Under compulsion NY Mental Health Professionals add 34,500 to Div. Criminal Justice Database

[HereSince1628]

A newly created database of New Yorkers deemed too mentally unstable to carry firearms has grown to roughly 34,500 names, a previously undisclosed figure that has raised concerns among some mental health advocates that too many people have been categorized as dangerous.

The database, established in the aftermath of the mass shooting in 2012 at the Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn., and maintained by the state Division of Criminal Justice Services, is the result of the Safe Act. It is an expansive package of gun control measures pushed through by the administration of Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo. The law, better known for its ban on assault weapons, compels licensed mental health professionals in New York to report to the authorities any patient “likely to engage in conduct that would result in serious harm to self or others.” Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo at a bill-signing ceremony on Tuesday with, in foreground from left, Leah Gunn Barrett of New Yorkers Against Gun Violence; Senator Jeffrey D. Klein; Sheldon Silver, the Assembly speaker; and Senator Andrea Stewart-Cousins.

But the number of entries in the database highlights the difficulty of America’s complicated balancing act between public safety and the right to bear arms when it comes to people with mental health issues. “That seems extraordinarily high to me,” said Sam Tsemberis, a former director of New York City’s involuntary hospitalization program for homeless and dangerous people, now the chief executive of Pathways to Housing, which provides housing to the mentally ill. “Assumed dangerousness is a far cry from actual dangerousness.”

Similar laws in other states have raised the ire of gun rights proponents, who worry that people who posed no threat at all would have their rights infringed. Mental health advocates have also argued that the laws unnecessarily stigmatized people with mental illnesses.

Because the names in New York’s database and the circumstances of their cases are private, it is impossible to independently determine whether the people in it are truly dangerous.
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http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/19/nyregion/mental-reports-put-34500-on-new-yorks-no-guns-list.html?_r=0

[valerief]

1. 34,500 of 15,411,151 (age 18+) = less than 1/4 percent.

http://datacenter.kidscount.org/data/tables/99-total-population-by-child-and-adult

Doesn't seem too high to me.

[HereSince1628]

2. If you have a link that shows Tsemberis wrong

please post it.

“That seems extraordinarily high to me,” said Sam Tsemberis, a former director of New York City’s involuntary hospitalization program for homeless and dangerous people, now the chief executive of Pathways to Housing, which provides housing to the mentally ill.

[valerief]

3. He considers less than a quarter percent high. Doesn't seem high to me.

No right or wrong.

[HereSince1628]

4. So it's based on your opinion

Is there something in your experience or education that informs that opinion in a way that makes it more like informed opinion than just a gut feeling?

[valerief]

5. Same as his.

Go away

[HereSince1628]

6. You are a former director of NY city's involuntary hospitalization program?

That would be interesting, but I have no reason to believe that.

Studies show about 5-8 percent of the -seriously- mentally ill are involved in -ANY- act of violence.

Not all 18 million people you refer to are mentally ill. So you can't do the arithmetic the way you did.

At minimum You've got to reference the people put into the database as a percentage of the mentally ill (and that should probably not include the total for -any and all types- of mental illness.

Nonetheless if you run the averages for the US as a whole against the population of the State of NY, the result is the 34500 represents 11 percent of an estimate for -all- mental illnesses.

That's double the low end estimate and greater than the high end estimate for violence in just persons with serious mental illnesses. Which explains why Tsemberis feels that the 34500 number is too big.

[mopinko]

7. go away?

if you dont want to discuss things, maybe you ought to take the walk.