When safeguards require actions from others, especially family, they will often be inadequate to ensure safety. Family dynamics can be very difficult. A lot of shame, secrecy, and a desire to not get people into trouble that leads to inaction. Usually family members that maybe strained, scared, or indifferent.
Police were called out when he expressed suicidal ideation. They confiscated potential means of self harm, which at the time, they felt was adequate to prevent harm. They did not pursue further action, likely because they had several other details to get to, and the family appeared to be able to manage the situation. We don't know how, or if, or what the family and Grimo did to follow up on the underlying problems that lead to the suicidal ideation. The second incident where he was found to be a "clear and present danger" again, there appeared to be insufficient evidence to make an arrest or place Grimo on an involuntary hold, which may have triggered the red flags to prevent him from buying firearms legally.
Again, after that detail, the police leave, very likely to several other calls that need their attention. The family and the individual undergoing the crisis are left to follow up with mental health referrals, which cannot be compulsory, and which entail going to either a private practitioner who can be expensive, or to the County system which can be very time consuming.
Those are the safeguards typically. We do not fund community mental health or public health programs anywhere near the levels that would be needed to have follow up by professionals who might be able to get people into treatment. You literally have to voluntarily go somewhere, and tell someone that you have problems and need to be evaluated for therapy or medications. How many people are honestly going to do that? How many family members have the ability to "compel" their adult or adolescent family members to do that?
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