Prosecutor: FedEx shooter didn’t have ‘red flag’ hearing

INDIANAPOLIS — A former employee who shot and killed eight people at a FedEx facility in Indianapolis never appeared before a judge for a hearing under Indiana’s “red flag” law, even after his mother called police last year to say her son might commit “suicide by cop,” a prosecutor said Monday.

Marion County Prosecutor Ryan Mears said authorities did not seek such a hearing because they did not have enough time under the law to definitively demonstrate Brandon Scott Hole’s propensity for suicidal thoughts, something they would need to have done to convince a judge that Hole should not be allowed to possess a gun.

The “red flag” legislation, passed in Indiana in 2005 and also in effect in other states, allows police or courts to seize guns from people who show warning signs of violence. Police seized a pump-action shotgun from Hole, then 18, in March 2020 after they received the call from his mother.

But prosecutors were limited in their ability to prepare a “red flag” case due to a 2019 change in the law that requires courts to make a “good-faith effort” to hold a hearing within 14 days. An additional amendment required them to file an affidavit with the court within 48 hours.

“This individual was taken and treated by medical professionals, and he was cut loose,” and was not even prescribed medication, Mears said. “The risk is, if we move forward with that (red flag) process and lose, we have to give that firearm back to that person. That’s not something we were willing to do.”

Indianapolis police have previously said that they never did return the shotgun to Hole. Authorities say he used two “assault-style” rifles to gun down eight people at the FedEx facility last Thursday before killing himself. Police said Hole, 19 at the time of the shooting, purchased those rifles in July and September 2020, just months after police had seized the pumpaction shotgun.

Other amendments to the law in 2019 made it a misdemeanor for a person deemed dangerous to buy or possess a gun and a felony offense for anyone to give or sell a gun to a dangerous person.

Republican state Sen. Erin Houchin, a sponsor of the tougher provisions, said in the Hole case the law “could have worked just as it should, but the prosecutor never pursued it.”

But Mears said there are still problems that need to be addressed.

“There are a number of loopholes in the practical application of this law. … It does not necessarily give everyone the tools they need to make the most wellinformed decisions,” he said.

Mears said he had spoken to legislators in the past about lengthening the two-week timeline for holding a red flag hearing and reiterated that call Monday.