Yet another mass shooting - Jax, Florida

Years before a 24-year-old Columbia man allegedly unleashed a deadly barrage of gunfire at a video game tournament in Jacksonville, Fla., the parents of David Katz had been desperate to find some treatment for their son’s troubling behavior.

They had tried psychiatric care in Towson and Rockville, enrolled him in public and private schools, and even sent him to Utah for a therapeutic wilderness school for teens.

Court records show his behavior was still worrisome.

“David would go days without bathing, would play video games until 4 a.m. on school nights, would walk around the house in circles,” Howard County Circuit Judge Lenore Gelfman wrote in 2010. “[He] was failing all classes at Hammond High, was unresponsive to school teachers and uncooperative with school psychotherapists/counselors, and was extremely hostile toward his mother.”

By 12 years old, he was taking Risperdal, an anti-psychotic drug to treat schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, his father said in court records. He often missed school and resisted treatment, sometimes curling into a ball. His father said the boy would appear to be “looking right through you.”

In April 2006, he locked himself in his mother’s Volkswagen Jetta to avoid an appointment with a therapist, according to court records.

A raft of psychologists and counselors offered various opinions on his behavior over the years. In court records, one therapist described 12-year-old David Katz as suffering a “psychiatric crisis.” The therapist concluded in 2006 that the boy’s depression interfered with his ability to eat, sleep and rise from bed.

David Katz attended Glenelg Country School from grades 6 through 8. He was hospitalized at Sheppard Pratt Health System in Towson for psychiatric treatment in 2007, his parents said in court records.

Questions have swirled about how he could have bought the handguns with Maryland’s rigorous background checks. The state laws are generally more stringent than federal prohibitions.

Under state law, someone may buy no more than one handgun in 30 days. So it remains unclear how Katz was able to buy two in “recent weeks,” as the sheriff said. The sheriff’s office did not answer questions Tuesday about the purchases.

Maryland blocks the sale of a handgun to anyone who has voluntarily entered a psychiatric treatment facility for at least 30 straight days.

Court records show Katz was admitted to Sheppard Pratt for nearly two weeks in 2007. He later spent 13 days at the Potomac Ridge mental health facility in Rockville. Neither stint would disqualify him from buying a handgun.