August 14, 2014 In the News

The Seattle Times: SPU shooter: Despite troubling history, law let him have guns

The Seattle Times reports:

After Aaron Ybarra’s deadly assault at Seattle Pacific University in June, some wondered why the suicidal, psychotic 27-year-old was allowed to have a gun in the first place.

After all, Ybarra possessed a well-documented history of mental illness: homicidal fantasies, emergency-room visits for alcohol poisoning, two brief involuntary commitments and a professed admiration for one of the Columbine High School mass murderers.

As far back as 2010, he drunkenly summoned Mountlake Terrace police to his family home, saying he “had a rage inside him” and wanted to hurt others and himself, officers reported. At the time, he had access to a significant arsenal there, including a semi-automatic SKS rifle and a 30-round AK-47 assault-style rifle, police records show.

Despite all of the above, Ybarra and the weapons were perfectly legal in Washington state.

Read the whole article here.