Tag Archives: Firearm

News

Crime rates in Chicago and DC drop after gun control laws are struck down

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From Fox News – what happens to crime rates when gun control laws are repealed?

Excerpt:

Murder and violent crime rates were supposed to soar after the Supreme Court struck down gun control laws in Chicago and Washington, D.C.

Politicians predicted disaster. “More handguns in the District of Columbia will only lead to more handgun violence,” Washington’s Mayor Adrian Fenty warned the day the court made its decision.

Chicago’s Mayor Daley predicted that we would “go back to the Old West, you have a gun and I have a gun and we’ll settle it in the streets…”

The New York Times even editorialized this month about the Supreme Court’s “unwise” decision that there is a right for people “to keep guns in the home.”

But Armageddon never happened. Newly released data for Chicago shows that, as in Washington, murder and gun crime rates didn’t rise after the bans were eliminated — they plummeted. They have fallen much more than the national crime rate.

Not surprisingly, the national media have been completely silent about this news.

One can only imagine the coverage if crime rates had risen. In the first six months of this year, there were 14% fewer murders in Chicago compared to the first six months of last year – back when owning handguns was illegal. It was the largest drop in Chicago’s murder rate since the handgun ban went into effect in 1982.

Meanwhile, the other four most populous cities saw a total drop at the same time of only 6 percent.

Similarly, in the year after the 2008 “Heller” decision, the murder rate fell two-and-a-half times faster in Washington than in the rest of the country.

It also fell more than three as fast as in other cities that are close to Washington’s size. And murders in Washington have continued to fall.

If you compare the first six months of this year to the first six months of 2008, the same time immediately preceding the Supreme Court’s late June “Heller” decision, murders have now fallen by thirty-four percent.

Gun crimes also fell more than non-gun crimes.

Robberies with guns fell by 25%, while robberies without guns have fallen by eight percent. Assaults with guns fell by 37%, while assaults without guns fell by 12%.

Just as with right-to-carry laws, when law-abiding citizens have guns some criminals stop carrying theirs.

Read the whole thing, there are more lovely facts in there. If you ever need to debate this, I recommend buying these academic studies published by the University of Chicago Press and by Harvard University Press. The former shows how crime rates dropped in the USA when Americans rescinded gun control laws, and the latter shows how crime rates rose in the UK when the British strengthened their gun control laws. Sometimes is good to have the data handy.

Let’s learn about the issue from the news

ABC News explains in this short 6-minute clip:

And here is a longer 44-minute show from Fox Business: (featuring a debate between economist John Lott and the Brady Campaign spokesman)

There are other debates in the show as well.

Now watch a 3-on-3 debate on gun control

This debate is in 13 parts, featuring the two of the best proponents of legal firearm ownership – John Lott and Gary Kleck. The real sparks fly during the Q&A, so don’t miss that. (If you can’t watch the debate, then you can read this post and this post instead).

Here’s part 1, which contains the introduction.

Here are the remaining speeches:

This is everything you need to know about whether legal ownership of firearms reduces crime.

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News

12-year-old girl shoots home intruder in the shoulder with legally owned firearm

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Left-wing ABC News reports.

Full text:

Kendra St. Clair, 12, was at home alone in Oklahoma, when loud banging began on the door to her family’s home. Soon, the glass shattered and an intruder had entered.

“I was scared and I didn’t know what to do next,” Kendra told ABC News.

Petrified, she called her mom Debra.

“I said Kendra get the gun and go get in my closet now. And call 911.”

The young 6th grader followed her mom’s orders to the tee.

The 911 tapes tell the story as it unfolded.

Kendra: “I’m at my house. I’m in my closet. And I ran away from (inaudible) someone’s trying to get into my house and I do not know who they are.” Dispatcher: “Ok I have a deputy en route, I want you to stay on the phone with me. Ok?” Kendra: “Ok. Please. I think they are in the house.”

Kendra had taken shelter in a closet, clutching her mother’s .40 caliber glock gun while she listened to the intruder make his way around her home.

Kendra: “Please help me. Please.” Dispatcher: “Alright, alright. I understand. Do you still have your mom’s gun there?” Kendra: “Yes I do. I have it in my hand.”

Her fear intensified to sheer terror, when she saw the knob of the closet door beginning to turn.

At that point, that for the first time in her life, Kendra fired a gun.

Police said the bullet traveled straight through the closet door and struck 32-year-old Stacey Jones in the shoulder, scaring him out of the house.

They arrested him a few blocks away and charged Jones with first degree burglary.

“When I had the gun, I didn’t think I was actually going to have to shoot somebody,” the 6th grader recalled. “I think it’s going to change me a whole lot, knowing that I can hold my head up high and nothing can hurt me anymore.”

Her mother Debra agrees.

“I think that she did something that most grown-ups wouldn’t be able to do in a frightening situation. I think she handled herself amazingly.”

Jones was treated at the hospital and released into the custody of authorities. Police said he has not yet entered a plea but that bond has been set for $250,000.

My fear about Barack Obama is that if he gets a second term, then he will ban private ownership of handguns. And then stories like this will end in tragedy for the law-abiding people. Banning guns is an inherently pro-criminal policy. And when you read stories like this, it’s easy to see why.

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Commentary

Do gun-free zones prevent incidents like the Colorado theater shooting?

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Do criminals about to do a mass shooting care about signs?
Do criminals about to do a mass shooting care about signs?

(Thanks to TM for the image)

In light of the shooting at the Colorado theater, which is apparently a gun-free zone, I want to review why I think that gun-free zones should be renamed slaughterhouse zones.

Here’s Dr. John R. Lott to make the case.

Excerpt:

It wasn’t supposed to happen in England, with its very strict gun-control laws. And yet last week, Derrick Bird shot twelve people to death and wounded eleven others in the northwestern county of Cumbria. A headline in the London Times read: “Toughest laws in the world could not stop Cumbria tragedy.”

But surely this was an aberration. Because America has the most guns, multiple-victim public shootings are an American thing, right? No, not at all. Contrary to public perception, Western Europe, most of whose countries have much tougher gun laws than the United States, has experienced many of the worst multiple-victim public shootings. Particularly telling, all the multiple-victim public shootings in Western Europe have occurred in places where civilians are not permitted to carry guns. The same is true in the United States: All the public shootings in which more than three people have been killed have occurred in places where civilians may not legally bring guns.

Look at recent history. Where have the worst K–12 school shootings occurred? Nearly all of them in Europe. The very worst one occurred in a high school in Erfurt, Germany, in 2002, where 18 were killed. The second-worst took place in Dunblane, Scotland, in 1996, where 16 kindergartners and their teacher were killed. The third-worst, with 15 dead, happened in Winnenden, Germany. The fourth-worst was in the U.S. — Columbine High School in 1999, leaving 13 dead. The fifth-worst, with eleven murdered, occurred in Emsdetten, Germany.

It may be a surprise to those who believe in gun control that Germany was home to three of the five worst attacks. Though not quite as tight as the U.K.’s regulations, Germany’s gun-control laws are some of the most restrictive in Europe. German gun licenses are valid for only three years, and to obtain one, the person must demonstrate such hard-to-define characteristics as trustworthiness, and must also convince authorities that he needs a gun. This is on top of prohibitions on gun ownership for those with mental disorders, drug or alcohol addictions, violent or aggressive tendencies, or felony convictions.

The phenomenon is not limited to school attacks. Multiple-victim public shootings in general appear to be at least as common in Western Europe as they are here. The following is a partial list of attacks since 2001. As mentioned, all of them occurred in gun-free zones — places where guns in the hands of civilians are outlawed.

He then lists about two dozen incidents – all occurring in gun free zones.

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