Morning Briefing
Summaries of health policy coverage from major news organizations
In One Of A Series Of Red Flags From His Past, Texas Gunman Once Escaped Psychiatric Hospital
The New York Times: Texas Gunman Once Escaped From Mental Health Facility
The gunman behind the worst mass shooting in Texas history escaped from a psychiatric hospital while he was in the Air Force, and was caught a few miles away by the local police, who were told that he had made death threats against his superiors and tried to smuggle weapons onto his base, a 2012 police report showed. That episode, which came to light on Tuesday, was another in a series of red flags about the threat the gunman, Devin P. Kelley, posed to those around him. But none of the warnings stopped Mr. Kelley from legally purchasing several firearms, including the rifle he used to kill 26 people at the First Baptist Church of Sutherland Springs on Sunday. (Romero, Blinder and Perez-Pena, 11/7)
The Associated Press: Gunman Once Fled Mental Health Center, Threatened Superiors
The records that emerged Tuesday add up to at least three missed opportunities that might have offered law enforcement a way to stop Kelley from having access to guns long before he slaughtered much of the congregation in the middle of a service. Authorities said the death toll of 26 included the unborn baby of one of the women killed. Kelley died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound after he was chased by bystanders and crashed his car. (11/8)
Los Angeles Times: Texas Gunman Escaped From Mental Health Facility In 2012, Threatened Military Superiors
Kelley "suffered from mental health disorders" and had apparently been sent to the facility during his Air Force court-martial proceedings on charges of beating his wife and stepson in 2011 and 2012, according to the police records. An incident report described Kelley as "a danger to himself and others as he had already been caught sneaking firearms onto Holloman Air Force Base" in New Mexico, and said that he had concocted a plan to use a bus to escape the mental health facility. (Pearce, 11/7)
NPR: Texas Shooter's History Raises Questions About Mental Health And Mass Murder
Devin Kelley, the man we now know killed more than two dozen people at a Texas church on Sunday, escaped a mental health facility before the Air Force could try him on charges that he beat his wife and baby stepson back in 2012. And President Trump, like many people before him, is pointing to mental health — not guns — as the cause of the church massacre. (Kodjak, 11/7)
