Temporary gun removal law shows promise in preventing suicides

The Connecticut measure was driven by concerns about distraught or disgruntled people committing violence against others, such as in a mass shooting, Swanson said. But the law is more often used by family members and law enforcement troubled by people who might harm themselves. Police must obtain a civil warrant from a judge with probable cause that the person is at risk of harming themselves or others. A civil court hearing must be held within two weeks to decide whether to return the guns to the owner, or hold the guns for up to a year.

Of the 762 instances of temporary gun seizures, 95 percent of the people were male with an average age of 47. An average of seven firearms were sequestered per case. Most of the people were not involved in the criminal justice system; 88 percent had no arrests leading to a criminal conviction in the year before or the year after their firearms were temporarily removed, according to the study.

Just 12 percent of the people whose guns were temporarily removed were already receiving public mental health treatment in the year before the guns were seized. A larger proportion (29 percent) were receiving mental health treatment through the state’s public system in the year that followed their guns being seized, suggesting some subjects began receiving mental health care as an indirect result of temporary gun removal.

Among the 762 interventions, 21 of the people involved ended up committing suicide — a proportion 40 times higher than suicide rate among the general population. Fifteen people used methods other than firearms to kill themselves. Six people used guns to kill themselves. All of the gun-related suicides occurred after the person was once again eligible to buy a gun or reclaim weapons that had been held by authorities.

Although 90 percent of suicide attempts are survived, the results are almost always fatal for those who use firearms, Swanson said.

“What if the guns had not been taken away, how many more people would have died?” he said. “We don’t know that for sure. But using information that we have from other studies about the means used in suicide in the U.S. population, and the connections between gun ownership and suicide, we can estimate that the gun-removal policy in Connecticut did save many lives. In effect, it offered a second chance at life for people in deep despair, and even a path to recovery when they got help as a result.”

The study data comprises quantitative and qualitative information from court records, interviews, public health files, vital records and other sources, and has limitations, Swanson said. Researchers relied on national and state data on suicide rates, causes of suicide death, gun ownership and rates of known suicide attempts to estimate the number of guns that need to be seized to prevent one suicide. The findings are also based solely on one state; Swanson and other researchers in the field are tracking similar laws in other states to gain additional insights, he said.

— Read more in Jeffrey W. Swanson et al., “Implementation and Effectiveness of Connecticut’s Risk-Based Gun Removal Law: Does it Prevent Suicides?” Law and Contemporary Problems (August 2016)