are much clearer in hindsight, but
there are some details. I want to ask you about because from a law
enforcement perspective now we now know that they went to the home
twice.
They took away knives, a dagger and a sword. After the family said
that this young man threatened to kill everyone there. They were
told he was getting mental health support. But then they say the
family didn't want to move forward with a complaint. They didn't
have any other information on threats. And even though local police
flag state police that's basically it, that's all they can do so
Is the bar for what law enforcement can do at the right place.
I don't want to second guess what the police did in this case, it
could well be that they should have done more. They should have done
something differently. It is. It's a real challenge in our country
when firearms are so prevalent
Um, what we need is an ensemble of laws. The red flag laws is a good
tool. It's It's a kind of a like a Swiss Army knife or, you know
it's a nimble tool because we don't have to.
Decide why somebody is dangerous at the time. Um, but they have to
be dangerous, You know, pose a risk during a particular time frame
flag loss would work better if we had universal background checks.
If we did something about
Um you know the illegal gun market in this country and the fact that
young people and or anybody for that matter can buy a weapon of war
that is designed to kill multiple people in in a very short period
of time with minimal physical effort.
So this is a real puzzle. Um, red flag laws I still maintain are
very important tools if people know about them, and if they are widely
used, we have evidence from Connecticut and Indiana the first two
states and enacted similar laws.
That you know, for every 10 to 20 of these legal actions, one life
is saved by averting a suicide. That's what many of them are used
for. And we have emerging evidence to show that in many cases in
California and other states, uh significant proportion of these are
used when there is a threat.
Of a mass shooting. We don't know in every case that it would have
happened without this, but we do know that if these are used in a
timely way, um
You know it's going to remove a key element in in one of these horrible
incidents. Other countries had troubled young men who are inclined
to hurt people or, you know, were saying scary things and social
media. They don't have.
This problem that we have, where this is very deviant cultural script
That's almost uniquely American people follow, but a key element
in that is, is this access to very lethal weapons?
That it's professor Jeffrey Swanson of Duke University. Joining us
tonight, Professor Swanson. Thank you for joining us again.