Few states follow mental health gun law

[pulledpork]

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110217/ap_on_bi_ge/us_guns_mental_health

ATLANTA – More than half the states are not complying with a post-Virginia Tech law that requires them to share the names of mentally ill people with the national background-check system to prevent them from buying guns, an Associated Press review has found.

The deadline for complying with the three-year-old law was last month. But nine states haven't supplied any names to the database. Seventeen others have sent in fewer than 25, meaning gun dealers around the U.S. could be running names of would-be buyers against a woefully incomplete list.

Officials blame privacy laws, antiquated record-keeping and a severe lack of funding for the gap the AP found through public records requests.

Eleven states have provided more than 1,000 records apiece to the federal database, yet gun-control groups have estimated more than 1 million files are missing nationwide.

[TheWraith]

1. Technically, this was the law before VT too.

However, it's considered a very low priority by most states. Particularly when they already don't have much interest in or care for people with mental health problems.

[ProgressiveProfessor]

2. Other threads here and elsewhere have pointed out conflicts with privacy laws as well