A lawsuit cannot cure, but hopefully it can help in the shooting victims

An October 16th headline on the front page of the Kennebec Journal informed readers of this ‘Lawyers and victims plan to file a lawsuit’ re: the mass shooting in Lewiston on October 25, 2023. That was an assumed fact.

Governor Janet Mills’ commission recently submitted its written report; a few days less than a year after the event. A quality piece; in detail.

It is likely that the retained lawyers provide a period of six months before the lawsuit is filed in court. An example of this is an attorney’s expected acquisition of Card’s medical and military records through his estate. What is the precedent that requires a criminal case against a person’s estate to await relevant evidence?

And why was it necessary for a plaintiff’s counsel to initially announce that “they do not intend to sue the Sagadahoc County Sheriff’s Office, which was criticized in the final report of the shooting commission and by the military for failing to use Maine’s yellow flag laws to remove Card’s weapons despite threats that he could commit a mass shooting. The lawyer’s explanation, not to complain on this point, would be; the fact that the sheriff’s office has had no contact with Card’s family and his superiors on the subject. Arguably, opponents in lawsuits perform best when they perform their duties with care.

The plaintiffs are the families of the victims, whose lives have been torn apart by mass shootings. (That’s from the newspaper’s accompanying article.) Time hurts.

As a Maine attorney for 64 years, in three branches of government, it is prayed that the lawsuits resulting from this tragedy will be comparable to the quality of the Governor’s Commission report.

Johannes Benoit

Manchester

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