Veteran’s Guns Confiscated After Forced ‘Psychiatric Evaluation’

Purge against armed ex-servicemembers accelerates

Paul Joseph Watson
Infowars.com
April 2, 2013

A US Navy veteran had his guns confiscated by police following a forced “psychiatric evaluation” in another example of how the Veterans Administration is accelerating a purge of armed ex-servicemembers in accordance with a federal government demonization campaign that has labeled vets domestic terrorists.

50-year-old David A Schmecker is an honorably discharged disabled US Navy veteran from Connecticut with no criminal record and no psychiatric history.

On February 5, Schmecker’s hospital primary care doctor called and heard a message on Schmecker’s answer machine that “sounded peculiar,” prompting him to contact the local police and urge them to visit Schmecker to perform a “wellness check”.

“The police came to my home, and, without any justification whatsoever, hauled me away for a psychiatric evaluation at a local hospital. I submitted to their forceful insistence under duress and fear of arrest or worse. I wasn’t arrested, no crime was committed nor any threats were made to myself or others,” Schmecker told Survive and Thrive’s George Hemminger.

“They confiscated my guns and pistol permit. I was released two days later from the evaluation on my on recognizance. I have since attempted to use the courts and attorneys to fight the revocation of my pistol permit. Then on top of everything else, the bills from the short stay at the hospital and EMS bills that they billed me, along with what I had to pay the attorney adds up to a large amount of money,” he adds.

Schmecker warns that the harassment he suffered is part of “a campaign orchestrated to disarm law abiding citizens,” adding that he is “concerned about where this country is headed.”

As with all contemporary authoritarian governments, the psychiatric system is being used to circumvent courts and bypass normal legal due process.

In August 2012, we reported on how a veteran in Ohio had his guns taken because he was adjudged to be mentally incompetent, despite the fact that his previous VA psychiatric evaluations were all clear, he was not on medication, and he had no criminal record.

As we reported last year, David Sarti, one of the stars of National Geographic’s Doomsday Preppers show, visited his doctor complaining of chest pains, only to have the doctor later commit him to a psychiatric ward and alert authorities, before Sarti was declared “mentally defective” and put on an FBI list that strips him of his second amendment rights.

Veterans are increasingly being targeted by authorities as part of a broader move to demonize them as domestic extremists and even potential terrorists.

The FBI has repeatedly characterized returning veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan as a major domestic terrorist threat. In addition, Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano said she stood by an April 2009 DHS intelligence assessment that listed returning vets as likely domestic terrorists.

Just a month later, the New York Times reported on how Boy Scout Explorers were being trained by the DHS to kill “disgruntled Iraq war veterans” as part of anti-terror drills.

Back in February, constitutional attorney Michael Connelly warned that the government is now moving to strip veterans it determines to be mentally incompetent of their Second Amendment right to own a firearm. Connelly cites a letter “sent by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to hundreds, perhaps thousands, of America’s heroes.”

“A determination of incompetency will prohibit you from purchasing, possessing, receiving, or transporting a firearm or ammunition,” the VA letter states. “If you knowingly violate any of these prohibitions, you may be fined, imprisoned, or both pursuant to the Brady Handgun Violence Prevention Act, Pub.L.No. 103-159, as implemented at 18, United States Code 924(a)(2).”

“This must be Barack Obama’s way of thanking our veterans for serving,” writes the Gateway Pundit. “US veterans are receiving letters from the government informing them that they are disabled and not allowed to own, purchase or possess a firearm. If the veteran does decide to purchase a firearm he will by fined, imprisoned or both… This comes on page 2 of the VA letter.”