Red Flag no panacea

The murder of an 86-year-old bedridden woman, by a caregiver who had clearly informed both police and the state welfare agency involved with her care that he was at the end of his rope, has been used by the governor to justify her red flag law.

This is unfair both to the public and the officer she implies should have seized the guns in the home. The man clearly stated that he would kill her if she was not promptly removed. He also said he had told the state the same thing.

What should the officer have done? If he had seized the guns, what would have kept the man from smothering her with a pillow, one of the more common ways in which the old and frail can be murdered, and harder for the authorities to prove? Should he have also seized every pillow in the house? How about kitchen knives? Prescription medication?

Clearly, the only effective way to protect her was to remove her, which the man had been demanding that the state do. Of course, anyone who has dealt with New Mexico state bureaucracy knows what urgency that demand likely received. The woman’s death lies squarely on the state.

Rather than admit this, the governor chooses to use this death as further ammunition in her war on the constitution, when the red flag law she so proudly foisted on us would have done nothing to prevent this crime.

Kenneth McDaniel

Rio Rancho