Gun seizures in Clark County surge in law’s 2nd year

The number of extreme risk protection orders issued in Clark County has increased since lawmakers passed legislation two years ago allowing law enforcement and family members to file petitions seeking to confiscate firearms from people who may be threats to themselves and others.

The uptick in orders happened in most counties statewide in 2018, from King to Walla Walla.

Clark County Superior Court judges granted three extreme risk protection orders in 2017. Last year, they issued a total of seven orders, according to Washington Courts data.

Voters approved the law governing the orders in a November 2016 ballot initiative. Law enforcement, family or other household members can file a petition that serves as a reasonable cause standard, indicating to the court the person is a danger and their firearms should be taken away immediately.

The initial petition is a temporary order that removes firearms from a person’s possession for two weeks. After 14 days, the owner is required to come to court and argue against the confiscation and imposition of a yearlong order. Judges granted yearlong orders in all of the cases reviewed by The Columbian.

“In 2017, the process was just starting, and last year as we worked to refine it, we also started developing things like better training for the officers. I think we all realized that in the right circumstances, this can be a very useful public safety tool for them to consider using,” said Vancouver’s Chief Assistant City Attorney Jonathan Young.

The county that issued the most extreme risk protection orders over the past two years is Washington’s most populous: King County judges issued 14 orders in 2017 and 54 last year. That comes out to about three orders per 100,000 residents over the law’s lifespan.

Clark County judges issued about two orders per 100,000 residents over the same time frame. That average is more in line with Washington counties like Pierce and Snohomish. Spokane and Clallam counties issued closer to one order per 100,000 residents.

While the number of orders issued in most areas of the state remains low, the frequency of their use is climbing due in part to refined practices.

A police officer generally applies for an order if they talk to a person in crisis who admits to having access to firearms and is planning to use them, said Vancouver Police Department spokeswoman Kim Kapp. In some cases, family members from outside Clark County report concerns to police, who then use that information to apply for the order, Kapp said.

“If police are seeking the order, they are asked to contact any person who may be directly threatened and advise them of the risk,” Kapp said. “Regardless of the petitioner, we take any other information provided and do some of our own research on the person,” as well as the location and type of firearms, and situational factors.

The order itself is not a warrant to enter someone’s property and remove firearms, however. The guns can be removed consensually or through a search warrant. If a warrant is deemed necessary, it has to be obtained independently from the order.

“Cooperation compliance with the order is preferential, particularly if all guns are known about and can be accounted for,” Kapp said.

Clark County sheriff’s Sgt. Brent Waddell said when deputies have served orders, people have willingly given up their firearms. The chance of the sheriff’s office applying for a warrant is slim, he said, but the threat of the court action usually prompts people to cooperate.

“We don’t have a lot of leeway in how we can go in and get the guns,” Waddell said. “There have been instances where deputies have taken a firearm during a domestic violence incident, which we could already do. Then, we can go back and file the extreme risk protection order. It’s a component of what we can do, not a substitute.”

Recent orders

Court records show a wide range of circumstances prompting law enforcement to remove firearms from a person, ranging from threats against others to suicidal comments. The Columbian is not naming the people involved in the petitions, due to the sensitive nature of the cases, most of which involve mental health issues. The majority of individuals were neither accused of nor charged with a crime.

On Aug. 22, 2018, Vancouver police officers responded to PeaceHealth Southwest Medical Center in Vancouver after a 60-year-old man threatened to shoot staff who refused to provide him pain medication, court records say. Officers contacted the man as he pulled up to the hospital, 400 N.E. Mother Joseph Place, and he was arrested. Police found materials to build a makeshift bomb and a cartridge for a 7.62 caliber firearm in the man’s car, according to the court documents.

The Vancouver Police Department filed a petition for an extreme risk protection order the next day. The yearlong order was granted about a month later, which directed the man to surrender five weapons. It also directed him to undergo a mental health evaluation within two weeks.

There is no affidavit in the public record indicating whether the firearms were ever collected. Law enforcement logs such seizures in its evidence system, which is shared with the courts.

Another order petitioned by Vancouver police stemmed from a Aug. 14, 2018, response involving a 57-year-old man who made several suicidal statements involving his firearm. He had previously handed over his gun to officers for safekeeping, according to the petition for an extreme risk protection order.

Officers first contacted the man July 27, 2018, when he said he was going to take his apartment manager “to hell with him” if he was evicted. He told police, who showed up at his doorstep, the manager “would be sending his soul to hell,” and he said he would never harm anyone but himself, according to the order.

He was evicted the following month. When he heard the news, he threatened to kill himself. He was placed on an involuntary mental health hold at a hospital while officers took steps to ensure he couldn’t get his firearm back. The evidence laid out in the order also noted that the man has mental health issues, a traumatic brain injury and memory loss. Judge Robert Lewis granted the extreme risk protection order lasting for a year on Oct. 5.

Young, the city attorney, was in court the day Lewis decided it was appropriate to keep the man’s firearm from him for a year.

“The cases that the city attorney’s office have been involved in have all had one-year orders issued. I think if we were to encounter an order where we felt like the facts didn’t justify it, or where maybe a temporary cool down period was appropriate and a yearlong restriction wasn’t, we’d be meeting with law enforcement and advising against it,” Young said.

“We haven’t had that come up,” he added.

Young said he relies on the evidence gathered at the filing of the initial petition to convince the court the extreme risk protection order is appropriate. Some cases simply require a police contact with a suicidal person; others involve more facts collected from family members.

Take the recent case of a 48-year-old Vancouver woman whose father reported her deteriorating mental health to authorities and shared the location of her cache of firearms. The father told police his daughter’s mental state had gotten much worse since her husband’s death. She sent texts to family members threatening violence against her mother. When the father tried to take the guns out of the woman’s house, she refused to let him in, according to the petition for an extreme risk protection order filed March 21.

The Vancouver police sergeant who submitted the petition also included numerous interactions with the woman — she had reportedly harassed her neighbor several times. The woman’s increasingly erratic behavior prompted numerous calls to her daughter from multiple police agencies, former co-workers and local businesses, according to the petition.

An extreme risk protection order was issued against the woman March 29. Her case is one of two Clark County law enforcement have dealt with this year.

Young said he thinks the 2-year-old law and orders are helping officers and the court put a magnifying glass to certain cases that could fall through the cracks: Those involving people who potentially pose a risk to the public or themselves, regardless of whether there is a criminal case.

It’s also likely the number of orders will continue to increase in the years to come.

“As much as I would like to say ‘no,’ I would fully expect people to continue to see these (orders), as they seem to be a direct result of some of the shortcomings that exist within our current mental health system,” Young said.