California gunman was volatile but passed mental assessment
THOUSAND OAKS, Calif. — Neighbours of Ian David Long described the man who shot and killed 12 people at a country music bar as distant in public but combative with his mother inside the suburban Los Angeles home the two shared.
One ruckus in April was so extreme that they called law enforcement. Authorities brought in a mental health specialist who concluded that Long could not be involuntarily committed for psychiatric observation but worried the 28-year-old Marine veteran might have post-traumatic stress disorder.
“The mental health experts out there cleared him that day,” Ventura County Sheriff Geoff Dean said Thursday, the morning after Long opened fire inside a bar that was hosting a night for local college students.
Julie Hanson, who lives next door to Long’s ranch-style home, described him as “odd” and “disrespectful” well before he left home a decade ago, got married and enlisted in the Marines, becoming a machine-gunner.