From the “Must do more, somehow” column comes this tragedy-spawned lawsuit by a grieving mother following the suicide of her daughter. The daughter was a manic depressive schizophrenic who killed herself with a shotgun she bought from Wal-Mart. The Wal-Mart branch seven miles away had on file her prescription for anti-psychotic medication. The mother wants $25,000,000 from Wal-Mart for failing to prevent the tragedy by reviewing her daughter’s pharmacy records or its own store records (the daughter had assaulted another person at the store where her prescription was on file).

Problem 1 = Federal law prohibits revealing pharmacy records in running firearm background checks.

Problem 2 = Texas law prohibits the publication of mental health records without the patient’s approval.

Problem 3 = How does an attack on a third party result in any evidence that someone is suicidal?

Details are here.

Filed under: guns