If the person is too dangerous to buy a gun, why are they even out on the street at all?
Well... this is a cut and paste from my post in another thread, but since we are rehashing the issue here goes:
Incapacitating mental illness of the type that renders you a danger to self or others (schizophrenia, major depression, bi-polar disorder, etc.), and of the severity that is liable to subject you to detention against your will, is typically not a static condition. This is often difficult to understand unless you have had experience with mental health patients.
While the diagnosis is more or less permanent, the condition of imminent danger that results in detention is rarely a "now and forever" situation like mental retardation. Many/most patients who are subject to detention are typically capable of living independently, and typically return to a behavioral state where it is innapropriate (and illegal) to keep them detained in a secure facility.
This does not however necessarily mean that they will remain that way; and in fact in most cases where an emergency detention has occurred due to psychosis the patient will indeed be rehospitalized at some point. It may be a very short period of time, or it may take years.
Gun ownership is a profoundly poor idea for most (not all, but most) of these people.
It is not as simple as "why is he/she allowed out in public?" however.
Not all states require adjudication for imminent risk hospitalizations, and not all persons who pose such risk are "mentally incompetent or defective" by legal definition.
If one's mental health history includes hospitalization (voluntary or otherwise) for imminent risk of serious harm to self or others, the information should, in my opinion, be potentially disqualifying to lawful gun ownership IF a law enforcement agency, mental health authority, etc. is willing to go to the trouble of petitioning a hearing by a Court that it be so ordered, and is capable of providing a compelling demonstration of the basis of their concern.
It should not be incumbent upon the individual, IMHO, to demonstrate their competency in the absence of such action.
Also, you fail to realize that "mentally ill" is a damn vague term.
No, it's not.
For the purpose of firearms restriction: an individual diagnosed with uncontrolled (or persistent transient uncontrollability of) schizophrenia, bi-polar disorder, or depressive disorder, and accompanying acts and/or expressions of imminent risk of causing greivous physical injury or death to themselves or another person.
