Maine’s yellow flag law has been used 412 times in the year since the mass shooting in Lewiston

In the year since the mass shooting in Lewiston, Maine’s yellow flag law has been invoked more than 400 times by police trying to take guns from people they believe pose a danger to themselves or others.

Law enforcement had used the law far less before the tragedy, just 81 times since the law first took effect in 2020 until the state’s worst mass shooting on Oct. 25, 2023. It was used 412 times from the second day. shooting until October 22 this year.

The average number of yellow flag interventions increased from about five per month before the shooting to an average of 34 each month after. And there is no indication that the police are less aggressive now than they were in the weeks immediately following the tragedy, or that the risk of violence has diminished. The number of cases rose in September to 50, the highest monthly total on record.

Ben Strick, vice president of adult behavioral health for Spurwink, a Portland-based nonprofit that offers 24-hour telehealth screenings as part of the Yellow Flag process, said that despite the law’s increased use, the severity of what I see has not diminished. .

“These incidents continue to be frightening,” Strick said. “I can’t say this with certainty, but my hope is that this law has prevented suicides, homicides and incidents of deadly force.”

It’s tomorrow the only state with a yellow flag law, while 21 states have a red flag laws on the books that make it easier for law enforcement to temporarily remove guns from people who pose a danger. Gun reform advocates are pushing to replace Maine’s law with a more aggressive version known as a red flag law, while the Mills administration and others say Maine’s current law is working.

The Army in Lewiston left 18 dead at two locations, a bar and a bowling alley. The shooter, Robert Card, later committed suicide and was found in a storage trailer in Lisbon. Card had a history of severe mental illness and had been hospitalized after making threats of violence in New York state for two weeks in July 2023.

The law was updated this spring to streamline the process and make it easier for law enforcement, courts and mental health providers to use, supporters of the current law say.

The Maine Attorney General’s Office provides a summary of each use of the yellow flag law without using names or other identifying details. The accounts reveal harrowing details of domestic violence, suicide threats and other volatile incidents that could have led to more tragedy.

For example, on October 19, 2024, Gorham police used the yellow flag law when “a 50-year-old man (was) struggling with his girlfriend to retrieve the gun to shoot himself; The 14-year-old son detained him until the police arrived,” according to the summary.

On Oct. 10, in an unidentified area of Androscoggin County, the sheriff’s office reported that “a 36-year-old man seriously assaulted two co-workers unprovoked while in a manic state. (He) believes his dead mother is guiding him and that she is a prophet.”

In another incident on Oct. 19, the York County Sheriff’s Office reported that “a 25-year-old man sent a photo of his girlfriend holding a gun to her head and threatening to kill herself.”

Red flag law data from California, Connecticut, Maryland and Washington indicate that a suicide is prevented every 17 to 23 times when a red flag law is used to temporarily remove guns, according to a study published in August 2024 in the Journal of the American Academy. of Psychiatry and Law.

People express suicidal or homicidal intent in more than 90 percent of yellow flag cases, according to state data. More than half of the cases – 52% – cite suicide threats, while 17% involve homicide threats. The rest involve both types of threats or do not identify the nature of the potential violence.

Sanford Police Maj. Mark Dyer, who heads his department’s support services, said the “steady increase” in the use of the law since the Lewiston tragedy is due to “officers, judges and hospitals getting familiar and getting used to how in which the law operates”.

Sanford has a mental health unit within its police department and has been one of the leaders statewide in helping other police forces learn how to use the law.

The law requires police to take subjects into protective custody, have them evaluated by a mental health professional to confirm they pose a threat to themselves or others, and secure a hearing before a judge for a temporary detention order one’s firearms.

The changes to the law — proposed by the Mills administration and passed into law this spring — helped make the law work more smoothly, Strick and Sanford police said.

Sgt. Everett Allen, who works in the Sanford Police Department’s mental health unit, said one of the big changes was expanding the amount of time officers are allowed to arrange and have a hearing before a judge from 2 p.m. to 30 days.

“It allowed us to not work in such a frantic way,” Allen said. “It gave us time to get everyone on the same page and understand what was going on in each case. It’s a better collaborative process.”

Strick said the updates to the law that went into effect in August were “a bunch of little fixes that were designed to make things work better in specific situations.”

Strick said from the mental health evaluation standpoint, under the updated law, they can now use “third party” information when conducting the mental health evaluation. This is helpful because when the person who might have the guns refuses to talk, mental health professionals can now use information from friends or family members and use other evidence, such as text messages, to determine if the law must be used, he said.

But Margaret Groban, a board member of the Maine Gun Safety Coalition and a retired prosecutor, said despite improvements to the yellow flag law this year, the law is still far more burdensome than red flag laws in 21 other states.

Red flag laws do not require a mental health screening. Under red flag laws, family members or police can directly petition a court to determine whether someone’s guns should be temporarily removed because they pose a danger to themselves or others.

“There’s a reason we’re an outlier,” Groban said. “The initial decision for a gun restraining order should not be based on mental illness. What we really care about is whether someone is dangerous.”

The Maine Gun Safety Coalition will collect signatures on Election Day to put the issue directly before voters in the upcoming election.

“The yellow flag law was a good start, but we can do better,” Groban said. “I hope Maine will see (passing a red flag law) as an opportunity to make our state safer.”

Vice President Kamala Harris, in a written statement marking one year since the Lewiston shootings, called on Congress to pass a series of gun reforms, including a national red flag law.

But state Sen. Lisa Keim, R-Dixfield, said Maine’s yellow flag law should not be abandoned.

“I see no reason to scrap the yellow flag law and replace it with a red flag law,” Keim said.

Keim said Maine’s yellow flag law and New York state’s red flag laws could have been used in Robert Card’s case, but neither state did so.

“The main thing is we have constitutional rights, Second Amendment rights,” Keim said, referring to the right to bear arms. “We should protect these rights to the highest degree possible.”

Meanwhile, Gov. Janet Mills, a Democrat, also supports the updated yellow flag law.

“The governor believes the changes made earlier this year strengthen the law by providing additional useful tools for law enforcement to take guns away from people who shouldn’t have them,” Mills spokesman Ben Goodman said in a statement. a statement. “Broadly speaking, she believes that law enforcement recognizes the value of the law, particularly in the wake of the Lewiston tragedy, and with more training and greater familiarity with it, has made a strong and concerted effort to take more advantage of it. to protect their communities.”