Update: Concealed Gun Holders Kill 9 Cops, 130 Others Since 5/07
WASHINGTON -- Concealed handgun permit holders have killed at least nine law enforcement officers in addition to 130 private citizens (including 14 shooters who killed themselves after an attack) since May 2007 according to the latest update of Concealed Carry Killers, a Violence Policy Center (VPC) on-line resource that tallies news reports of such killings. The web site, located at http://www.vpc.org/ccwkillers.htm, is updated monthly to include new fatal shootings since May 2007 by concealed handgun permit holders and any changes in the legal status of permit holders facing criminal charges. (Any concealed handgun permit holders who are eventually acquitted of their alleged crimes are not included in the tallies maintained on the site although the facts surrounding the shooting are detailed.)
The VPC web site categorizes the 78 incidents, which occurred in 22 states, and offers detailed descriptions of each incident (some incidents may fit into multiple categories). Of these incidents, 14 were murder-suicides involving firearms and 13 were mass shootings (three or more victims) that claimed as many as 11 lives at a time. Law enforcement officers were killed in Alabama, Florida (two incidents), Idaho, Ohio, and Pennsylvania (two incidents). All of the law enforcement killings were committed with guns.
Private citizens were killed in Alabama, California (two incidents), Colorado, Florida (13 incidents), Idaho (two incidents), Kentucky, Massachusetts (two incidents), Michigan (six incidents), Minnesota, New York, North Carolina (five incidents), Ohio (six incidents), Oklahoma (two incidents), Oregon, Pennsylvania (six incidents), Rhode Island, South Carolina (two incidents), Tennessee (six incidents), Texas (two incidents), Utah (five incidents), Virginia (five incidents), and Washington. All but one of the killings were committed with guns.
Violence Policy Center Legislative Director Kristen Rand states, “When the National Rifle Association launched its state-by-state campaign for lax concealed handgun laws, it made this promise: ‘People who get permits in states which have fair right-to-carry laws are law-abiding, upstanding community leaders who merely seek to exercise their right to self-defense.’ To the contrary, concealed handgun permit holders are killing people over parking spaces, football games, and family arguments.”
Because most state systems that allow the carrying of concealed handguns in public by private citizens release little data about crimes committed by permit holders, the VPC reviews and tallies concealed handgun permit holder killings primarily as reported by news outlets. It is likely that the actual number of fatal incidents involving concealed handgun permit holders is far higher.
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The Violence Policy Center should stop their lying smear campaign.
In a fair evaluation of anything, you have to measure both the positive and the negative effects it might have. This article does a great job of sensationalizing what the author considers a negative effect. It doesn't even mention any positive effect, such as the thousands of criminal acts that are stopped by law -abiding citizens with concealed carry weapon permits.
When you look at all the numbers, not just one, you see that CCW holders are one-third as likely as the average citizen to commit any crime . They are one-seventh as likely as the average citizen to commit any violent crime.
Obtaining a CCW doesn't automatically turn a person into a saint. Out of any very large group of human beings, there are bound to be a few bad apples or people who react badly in an emergency situation. There are hundreds of thousands of CCW holders in the United States.
Well stated mmeyers60. A CCW doesn't automatically turn a person into a Saint. It also does not automatically turn a responsible CCW gun owner into a murderer . I know people who are so fearful of guns they have an entire soap opera built around the person as soon as they find out. Pathetic it is and it only goes back to the old saying, " People kill people, guns do not."
a close examination of the data provided by the VPC included permittees charged, with no adjustment for future disposition if the the charges were dropped or the person found not guilty. further, they even included permittees for whom the permit was irrelevant to the crime they committed. As such, then, at best this data is inaccurate; at worst, it is deceptive and a dishonest statistical analysis.
Nonetheless, if those 130 crimes an accurate portrayal--then, since there are nominally 13000 homicides by firearms per year--including justifiable homicide (shootings by police or civilian permitees), then--over the nominal three-year period this "study overs" it appears that civilian permittees have a violence rate well below the national average.
I'll take those odds any day.
Jim H.
gun control: the belief that a woman raped and strangled with her own hose is morally superior to one who defends herself with a firearm.
First, no system is perfect. What percentage of permit holders does these numbers represent vs the percentage of those by non-permit holders.
Second, how many police officers have killed others (not in the line of duty) such as family members and what percentage of the number of officers is this?
On a percentage basis, gun permit holders are more law abiding than the general public and the police.
There needs to be a complete disclosure of the basis numbers before any conclusions can be drawn. This is the classic misuse of statistical information.
dondad, currently there are about 2 million concealed handgun permit holders in the United States.
These 78 incidents represent .000039 of permit holders.
Meanwhile, 11% of police shootings end in an innocent bystander being shot.
-meantime
those 78 incidents have occurred over a period of nearly 3 years.