A military investigation found “multiple failures” leading to the deaths of 18 people in a mass shooting in Lewiston, Maine by an Army reservist whose declining mental health had been known to local police and military leaders for months, Scripps News reports. The findings, which were released to the public in redacted form by the U.S. Army on Tuesday, resulted in discipline for “dereliction of duty” against three officers in the chain of command of Robert Card II, the reservist who opened fire at a Lewiston bowling alley and restaurant in October 2023. After a two-day manhunt, Card was found dead by suicide. “There were a number of communication breakdowns within his unit,” said Lt. Gen. Jody Daniels, the Army Reserve chief. The investigation revealed new details about the events leading up to October’s massacre.
Months before the incident, a court hearing that could have led to Card’s involuntary commitment to a psychiatric hospital was canceled for unclear reasons. Card admitted to mental health professionals he had a “hit list.” Just six weeks before the shooting, Card told a fellow reservist he “could take out 100 people with this expensive scope” he bought, and listed different places he could “shoot up.” These comments were made around the same time military leaders took steps to alert local law enforcement about Card’s behavior. Many of the findings revolved around the aftermath of Card’s hospitalization in a New York mental health facility that ended in August 2023 under what the Army called “questionable circumstances.” Card was at Four Winds Hospital for 19 days after his Army leaders ordered him to receive treatment due to his threatening behavior during a training assignment at the Camp Smith training center near West Point.
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