An Iraq veteran who is believed to have killed his 11-year-old sister and himself in Gilroy this week had been upsetting his family with his talk of suicide and brandishing of guns. When they called police to their apartment two weeks ago, they told the officer the war had left their loved one a changed man.I've wondered about that. After Vietnam, for example, I don't recall so many incidents involving guns even though PTSD was very widespread. Vietnam vets often got into drugs or drank heavily, there were fights and lots of maladjustment. But these incidents of murder/suicide were fewer, at least as I recall.
Zillmer [psychologist Eric Zillmer, a Drexel University professor and co-editor of the book "Military Psychology] said record keeping on suicides and murders by veterans suffering from PTSD is a modern phenomenon, so it is impossible to know if the problem is any worse now than during previous wars.
Gun availability is one obvious difference.
Faustino Gutierrez, 46, Martha Gutierrez's brother, said the young veteran would sit on a sofa twirling a handgun and also brandished a rifle inside the family's apartment. He had recently returned from Iraq.What's your opinion? For sure the family made a tragic mistake in not taking proactive steps to prevent this. Do you think the pro-gun talk of rights and freedom, as they define it, contributes to the difficulty of disarming an obviously dangerous person before they go off the deep end?
"He said he killed a lot of people in Iraq," Faustino Gutierrez said. "It was in his conscience, and he didn't want to live anymore."
I think so. The combination of gun availability and the misguided importance many folks place on the "right" to own guns is a deadly combination in many cases.
What do you think? Please leave a comment.
