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By contrast with tabloid innuendo, both ABC's Dan Harris and CBS' Dean Reynolds returned the coverage of the tragedy in Tucson to serious public policy. Both examined the state's healthcare system and its provision for the mentally ill. "Under Arizona law, anybody who comes into contact with somebody who they believe is mentally unstable, they can simply call and report it," ABC's Harris told us, referring to a 24-hour-a-day crisis hotline. Yet no one from the community college made that call. CBS' Reynolds pointed out Arizona allows earlier intervention than in most states, where laws have to be broken first. Yet the law is not backed by funding: Arizona's mental health budgets have been cut by $65m over the last three years, a 51% reduction.
"We should point out that even if somebody had reported Jared Loughner, there is no guarantee that his alleged violence would have been thwarted," ABC's Harris continued, since fewer than 5,000 of the 120,000 in Arizona who are disqualified from buying firearms because of mental illness have been logged into the federal database for background checks. His colleague Pierre Thomas reported that sales clerks at the gun store where Loughner bought his automatic pistol were reluctant to sell it to him because of his strange behavior but "his background check came up clean."
CBS' legal eagle Jan Crawford predicted that Judy Clarke, Loughner's defense attorney, would first argue that his delusions make him mentally incompetent to stand trial, and only rely on an insanity defense as a last resort if competence is found. For those counts on which Loughner will be tried in state court, NBC's Pete Williams pointed out that Arizona law does not acquit defendants who successfully plead insanity. Instead it has a verdict of Guilty But Insane, which requires commitment to a mental hospital first, and then prison if the patient happens to be cured.
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