Firearms and mental illness: the gaps in Swiss gun law

The man who opened fire at the techno party in Aarau, killing a 22-year-old Italian woman, was 43 years old and suffered from schizophrenia. At home he kept two pistols and a Kalashnikov assault rifle. The case has drawn attention to a weak point in Swiss gun law: how can someone with a psychiatric diagnosis remain in possession of firearms?

Switzerland has three categories of purchasable weapons. For the first, it is enough for the seller to declare the sale to the authorities. For the second, subject to authorization, it is the buyer who must meet certain conditions: being of legal age, having a clean criminal record and no history that would raise doubts about public safety. Automatic weapons require an exceptional authorization. The law is federal, but it is applied at the cantonal level.

This is exactly where the weaknesses of the law lie, according to lawyer Chiara Donati, a criminal defence lawyer who also handles weapons law. A weapon can be seized when the conditions for holding it are no longer met, but no periodic checks are carried out on the person who owns it. The system is triggered only by a report, when concerning elements emerge. Every canton is required to keep a weapons registry: when a report comes in, the authorities check whether the person concerned owns registered weapons, then reassess whether they still meet the requirements to keep them.

Who can report a risk? In principle, anyone who suspects a weapon could endanger its holder or others. For people under psychiatric care, the situation is different: federal law gives the doctor, bound by professional confidentiality, the right to report a patient, but only if the patient explicitly states during therapy an intention to use the weapon. Ticino's cantonal law goes further, turning this right into an obligation when the therapist identifies a concrete danger to public safety. A professional who fails to report faces no criminal consequences, since federal law leaves the choice to the doctor. For a private citizen, however, the omission could in theory carry criminal weight, to be assessed case by case.

Widespread mental illness, limited checks

According to Donati, in Switzerland one person in three has had a mental health problem at some point in their life, and one in ten suffers from serious to severe disorders. A prevalence that makes the issue far from marginal. In Ticino, someone with a history of psychiatric disorders who expresses an intention to buy a weapon is subject to a preventive ban: to acquire or keep the weapon, they must undergo a psychiatric evaluation and submit clearance from their treating doctor confirming the problem has been resolved.

But even here, the lawyer points to a gap: once authorization is granted, no one checks the situation again, neither at regular intervals nor through spot checks, for as long as the weapon is held. A gap that Donati attributes to a lack of coordination and dedicated resources for this kind of check across the cantons.