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crime report on gun violence

The Crime Report - Covering Gun Violence

"America has a complicated relationship with its guns--perhaps best illustrated by the fact that we don’t even know how many we own, and some of us are determined to keep it that way. The use of guns in the commission of crimes has mirrored the broad trends of American crime statistics. Gun use in crime reached unprecedented levels in 1993 and 1994, when 1.3 million Americans each year faced assailants wielding firearms. Crime statistics indicated a precipitous decline in the use of firearms in crime during the late 1990s and early years of this decade—mirroring the overall crime decline in America. However, many communities in America--in particular minority and poor communities-- suffer from an abundance of gun violence.

In an effort to further examine this dichotomy, reporting grants were awarded to seven media outlets covering gun violence in the Midwest. Participating journalism fellows attended a skills workshop on November 15, 2010 in Chicago, Illinois. Access the agenda here. 

Following months of investigative reporting, journalism fellows reconvened on Jan. 31st and Feb. 1st  at the 2011 H.F. Guggenheim Symposium on Crime in America at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. In addition to attending related panels, fellows worked with veteran investigative reporter Cheryl W. Thompson of the Washington Post on their stories. Access the agenda here.

In order to assist other reporters in investigating gun-related stories, resources from the two workshops are made available on this page, in addition to the finished story and corresponding materials from the media outlets.

This special project was made possible by grants from the Joyce Foundation and the David Bohnett Foundation. It is administered by the John Jay College Center on Media, Crime and Justice, including Pulitzer-prizewinning former Chicago Tribune journalist Maurice Possley, who is the project coordinator."

The Crime Report » Archive » 62,000 Firearm Sales Unaccounted For: Brady Center

More than 62,000 firearms have disappeared from licensed U.S. gun dealers in the past three years, says a Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence study reported by the Washington Post. The study says that the dealers did not have records of legal sales for the guns – an average of about 56 missing firearms per day. “It is unacceptable that weak federal gun laws and irresponsible gun dealers allow tens of thousands of firearms to leave gun shops without background checks or a record of sale,” said Paul Helmke, the center’s president.

More than 21,000 firearms were missing in 2010, up from 18,323 in 2009 but down from 22,770 in 2008, said the study, compiled using data from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The federal agency could not account for the guns during its compliance inspections of dealers. “We would like to see it where zero firearms are missing from inventory,” said ATF spokesman Scot Thomasson. “We take any missing firearms from inventory seriously and we do work with industry members to try and reduce the number.” The Brady Center believes the actual number of unaccounted-for guns is far higher because ATF inspects fewer than 20 percent of the nation’s dealers annually.

via thecrimereport.org

[ the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence is @ http://www.bradycenter.org/]

Language of the gun : youth, crime, and public policy ...

Legal and public policies concerning youth gun violence tend to rely heavily on crime reports, survey data, and statistical methods. Rarely is attention given to the young voices belonging to those who carry high-powered semiautomatic handguns. In Language of the Gun, Bernard E. Harcourt recounts in-depth interviews with youths detained at an all-malecorrectional facility, exploring how they talk about guns and what meanings they ascribe to them in a broader attempt to understand some of the assumptions implicit in current handgun policies. In the process, Harcourt redraws the relationships among empirical research, law, and public policy. Home to over 150 repeat offenders ranging in age from twelve to seventeen, the Catalina Mountain School is made up of a particular stratum of boys-those who have committed the most offenses but will still be released upon reaching adulthood. In an effort to understand the symbolic and emotional language of guns and gun carrying, Harcourt interviewed dozens of these incarcerated Catalina boys. What do these youths see in guns? What draws them to handguns? Why do some of them carry and others not? For Harcourt, their often surprising answers unveil many of the presuppositions that influence our laws and policies.

via bernardharcourt.com

[ A close examination of American youth's "fascination with guns, their attraction to firearms, their lust for the weapons..." ]

"the practical effect of incorporation"

SCOTUSblog - Analysis: state gun regulations and McDonald - The practical effect of incorporation [Matthew Scarola| Monday, June 28th, 2010]

"Today’s opinion in McDonald v. City of Chicago means that for the first time, state and local governments’ gun regulations must comport with the Second Amendment’s protection of the right “to keep and bear Arms.” Although many state constitutions have a gun rights provision, McDonald has the potential to radically reshape non-federal firearms legislation.  In this post, we discuss McDonald’s likely effect on some of the most significant pieces of non-federal firearms legislation. The description of existing firearms laws is drawn primarily from a 2008 reportpublished by the Legal Community Against Violence (LCAV), which has a summary of firearms laws on its website..."

"While most state constitutions protect a right to keep and bear arms, state courts almost always deem state gun regulations “reasonable” and uphold them on that basis. In McDonald, the plurality stressed that its holding will not end “‘experimentation with reasonable firearms regulations.’” But it left undisturbed the Court’s strong suggestion in District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), the D.C. guns case, that a more demanding test is appropriate..."  [RESTOFPOST]