The Glock, the Ex-Girlfriend, and the Absent Supervisor
Marcus, 29, is in his twelfth session for anger management and cannabis use. He reports that his ex-girlfriend has a new partner and says flatly: 'I bought a Glock last week. I know where he works and when he leaves. I'm going to end it and then myself. I'm not going to jail again.' He has a prior assault conviction, and a current protective order names him as the respondent and the ex-girlfriend as the protected party. He refuses to sign any release that would let you contact her or her partner, refuses voluntary hospitalization, and says that if you tell anyone he will 'disappear.' He is not intoxicated, is oriented, and denies current intent to act today but will not rule out this week. Your agency supervisor is unreachable for a week.
1. Missouri has no Tarasoff-style duty-to-warn statute. Does that mean you cannot or should not act? Analyze the governing standard and identify the disclosures the rules permit.
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Absence of a statutory duty to warn is not permission to do nothing. It means the obligation is framed by the confidentiality rules and by the ordinary standard of care rather than by a warning statute.
- The permission: board rules and the professional ethics standards permit disclosure of otherwise confidential information without the client's consent when the counselor reasonably believes disclosure is necessary to prevent serious and imminent harm to the client or to an identifiable other person. This is a may, exercised with judgment - but exercising it badly (ignoring a plan, a weapon, a named target, and stated suicidal intent) is far riskier than exercising it.
- The facts line up decisively: named victim, known workplace and schedule, weapon acquired within the week, stated intent to kill and then himself, prior violence, and an active protective order. The 'not today' hedge does not neutralize the threat; it defines a window.
- What may be disclosed: the minimum necessary to avert the harm. The victim is an obvious recipient, but with a firearm and a stated deadline, law enforcement is the more protective first call - officers can also enforce the existing protective order in real time.
- Do not disclose more than needed to the victim: the threat and the immediate safety steps, not Marcus's diagnosis, history, or treatment details.
- Marcus's threat to 'disappear' is a treatment issue and a risk indicator, not a veto.
2. Map the actions you take in the next two hours, in order, and identify what you tell Marcus before and after.
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Sequence matters, and so does having a second clinician involved.
- Re-assess and stabilize the session. Complete a structured risk assessment, ask directly about firearm access and location, and do not let Marcus leave in acute escalation if you can safely extend the session or involve a co-worker.
- Tell Marcus the limits first, when safe. He has already been told confidentiality has limits; remind him that a threat to a specific person with a weapon is exactly the exception, and that you will disclose only what is needed. Warning him is honest, but it also creates a flight risk - weigh that and, if he bolts, note the time and act anyway.
- Call law enforcement / mobile crisis for the imminent firearm threat. Given the suicidal statement as well, request a welfare and safety response and ask about an emergency evaluation at a designated facility; in Missouri the authority to initiate a hold sits with peace officers and designated clinicians, not with you alone, so route it through those channels.
- Notify the potential victim (directly or through law enforcement, whichever is faster and safer) with the minimum facts and a recommendation to contact police.
- Get consultation. Your supervisor's absence does not suspend the duty: consult the agency's on-call clinician, a crisis line, or an outside licensed colleague, and record the name and time.
- Document the verbatim statements, the risk formulation, each call and outcome, and the rationale for the scope of disclosure.
3. Marcus returns for his next session, angry but calm, and demands to know exactly what you told whom. How do you handle the disclosure conversation and the future of treatment?
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Disclose the fact and the scope of your disclosure - not a fishing expedition.
- Tell him what you did and why, in specific terms: that you contacted police and the person he named, and that you confined yourself to the threat and the safety concern. Withholding this from a client who already suspects it corrodes any remaining alliance and invites a second rupture.
- Do not re-litigate whether you were allowed to act. Offer to hear his anger, name it as legitimate, and hold the boundary: the decision was yours and would be made the same way again.
- Re-contract for safety. A no-harm/safety plan naming who he will call, where the firearm is stored and with whom, and what he will do when the urge spikes. If he will not engage in safety planning, that is itself risk data.
- Reassess level of care. Continued weekly outpatient work may no longer fit; consider intensive outpatient, substance use treatment, or psychiatric evaluation, and say so plainly.
- Consider whether the therapeutic relationship survives. Angry-but-engaged clients often continue well; clients who threaten retaliation or refuse all safety planning may require a documented, properly referred termination that is not abandonment - with referrals in hand, a written notice, and enough sessions to transfer safely.
- Document the session and the continuing risk formulation.