Suicidal IL Woman Buys Ammunition Without FOID Card--Husband Sues

[Archer1945]

Fisherman might just be on to something.

If you are an Illinois resident you need a FOID (Firearms Owner Identification Card) to even be able to look at a gun, or have one in your house. The first thing a clerk working with firearms or ammo is supposed to do is ask to see your FOID card, if an IL resident, or your driver's license if a non-resident. I know this very well because as a MO resident I do most of my shooting in IL. The best stocked gun shop/range in the St Louis area is over in Belleville, about a 45 minute trip from my house in North St Louis County.

 

[Mt Shooter]

I don't mean to steal the thread or sound too ignorant, but whats a FOID card. Do you have to have one for each firearm that you own?

 

[dakuda]

FOID info: http://www.isp.state.il.us/foid/

You only need one card, not one for each firearm.

 

[Derek Zeanah]

Folks, let's not disparage the people involved in this news story. Beyond the fact that we don't know anything about this situation, the "high road" way to have this discussion is to assume some of the parties involved may step in some day.

Do we really want to be calling this woman a "whack job?" Do you know for sure her suicidal thoughts aren't a side-effect of prescription meds she was on? Do we know it was a suicide at all? If it's something we don't expect, do you want to have to justify your comments to a relative once they pop in?

We're talking about a tragic situation that affected real people here, not some hypothetical. Let's try and be a bit sensitive to it.

 

[hksw]

Mark Johnson should be suing himself for provideing access to a firearms to his wife, a mentally unstable individual. Ammo can't shoot by itself. If the wife had visited a friend who had a firearm that was easily accessible and commited the act with it, would Mr. Johnson have sued the friend?

 

[SCKimberFan]

^ Probably.

 

[MGshaggy]

Treo I also have wonder if this guy thinks WM is really responsible for his nut job of a wife's suicide why is he only suing for 75k

Requirement for diversity jurisdiction in federal court; you can be awarded more, but to get jurisdiction you have to allege damages in excess of $75k.

 

[Soybomb]

It certainly appears someone is taking their own personal tragedy (that they actually have some responsibility in) and trying to profit from it. Hopefully his negligence and greed won't effect the ability of everyone else to get affordable accessible ammo.

 

[mp510]

Wal-Mart should not have given the ammo keys to an untrained employee. Between haveing an untrained employee engaged in ammo selling, and illegally selling her ammo, wal-mart should pay. The husband also should bear some liability for leaving a firearm accessible to her, BUT the gun alone would not have done squat to her without the ammo, which would not have been available to her had a clerk Wal-Mart did not properly trained illegally sold her ammo.

 

[Gibbles]

I believe it to be on the husband, but the law of the land is that they should have checked for that FOID card. I think the whole concept of the FOID card is a joke, and it should be against the law to even require one, but it is law in that state.

I think the husband should have locked the gun up.

 

[papajohn]

If the husband ASSUMED she couldn't get ammo because of a lack of a FOID card, did he even consider the fact that had she driven to any of the surrounding states, it wouldn't have been a factor? In fact, if the woman had an out-of-state ID, she could have bought ammo in Illinois, regardless.

When I first moved to Illinois (a serious mistake long since corrected), I could buy ammunition just by showing my Missouri DL. My girlfriend, who had lived there all her life, couldn't buy a single round of 22 ammo without a FOID card.

Thank heaven for politicians, for making such a foolproof system!

I don't think Wal-Mart owes this guy a cent, and I am NOT a WalMart fan!

Papajohn

 

[ants]

Like Papajohn says, we're pretending that she could not leave Illinois to purchase ammunition. Sure, a FOID card is required in Illinois. It would only take her an hour or less to buy the ammunition in a neighboring state, and everyone knows that.

No, the lawsuit is not about principle, nor about wrongdoing. It's not about FOID. It's not about Illinois. It's not about her mental condition.

It's all about money. The plaintiff's lawyer knows full well that a trial is costly, but an undisclosed settlement gets him just as much fee and is much less risky. Plus, the lawyer gets to set up a trust to receive the settlement (with himself as administrator) and collect his contingency from the trust, then charge his expenses to the trust, charge the cost of administering the trust itself, and finally deliver the remaining few thousand dollars to the loser - er, I mean the winner - of the settlement.

 

[thegoodfight]

this story is so old...well...maybe cause i live in peoria. anyway...takes more than an hour to get to any border from peoria, btw.

 

[Guns and more]

If she was enough of a danger to herself and others, why was she allowed to walk around by herself?

ACLU

Walmart will probably win the case

They'll settle. Hell, the guy is only asking 75K, cheaper than a trial.

says he had a gun in the house, but no bullets.

I guess guns don't kill, after all.

why didn't the guy lock up his gun knowing his wife was a little cuckoo?

Bingo!

Wal-Mart should not have given the ammo keys to an untrained employee.

What training? I often have to get someone from the sewing department to help me.

 

[lysander]

Mmmmmmmmmm.....where to begin?

Because this guy couldn't lock up his guns, I'm not going to be able to buy ammo at Wal-mart.

We don't know that his guns weren't locked up do we?

They'll settle. Hell, the guy is only asking 75K, cheaper than a trial.

As has been previously mentioned, the amount of damages being asked for is strictly a requirement of jurisdiction. Many lawyers have dropped asking for huge damages sums in complaints. The prayer for damages that used to allege millions draws a public backlash. So I guess you can't win for trying. Ask for millions and people say you are trying to intimidate the defendant into a settlement. Ask for the jurisdictional minimum and people think you have a crap case and are trolling for a quickie settlement. The real damages request probably wouldn't appear until closing arguments.

Walmart cannot possibly be responsible in ANY WAY for this tragedy.

No? What about negligence per se? Walmart's agent sold handgun ammunition to a woman in violation of state law. The woman is a member of a class intended to be protected by the FOID act. Ergo...an actionable negligence claim.

 

[jonmerritt]

Good point Eightball, thankyou.

 

[Orthonym]

Stevemis, yep, there are "better" ways. If I felt like I just had to do it, say I had advanced metastatic bone cancer or something, well, somehow arrange for myself and a bottle of compressed nitrogen to inhabit the same small space, and crack the valve open. Hypoxia is the easiest way to go.

P.s. There was a woman around here a few years back who shot her daughter in the head with a .44 Special, then shot herself in the chest. Reminds me of that Dorothy L. Sayers novel about the guy who was too vain to shoot himself in the head.

Really, if one is contemplating something like that, I think he should take at least as much care as H. Beam Piper did, when he did himself in. I recommend a thorough enema beforehand, as well.

 

[hotpig]

Wal Marts register system always reminds the employee that they have to check the FOID. The employee did not do it even though it was right there in writing on her check out screen.

I do not think Wal Mart will have a leg to stand on. Even if the employee knew nothing about firearm laws.

 

[MICHAEL T]

Well come insurance won't pay on suicide. So maybe husband trying to recover some losses. After all he will need trolling money to find a new wife.

 

[hotpig]

Fisherman_48768
Female suicide with a firearm is rare, they tend to use less destructive means. Makes me wonder if further information needs to be looked at.

I generally follow this line of reasoning also.

The last one that I had was a 21 year old pretty blond that worked security at a area hospital.

She was found slumped over the steering wheel of her car in a local park at 3am.

There was one empty 9mm shell case lying on the ground near the drivers door. The doors were locked and the windows were all rolled up.

A Berreta 92 9mm was lying on the floor between her feet. It had a stove pipe malfunction.

The female had a hugh hole in her forehead and a tiny hole in the back of her head. The Deputy Coroner on call bagged her and transported her to the local hospital for post mortum x rays. I met him there to help move the body.

When I saw her forehead I about had a cow. No pretty young gal is going to shoot themselves in the face. And do it from the back of their head!!

I had the Coroner and sheriff called in to Investigate further. After shooting some xrays we found the bullet image. It was caught up in her hair at the back of her head.

Further examination of the forehead showed it to be a large hole from the muzzle blast.

I was real embarrassed but also glad that we did not have a homicide scene that was ruined because it was to recognized as such early on.

 

[Dr. Tad Hussein Winslow]

Normally I am quite gleeful when I hear Walmart is sued, and in fact the plaintiff has an arguably valid legal claim called "negligence per se" (statutory violation leading to the exact harm contemplated by the statute - one of them anyway), and the smoking gun of the manager admitting that the clerk had not received the firearms training, (so the lawsuit will likely succeed in bringing about a "confidential settlement"), but since the FOID law in the first place is violative of everyone's 2A rights, and since I think people should be perfectly free to off themselves if they are an adult, then I have a real problem with this lawsuit.

 

[denfoote]

The Peoria County State's Attorney's office filed criminal charges against Wal-Mart clerk Christy Blake for selling the ammunition, but later dropped the charges.

There are no Federal restrictions for an adult to buy ammunition, save being prohibited person.
Buying ammunition is guaranteed by the second amendment.
This probably reflects an evaluation by the State's Attorney that requiring a FOID contradicts the recent SCOTUS decision.

 

[Gunsby_Blazen]

Sadly, the man and Wal-Mart are both to blame.
The man should have locked up his gun, and Wal-Mart should have followed the law. I don’t agree with the whole FOID card program because I don’t think the gov should know that you own firearms. But, the purpose of FOID is to prevent mentally handicap and unlawful citizens to get their hands on stuff like that.

Despite not agreeing with FOID, Wal-Mart dropped the ball and I don’t think they can win.

My projection, Wal-Mart will settle out of court and will continue selling ammo in Illinois.

And Denfoote, I really doubt that the Heller decision had any impact on the reason why he dropped the case.

Trying to get rid of FOID in Illinois is a completely different battle. Illinois is really stuck in its ways. FOID has its pros and cons and sometimes I flip flop on the whole idea form time to time. Hope I don’t get hounded for that last statement.

But, maybe I am wrong. Perhaps FOID is on its way out...
Either way, I don’t think things will change around here for some time.

 

[misANTHrope]

Why are we assuming that the gun was not locked up? I'm no saying that it's not likely that this was the case, but it seems like there is some conclusion-jumping going on here.

 

[RaspberrySurprise]

I guess I must be one of the few people who considers the woman solely responsible for killing herself. This is not to say that if I was that woman's husband I would not have secured my weapon beyond her reach if I knew or was suspicious of her state of mind.

Each time a court finds for the plaintiff in a case like this it removes the amount of responsibility that is required of an adult, some day I can see being able to sue a company for accidentally cutting yourself with a knife because they sold it to someone too stupid not try and trim their nails with a machete.

Walmart should of course be punished for breaking the law but such punishment is between the State and Walmart, there are likely fines and other provisions in place for when a company breaks this law.