When are we as a state and nation going to take any murder, and all murders of our fellow citizens, seriously enough to do something about it?
We sadly woke up to news recently of the tragic murder of Zoe Welsh in a local neighborhood in Raleigh. Zoe had been a neighbor until a couple of years ago and was a Ravenscroft School science teacher who was loved and adored by many.
There are murders reported every day in local and national news, and each is horrible in its own context and for the personal grief they cause for the immediate family and close circle of friends and colleagues. But when the victim is someone you know and can remember talking to on the street or on your front porch, it carries with it a special degree of weight and sense of urgency that something must be done now.
Once any debate about crime control and prevention devolves into a discussion about gun ownership or racial inequality, the goal of preventing murders gets lost in a foggy rearview mirror. There has to be some progress made on something that will work. In recent conversations with people on both sides of the political spectrum after Welsh’s murder, there seems to be unanimous agreement that more mental health facilities should be opened to house and treat such patients as her accused murderer, Ryan Camacho. It’s needed not only to help them recover but also to keep them off the streets where they can do unimaginable harm to innocent victims.
More mental health services and secure facilities can be achieved in a relatively short amount of time, especially when compared to the political fight it would take to ever repeal the Second Amendment and ban gun ownership by the hundreds of millions of law-abiding citizens who currently own firearms — which is unlikely to ever happen.
Congressman Alex McMillan, for whom I worked, would periodically say during debates on Capitol Hill about assault weapons, “Isn’t every object used to hurt or kill people ‘an assault weapon?’” His point was that the real issue is dealing with the intent of certain people who want to use deadly force in a fit of anger or retribution to get what they want.
Isn’t any premeditated or spontaneous unprovoked assault on an innocent person some form of mental illness when all is said and done? It is the act of violence that has to be stopped first. Any social, economic or educational deficiency that may contribute to a person resorting to violence can be dealt with over the coming decades. However, plenty of people overcome such hurdles without ever trying to assault or kill another person. Perhaps curing and controlling mental illness is the core common factor in such random murders upon which every law-abiding citizen can agree should be the first step in dealing with and preventing such heinous acts.
This is where Democratic and Republican leaders can make an indelible mark in North Carolina and American history. They could both agree to pursue extensive expansion of mental health services and hospitals across the state. They can also find ways to make it less complicated to have a person who has committed a series of crimes committed to a psychiatric facility for an extended period. Had Camacho been committed to a mental institution instead of released back on the streets, he would have at least not been allowed to roam freely in Raleigh and then take the life of Welsh in a random act of violence. He may have even been restored to full health by highly trained physicians and psychiatrists.
The second thing leaders can do is strengthen the enforcement of existing sentencing guidelines to prevent the early release of criminals such as Camacho on plea bargains that reduce serious felony charges into a single misdemeanor.
Once any bill starts to move in the legislature or Congress to deal with crime control, advocates of complete gun control will try to add on amendments to eliminate gun ownership, which will end any incremental progress that can be made in the short run on providing serious mental health services for dangerous people.
The key for the average voter is to make sure your elected officials know you want to see immediate results and progress, not simple posturing for political gain in the next election. There are real lives at stake each and every day.
