Letter: Separate gun ownership from mental illness

Regarding the article, “Isle gun group aims to sue over ‘red flag’ law” (Star-Advertiser, April 28): The substance of the article is at the confluence of a too-widely-held desire for minimally regulated gun ownership, and the terrible misunderstanding of the nature of severe and persistent mental illness.

First of all, there are no words in the Constitution that specifically state that any adult who wants to buy a gun is entitled to have one. And second, mentally ill people such as Bryan Uyesugi, the shooter mentioned in the article, are not as stated, “perfectly normal.” He believed that the FBI and the CIA had surveillance equipment in his car and in his bathtub drain, according to the article. Are these the thoughts of a normally functioning brain?

It seems to me that in order to have a more stable society, these are two issues that need much more clarification.

Ed Sullam

Founding co-president, NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness)-Hawaii

Kahala

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