• Addressing the knowledge gaps about firearm injuries and deaths

    “Because there are so many types of homicides, with multiple types of motives, there are multiple reasons for why they occur,” ASU’s Jesenia Pizarro says. But “situationally, there are things that increase the risk of a homicide taking place, and this is different from someone’s motive. A motive might be that a husband wants to kill his wife. But situationally, we know that crime facilitators such as alcohol, drugs and the availability of firearms increase the risk of a homicide taking place. If you have a firearm, you are more likely to use it. Of all the traditional types of weapons you can use, firearms are the most lethal. So, the availability of a firearm increases the odds of a homicide incident occurring.”

  • White mass shooters receive sympathetic media coverage

    White mass shooters receive much more sympathetic treatment in the media than black shooters, according to a new study that analyzed coverage of 219 attacks. Findings showed that white shooters were 95 percent more likely to be described as “mentally ill” than black shooters. Even when black shooters were described as mentally ill, the coverage was not as forgiving as it was for whites responsible for similar kinds of attacks.

  • FBI to add major law enforcement database to gun background check system

    The bureau is getting ready to tap National Data Exchange and its 400 million records to help screen gun buyers. Expert say it would have blocked the Charleston church shooter from obtaining his murder weapon.

  • Intrusion Technologies, Louroe Electronics integrate threat detection t technologies

    Most of the casualties in an active shooter attack are killed or injured in the first three minutes. On average, responders arrive and engage the attackers in 4–11 minutes. Intrusion Technologies says that the its AIMS platform, using Louroe’s Digifact-A microphone, detects and activates 360° protective systems in less than four seconds, stopping the would-be assailant before tragedy strikes.

  • German court rules that police officers in North Rhine-Westphalia must be at least 163cm tall

    A German court in North Rhine-Westphalia on Thursday has ruled that three women who are shorter than 163 centimeters cannot become police officers. The court upheld the North Rhine-Westphalia’s police rule that officers must meet the minimum height requirement of 163 centimeters (5 feet and 3.5 inches). Lawyers for the police argued that small officers are hard to see in a crowd, and that hips of shorter people tend to be too narrow to attach all the police tools.

  • New data shows U.S. hate crimes continued to rise in 2017

    We have collected new police data from 2017, ahead of the FBI totals, which cover crimes only up to 2016, and performed the first analysis of that year’s hate crimes, with a particular emphasis on the 10 largest U.S. cities. Our investigation found that hate crime totals for the 10 largest cities rose for four straight years to the highest level in a decade. Within these data are intriguing signs about the timing and direction of this bigotry. We may also be on the threshold of a new era in crime: Russia’s broad interference in the 2016 U.S. election is well documented – but what is also notable about Russian interference was their focus on sowing racial discord. There appears to be a correlation between the rise in targeted racially divisive social media ads and a near contemporaneous rise in hate crime.

  • Just how many guns do Americans own? (And why do estimates vary so widely?)

    There is no official count of how many guns Americans own. But the best available calculations make it clear that the number has grown by tens of millions in recent decades, leaving the United States ever more densely armed than other countries. A June 2018 report from the Small Arms Survey estimates that American civilians own 393 million guns, both legally and otherwise, out of a worldwide total of 857 million firearms. That’s up from 270 million civilian-owned guns domestically, and 650 million globally, in 2007.

  • Bank withheld $1.6 million from top bump stock maker after Las Vegas shooting

    In a lawsuit, Slide Fire Solutions, the inventor and manufacturer of the bump stock, accuses Merrick Bank of holding more than $1.6 million of the company’s money “hostage.” The financial institution says it had to hedge its risk in light of threats to Slide Fire’s business arising from the Las Vegas shooting.

  • NIST boosts drone forensics with new data on its website

    Aerial drones might someday deliver online purchases to your home. But in some prisons, drone delivery is already a thing. Drones have been spotted flying drugs, cell phones and other contraband over prison walls, and in several cases, drug traffickers have used drones to ferry narcotics across the border. If those drones are captured, investigators will try to extract data from them that might point to a suspect.

  • “Red flag” gun laws linked to reduction in firearm suicides

    Risk-based firearm seizure laws – also known as “red flag,” risk warrant, gun violence restraining order, or extreme risk protection order laws – provide ways for law enforcement to seize guns from individuals considered to pose an imminent risk of serious harm to themselves or others. Nearly 23,000 Americans died in suicide incidents involving a firearm in 2016. A new study provides evidence that risk-based gun seizure laws are saving lives.

  • RAND to help oversee high-quality research on gun violence

    Every day in the United States, close to 100 people are killed by guns, and for every death, two more are injured. The gun-related murder rate in the U.S. is 25 times higher than the rate in 22 other high-income nations. About two-thirds of gun deaths in the United States are suicides. The RAND Corporation has been selected to help oversee a philanthropic fund that will support high-quality research on issues related to gun violence.

  • Gun violence research gets $50 million boost from private funders

    In one swoop, a new $50 million initiative to boost funding for gun violence research is poised to eclipse the federal government’s efforts to understand the epidemic. Experts in the field say the fund, created by the Laura and John Arnold Foundation, could advance understanding of the causes and effects of gun violence and inform public policy.

  • Handgun purchaser licensing laws linked to fewer firearms homicides

    State laws that require gun purchasers to obtain a license contingent on passing a background check performed by state or local law enforcement are associated with a 14 percent reduction in firearm homicides in large, urban counties, a new study finds.

  • Stop-and-search report leads Scottish police to change policy

    Police Scotland has changed the way it carries out stop and search following a series of recommendations made by researchers. The researchers’ report highlighted elements of the pilot that can be regarded as good practice while also making nineteen recommendations for improvement. Police Scotland has published their response to this and other reports, highlighting the ways in which policy has been changed.

  • Guns in Chicago just “2.5 handshakes” away

    In one of the first studies to try to map a gun market using network science, researchers used the novel scientific approach to understand how close offenders are to guns in the city of Chicago. Recreating Chicago’s co-offending network of approximately 188,000 people, the researchers used data on firearms recovered by the Chicago Police Department to locate who in the network possessed those guns. The networked approach in the study suggests that one could map the risk of exposure to guns in a network and potentially use that as strategic points of intervention.