PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Sohrab Zahedi
AU  - Robert Burchuk
AU  - David C. Stone
AU  - Alex Kopelowicz
TI  - Gun Laws and the Involuntarily Committed: A California Road Map
DP  - 2009 Dec 01
TA  - Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law Online
PG  - 545--548
VI  - 37
IP  - 4
4099  - http://jaapl.org/content/37/4/545.short
4100  - http://jaapl.org/content/37/4/545.full
SO  - J Am Acad Psychiatry Law2009 Dec 01; 37
AB  - The 2007 incident at Virginia Tech brought the question of gun ownership by the mentally ill to the forefront of public attention. Moreover, it underscored the potentially devastating consequences of the imperfect connection between federal and state laws that apply to the right of gun ownership by a psychiatric patient. The laws are complex, and, as demonstrated in this article, conflicting. We present a case report of an involuntarily committed patient in the state of California, and discuss details of state and federal laws that applied to him.