The families of the victims of a mass shooting of 2023 in Maine and dozens of survivors are intended to file a negligence demand on Wednesday against the United States government, claiming that the military and others did not respond to the warning signs and a threat of the gunman, who was an army reservist.
Robert Card, 40, killed 18 people in a bowling alley and a bar in Lewiston, triggering a two -day human hunt that ended when he died from suicide, authorities said.
The approximately 100 plaintiffs are expected to name the Department of Defense, the Army Community Hospital and Keller Army in West Point, New York, in the lawsuit, that a team of four law firms will be presented in a federal court in Maine.
“The army repeatedly broke his promise to protect the community that undertakes to defend and must be responsible,” said Maine Travis Brennan lawyer in a statement.
Benjamin Gideon, another lawyer in Maine who represents the plaintiffs, added that “it is difficult to imagine that the army accepts responsibility without being forced to do so in court.”
Law firms delivered legal notices of their intention to sue in October. The lawyers said that the army had multiple opportunities to intervene in the case of Card, but did not, even as soon as May 2023, when their son informed that his father’s mental health seemed to be deteriorated and his behavior was erratic.
The justice and defense departments and the army could not be immediately contacted to comment on the planned complaints. They previously refused to comment on the legal notices.
The National Litigating Law, a law firm in Texas, is working with two law firms from Maine to represent the plaintiffs. The firm represented the survivors and families of those killed in the 2017 church shooting at Sutherland Springs, Texas, committed by a member of the Air Force Service. The Federal Government was partially responsible in that case, and the survivors agreed to establish themselves in 2023 after the Department of Justice APLA.
The legal cases in Maine focus similarly on the federal government and the actions taken by military members.
Despite the apparent warning signs, a definitive reason for the uproar in Lewiston is still clear. Card’s family has said he claimed to have listening to voices months before when he was equipped for high -power headphones and that he had become increasingly paranoid.
A month after the shootings, an independent commission was formed to investigate and analyze any failures by the military, the application of the law and the card family.
The commission report and military investigations shed light on possible failures.
The Internal Army Report said that the card unit could not follow certain procedures after it was involved in a thrust incident with another reservist in July 2023, which led him to be hospitalized for two weeks in a psychiatric unit in a civil hospital. At that time, their informed symptoms included psychosis and homicidal ideations, and had created a “list of successes”, according to the investigation of the military.
Then, the army prohibited Card from having access to service weapons.
An independent report separate from the State Commission concluded that although the armed man was solely responsible for his conduct, there were false steps. The leaders of the Card Unit “could not take the necessary steps to reduce the threat that represented the public,” how to ignore the “strong recommendations” of their mental health providers to stay committed to their care and ensure that weapons were eliminated in their home.
The commission also found that its unit “neglected to share” all the information about the past threats with the local Sheriff’s office.
In addition, the commission said, the members of the medical staff of Keller Army Community Hospital, where the card was initially evaluated three months before the shootings, did not present a call of Act safe. The report is used to alert the authorities when people can be danger for themselves or for others.
The reports of the Military and Independent Commission also detailed how Card’s family alerted a sergeant of the Sheriff of Sagadahoc County about its deterioration of mental health. The report also said that the law enforcement agencies had a probable cause to initiate Maine’s “yellow flag” law, which allows them to confiscate people’s firearms if they believe they are threats to themselves or for others, but that was never done.
The Sagadahoc County Sheriff, Joel Merry, said after the shootings that the Army reserve informed his department that Card threatened to “shoot” the base of the National Guard in Saco, Maine. Merry said he distributed a state alert to the law enforcement agencies after the agents sent to Card’s house in Bowdoin could not find it.
The researchers also analyzed whether Card exposure to low -level explosions as manual Granada instructor in the army was linked to the “serious” traumatic brain injury that the investigators found evidence last year. The military denied in their report that any brain -related injury was linked to their service.
The law firms had previously said that they were focusing on the federal government and not on the application of the local law because the army had access to the most critical information about Card’s mental state and could have helped guarantee that it did not have access to firearms.
The Card Unit could not carry out a “investigation of the” required duty, which would have documented the condition of its mental state, the army recognized in its internal report.
Card’s family told NBC News a year after the shootings that supported more investigations of the brains of military service members. They also launched a non -profit organization, ascending on the breakdown, to focus on the awareness of mental health and brain injuries among service members.
If you or someone you know is in crisis, call or send a text message to 988 or go 988lifeline.orgto achieve the suicide and crisis life line. You can also call the network, previously known as the National Life of Suicide Prevention, to 800-273-8255 or visit Speakingofsuicide.com/resources.
