The family asked for the gun to be removed before the deadly school shooting. The officers had few options

Orlando Harris’ family has asked Missouri police to confiscate the 19-year-old’s body armor, ammunition and AR-15 rifle. They knew that his mental health was fragile after more than one suicide attempt. But the best officers could work in the state with some of the biggest broad gun rights suggest that Harris keep the weapon in the storage room.

Nine days later, Harris walked into his former high school in St. Louis and declared, “You’re all going to die.”

A new 456-page police report details efforts by Harris’ family to try to retrieve his gun days before he entered Central High School for the Visual and Performing Arts on Oct. 24, 2022, when he killed a student and a teacher and injured seven more before he was fatally shot by police.

Missouri is not among the 21 states with a red flag law. Also known as special risk protection orders, red flag laws are intended to limit the purchase of guns or temporarily take them away from people who may harm themselves or others.

This case shows how difficult it is for law enforcement to restrict access to guns, even when there are clues that something is deeply wrong.

After an Reservists killed 18 people in October 2023 in Lewiston, Maine, an investigation found missed opportunities to intervene in the shooter’s psychiatric crisis. Earlier, a 14-year-old teenager was charged with fatal shooting this fall at his Georgia high schoola deputy spoke to him about the online threat and the family was alerted “emergency situation”.

The investigation Harris’ case report shows he first attempted suicide in the fall of 2021, just before he was supposed to start college. The upheavals of the pandemic, the arrest of a friend for murder and a car crash could all have contributed to his depression, his family and former boss told the inquest.

The police report does not mention that he attended college. Instead, he worked in the cafeteria at the senior institution, where he sometimes discussed guns with colleagues.

The following August, he met with a University of Washington psychiatry resident, telling her he was thinking about shooting people at his old school. He said that these thoughts only lasted one evening and went away and that there was no planning and he didn’t want to do it.

But soon after, Harris began the countdown to the shooting. His plans included detailed maps of the school and a plan aimed at teachers, students and the LGBTQ community. He also planned to burn down his family’s house with them inside.

The psychiatrist prescribed medication, but Harris didn’t take it. The message says that they have developed an emergency plan.

The University of Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press.

Then Harris stopped showing up at meetings.

On October 8, he attempted to purchase a firearm from a licensed dealer in St. Charles, Missouri, but the transaction was blocked FBI check. The report did not say why, and police did not respond to an email from the AP. The FBI only provided a list 12 reasons for rejection without other details.

Then on October 10, Harris drove to a nearby suburb to pay a man $580 in cash for the rifle he had fired.

The Harris family became even more worried on October 15 when two packages arrived from arms and ammunition suppliers. One of his sisters, Nonica Harris, opened them, finding body armor, magazine holsters and magazines. She then searched his bedroom and found the rifle in an old television box.

Harris’ mother, Tanya Ward, called BJC Mental Health Services, and staff there “considered the situation to be an immediate threat.” She was advised to take the things to the police station and tell the law enforcement officers about her son’s mental illness.

Officers at the precinct told her they could not take the firearm because Harris was old enough to own one. They said she should go home and an officer would meet them there. When she returned, Harris was home and insisted that he leave the gun.

His mother was adamant that the gun not be in the house, so the officers offered to hide it. Police also advised her what she needed to do to have her son declared mentally unstable, the report said.

Federal law has barred some mentally ill people from buying guns since 1968, including those deemed a danger to themselves or others who were involuntarily committed or found not guilty by reason of insanity or incapacity to stand trial.

Eventually, the firearms and other items were loaded into the trunk of Harris’ sister’s car, including a box of ammunition that arrived the next day. She later drove her brother to the safehouse, which was about 5 miles (8 kilometers) from the high school.

She told police she “knew something was going to happen.”

On Oct. 24, Harris entered his former high school when shots rang out.

It is unclear why Harris targeted the school. According to the investigation report, a security officer described him as somewhat popular, and the principal of his elementary school said he was not bullied. But as he shot into the dance class, one student told police she heard someone yell, “I hate this school. I hate everyone.”

The fatally wounded Alexandria Bell first ran to the entrance before falling to the ground as a security officer assured the 10th grader that help was on the way. But then she fell silent.

One class jumped out a window to escape after their gym teacher, Jean Kuchka, 61, got between them and Harris. Kuchka was killed.

Harris eventually made his way to the third floor, hiding in the computer lab. The first officer who broke into the lab had a daughter at school.

“I had something to lose,” the officer who was among those who opened fire recalled in a police report. He later texted his daughter, telling her: “I killed him.”

Harris’ sister told investigators that when she heard the shooting, she drove toward the school, but then drove home, waking her mother, who was working through the night.

Later, Harris’ mother checked her voicemail. There was a message from the hospital asking if she still needed help with her son.