On July 28, 2025, a tragic scene unfolded in Midtown Manhattan when Shane Tamura, a 27-year-old Las Vegas casino surveillance worker, entered the lobby of 345 Park Avenue and opened fire with a semi-automatic AR-15-style rifle. By the time the chaos subsided, four people had lost their lives, another was critically injured, and Tamura himself was dead from a self-inflicted gunshot wound on the 33rd floor. According to records released this week by the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department (LVMPD), Tamura’s violent act was preceded by a troubling history of mental health crises that, despite raising red flags, failed to prevent him from legally purchasing firearms.
The newly disclosed police documents, made public due to what LVMPD described as "extraordinary circumstances," reveal that Tamura had been subjected to two emergency psychiatric evaluations—commonly known as mental health holds—in Las Vegas, in 2022 and again in 2024. These holds followed a series of alarming incidents, including 911 calls from Tamura’s mother, who reported her son was suicidal and had been diagnosed with anxiety, depression, and bipolar disorder. As reported by NPR, she also informed dispatchers that her son had previously owned a gun and might still possess one.
Despite these clear warning signs, Tamura was able to legally buy the very weapon he used in New York. Why? The answer lies in the patchwork of state and federal gun laws that govern who can—and cannot—own firearms in the United States. As Duke University law professor Jeff Swanson explained to NPR, "About half the states do have a law that would render one of those short-term holds—a 72-hour hold—a gun-disqualifying record. But not Nevada." Swanson elaborated, "Under Nevada law, a law enforcement officer or health care professional can initiate a 72-hour emergency mental health hold for a person deemed a danger to him or herself or others. This does not automatically trigger a firearm prohibition under federal or state law, unless it progresses to a court-ordered involuntary commitment."
This means that while Tamura’s mental health holds were serious enough for police to believe he posed a risk to himself or others, they did not meet the threshold required to be reported to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). According to Casino.org, the officer who filed Tamura’s most recent mental health hold application checked boxes indicating Tamura was at risk of "attempting suicide" and "causing bodily injury to himself or others, including without limitation, death, unconsciousness, extreme physical pain, protracted and obvious disfigurement or a protracted loss or impairment of a body part, organ or mental functioning." The officer also wrote, "He’s made vague statements to mom/medical about ending it. He doesn’t have a method in mind yet."
Under federal law, individuals can be barred from purchasing firearms only if they have been "adjudicated as a mental defective" by a court or other authority. The NICS database currently contains more than eight million names in this category, but, as Swanson told NPR, "They identify lots of people who are never going to be violent, but they might have had a civil commitment 20 years ago. And then there are a lot of other people who might have really impulsive anger traits and a really short fuse and they're not prohibited, necessarily, because they don't have one of these records."
Adding another layer of complexity, Nevada does have a so-called "red flag" law, which allows courts to issue emergency risk protection orders (ERPOs) that can temporarily confiscate guns and block new purchases for up to a year if someone is deemed a threat to themselves or others. If an ERPO had been sought for Tamura after his last mental health hold in August 2024, he would have been legally barred from buying the rifle used in the New York shooting. However, there is no record that police or family members attempted to obtain such an order in Tamura’s case.
April Zeoli, a gun violence researcher at the University of Michigan, highlighted the uneven application of red flag laws across the country. "Mainly, this is on law enforcement, and how much they know about it," she told NPR. "If a jurisdiction, a state, a locality isn't actively training law enforcement officers on how to use this, it won't be used." She emphasized the need for step-by-step guidelines for officers on how to petition courts when a gun owner appears to pose a danger.
In 2022, the Nevada attorney general's office launched a program to fund red flag law training for police and affected families. Yet, Nevada continues to lag behind other states in the use of ERPOs: only 28 were issued in 2024, compared to thousands in California and Florida. Political considerations also play a role. Nevada’s red flag law, passed in 2019, received no support from Republican lawmakers, and some sheriffs in the West have resisted its use, viewing it as a threat to gun rights. As NPR noted, the willingness of law enforcement to utilize these tools varies widely depending on local attitudes and training.
Tamura’s path to the Manhattan shooting also included brushes with the law. In 2023, he was arrested for trespassing at the off-Strip Red Rock Casino Resort in Las Vegas. Nevertheless, none of these incidents resulted in a court-ordered involuntary commitment or an ERPO, leaving him legally eligible to purchase firearms. The AR-15-style rifle he used in the shooting was bought from his supervisor in the surveillance department at Horseshoe Las Vegas, according to Casino.org.
The victims of the July 28 shooting included an off-duty NYPD officer working security and several building employees. The attack sent shockwaves through both New York and Las Vegas, raising urgent questions about the effectiveness of existing gun laws and mental health interventions in preventing such tragedies.
Experts say Tamura’s case underscores the gaps in the nation’s gun background check system—gaps that can have deadly consequences. Swanson summed up the dilemma: the criteria for inclusion in the NICS background check system "tend to be too broad and too narrow at the same time." While some people are barred from gun ownership for decades-old issues, others with recent, acute crises slip through the cracks.
As communities in New York and Nevada mourn the victims, the debate over gun laws and mental health continues to intensify. The Tamura case has become a flashpoint in the broader national conversation about how to balance public safety, individual rights, and the responsibilities of law enforcement and mental health professionals. With only 28 ERPOs issued in Nevada last year, compared to thousands in other states, the question remains: will tragedies like this finally spur meaningful change?
For now, the story of Shane Tamura serves as a sobering reminder of the complexities—and consequences—of America’s patchwork approach to guns and mental health.