Wellford C.S., Pepper J.V. - Firearms and Violence[c] What Do We Know[q] (2005)(en)

58	FIREARMS AND VIOLENCE

that they have a firearm in the home has been declining since the late 1950s. While the estimates vary from year to year, all three surveys indicate a decline in the percentage of households possessing firearms. From 1980, when the percentage of households owning a firearm was between 45 and 48 percent, ownership has decreased by 5 to 16 percentage points to a prevalence of 30 to 43 percent. In discussion with the committee, Cook has suggested that the decline in ownership per household while individual ownership remains constant may be due to the increase in female-headed households during this period. Despite these overall reductions in household ownership, the relative distribution of firearm ownership across attributes of gender, race, age, education, income, and region has been remarkably consistent over time (Maguire and Pastore, 2002: Table 2.70).

Of households owning a firearm, between 59 and 62 percent reported owning a handgun (Maguire and Pastore, 2002: Tables 2.69, 2.71, and 2.72). All three surveys indicate that gun owners are more likely to be male, white, and middle-aged or older. Furthermore, gun ownership was higher among those who live in the South, had less education than a college degree, and had a higher than average income. Among respondents reporting household gun ownership, the percentage of blacks reporting handgun ownership was 6 to 9 percent higher than for whites, and the percentage of blacks reporting long gun ownership was 11 to 29 percent lower than for whites (Maguire and Pastore, 2002: Tables 2.71 and 2.72).

Aggregation of Individual Survey Responses

Recent research has aggregated the individual survey responses about firearms ownership across U.S. communities (Baumer et al., 2002; Rosenfeld et al., 2001). The GSS is based on a national area probability sample composed of 100 primary sampling units (PSUs) (in the 1990 sampling frame) designed to represent the population of people age 18 and older in the United States. Each PSU is a “self-representing” geographic unit, in the sense that the respondents are representative of the PSU adult population.

Aggregating the individual survey responses to the PSU level permits comparisons of the aggregated items, including firearms ownership, across a representative sample of U.S. geographic areas. Figure 3-1 shows the geographic distribution of household firearm ownership for the 100 PSUs in the 1990 GSS sampling frame, covering the period 1993 to 1998.

The figure shows substantial variability in firearm ownership in the United States. The prevalence of household ownership varies from roughly 10 to 80 percent. Most of the PSUs cluster around the mean ownership level of 43 percent, with fewer PSUs located near the extremes of the distribution.

PATTERNS OF FIREARM-RELATED VIOLENCE		59

FIGURE 3-1 Distribution of firearms ownership across geographic regions, 19931998 (N = 100).

SOURCES: Baumer et al. (2002); Rosenfeld et al. (2001).

FIREARM-RELATED HARM

The majority of firearm-related deaths are the result of murder and suicide, while the majority of nonfatal firearm-related injuries are the result of assaults and accidents. Firearm-related deaths constitute the majority of all homicides and suicides, but firearm-related injuries represent only a minority of nonfatal injuries.6

Table 3-3 shows overall and firearm-related deaths by intent based on National Vital Statistics System (NVSS) data. In 1999, there were 28,874 firearm-related reported deaths in the United States. Suicide and homicide accounted for the majority of these fatalities, representing 57 and 37 percent of total firearm-related deaths, respectively. Furthermore, firearm-

6In this section we use data from the National Vital Statistics System, the National Crime Victimization Survey, the Uniform Crime Reports, and the National Electronic Injury Surveillance System.

60					FIREARMS AND VIOLENCE
TABLE 3-3 Overall Firearm-Related Deaths, 1999
Category	Firearm-Related			Total			% Firearm-Related
	Number	Rate a		Number	Rate a		Percent
Suicide	16,599	6.09	29,199		10.71	56.85
Homicide	10,828	3.97	16,899		6.19	64.07
Accident	824	0.30	97,860		35.89	0.84
Legal intervention	299	0.11	398		0.15	75.13
Total	28,874	10.59	148,286		54.30	19.47

aRate per 100,000 population

SOURCE: National Vital Statistics System data compiled using Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS). National Center for Health Statistics (2002).

TABLE 3-4 Number and Rate (per 100,000) of Overall and FirearmRelated Nonfatal Injuries by Intent, 2000

		Firearm-Related			Total
		Number	Rate		Number	Rate
	Assault	48,570	17.64		1,672,117	607.37
	Legal intervention	862	0.31		63,304	22.99
	Suicide attempt	3016	1.10		264,108	95.93
	Accident	23,237	8.44		27,550,181	10,007.10
	Total	75,685	27.49		29,549,710	10,733.39

SOURCE: NEISS data compiled using WISQARS (National Center for Health Statistics, 2002).

related deaths accounted for the majority of the total number of deaths in each category except accidents. In that case, firearm-related deaths accounted for a tiny fraction of all deaths by accidental means.

Table 3-4 shows overall and firearm-related nonfatal injuries by intent based on National Electronic Injury Surveillance System (NEISS) data. In 2000, there were 75,685 nonfatal firearm-related injuries in the United States. Injuries from violent assault and accidents accounted for the majority of all firearm injuries—64 and 31 percent, respectively. In contrast to completed suicides, firearms account for a small proportion of self-inflicted nonfatal injuries.

How much violent crime involves the use of a firearm?7 This question can be answered with varying degrees of certainty, depending on the crime and the data source consulted. In general, data on homicide are the

7By definition, firearm involvement in violent crime includes not only the discharge of a firearm but also the presence of a firearm during the commission of a violent crime.

PATTERNS OF FIREARM-RELATED VIOLENCE

61

most reliably reported and provide greater detail about the circumstances of the offense. Of crimes known to police in 2000, the most recent year for which Uniform Crime Reports (UCR) data are available, firearms were involved in 66 percent of the 15,517 murders, 41 percent of the 406,842 robberies, and 18 percent of the 910,744 aggravated assaults. Data from the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS) for 2000 indicate about 3 percent of the 260,950 rapes or sexual assaults involved the use of a firearm, although this estimate is based on 10 or fewer sample cases (Rennison, 2001).

Firearms and Homicide

Weaponry in Homicide

According to the UCR, 10,179 murders were committed with firearms in the United States in 2000, corresponding to a rate of 3.6 per 100,000.8 This count is down from a historic high in 1993 of 17,046 firearm-related murders (6.6 per 100,000). Handguns were used to commit 52 percent of all homicides, and firearms of any kind were used to commit 66 percent of all homicides in that year; 14 percent were committed with knives or other cutting implements, and 7 percent were achieved with hands, feet, or other “personal weapons.”

Trends in weapon-specific homicide rates from 1976 to 2000 are shown in Figure 3-2. Handgun homicides rose until 1993 and then fell, tracking closely the overall homicide rate, while the rates for other firearms, knives, and other weapons fell steadily and closely track each other. Thus, handgun homicides accounted for virtually all of the increase in the overall homicide rate between 1985 and 1993, the year the handgun homicide rate reached its 25-year peak of 5.4 per 100,000 (an estimated 14,005 handgun homicides).

The likely use of firearms varies dramatically from one type of homicide to another. For example, in the year 2000, about 17 percent of homicides were known to have occurred during the commission of other crimes; among these, 73 percent of robbery-related homicides were committed with a firearm, but only 9 percent of rape-related homicides were committed with a firearm.

8These UCR statistics differ slightly from those presented in Table 3-3. Since the UCR collects data from police sources and the NVSS from medical examiner records, the disparity between the two systems arises because of data collection differences. Despite these differences, the systems are highly concordant in their estimates of firearm-related murder. Here we present UCR-Supplemental Homicide Report data because they provide information about offenders, weaponry, and circumstances surrounding the offense—information not found in the NVSS.

62	FIREARMS AND VIOLENCE

Rate per 100,000

12

10

8

		Total
	6	Handguns
		Knives
		Other Firearms
	4	Other Weapons
		Unknown

2

0

1976 1979 1982 1985 1988 1991 1994 1997 2000

FIGURE 3-2 Murder rates by weapon type.

SOURCES: Fox (2001); U.S. Department of Justice (2001); U.S. Census Bureau (2001a, 2001b, 2002).

Victims

Males are more likely to be victims of homicide than females, and they are even more likely to be killed by firearms. In 1999, male victims accounted for 83 percent of firearm-related homicides and 64 percent of other homicides.9 The male firearm-related homicide victimization rate was 6.71 deaths per 100,000, compared with a female rate of 1.35 (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2002a, 2002b). From 1981 to 1999, trends in firearm-related homicides of males seem to explain much of the trends in the total homicide rate.

Young adults and adolescents are disproportionately victimized by fire- arm-related homicide. The rise and decline of the firearm-related homicide rate beginning in the mid-1980s was largely confined to the young adult and adolescent males (Wintemute, 2000). From 1981 to 1999, 20to 24- year-olds were most likely to be victims of homicide, especially by firearms, but victimization rates among 15to 19-year-olds rose and fell more dra-

9SHR data for 1999 are nearly identical for male involvement in firearmand nonfirearmrelated murder at 83 and 62 percent, respectively (calculated from Fox, 2001).

PATTERNS OF FIREARM-RELATED VIOLENCE

63

	35
	30
100,000per	25
	20
Rate	15
							Blacks
							Whites
	10						Other
	5
	0
	1981	1984	1987	1990	1993	1996	1999

FIGURE 3-3 Firearm-related murder victimization rates by race, 1981-1999. SOURCE: National Vital Statistics System data compiled using Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS). National Center for Health Statistics (2002).

matically than other age groups between 1985 and 1999. Adolescent victimization rates surpassed the rates for those 25 and older by 1990 and did not fall back below the rate for persons in their late 20s until 1998.

Blacks have been at high risk of victimization by firearm-related homicide. Figure 3-3 indicates that in 1999, for example, non-Hispanic blacks accounted for 51 percent of the firearm-related homicide victims, while representing only 13 percent of the total population (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2002a). The firearm-related homicide victimization rate was 16.64 per 100,000 for non-Hispanic blacks, 6.19 for Hispanics, 1.53 for non-Hispanic whites, and 2.60 for other races. Blacks were also disproportionately affected by the rise and fall of firearm homicides in the 1980s and 1990s.10

10Race is presented in the figure regardless of Hispanic ethnicity, since Hispanic ethnicity is not available in the Web-based Injury Statistics Query and Reporting System (WISQARS) prior to 1990.

64	FIREARMS AND VIOLENCE

Offenders

Young males are an even larger percentage of firearm-related homicide offenders than homicide victims. For example, cumulative data from the FBI’s Supplementary Homicide Reports (SHR) for the years 1976 to 1999 reveal that males committed 90 percent of all firearm-related homicides (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2002a). In 1999, 56 percent of the 10,969 offenders who used firearms to commit murder were between 14 and 24 years old. The rate of handgun murders by persons under age 18 nearly quadrupled from 1985 to 1993, and rates for 18to 24-year-olds more than doubled, while homicides by persons over 24 declined steadily from 1985 on. The highest concentrations of recent involvement in handgun homicides have been among young blacks; the homicide offense rate among blacks ages 18 to 24 tripled between 1984 and 1993, while the combined offense rates for young whites and Hispanics did not begin to increase until 1987 and even then accounted for a relatively small proportion of the subsequent rise and fall in the handgun homicide rate (Blumstein, 2000).

Historically, firearm homicide rates have been higher than the national average in the southern states, about average in the mid-Atlantic and north central regions, and below average in the New England, mountain, and west north central states (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2002a). Larger cities (more than 100,000) have had higher homicide and firearm homicide rates than smaller cities, towns, or rural areas.

Firearms and Nonfatal Injuries

Aggravated Assault

Assaults are the most common type of nonfatal firearm injury in the United States, but firearms are not the most common method of nonfatal assault. Figure 3-4 shows trends in the rates of aggravated assault by firearm involvement. According to the UCR, the aggravated assault rate more than quadrupled from 1964 to 1992 and has been declining just as steeply since then.11 Nonfirearm-related assaults accounted for 72 percent of the overall rise from 1964 to 1992 and 57 percent of the overall decline from 1992 to 2000; firearms were involved in only 18 percent of assaults in 2000; and assaults using blunt objects constituted the largest share of offenses.

11Recent trends in aggravated assault rates have dropped much more dramatically between 1993 and 2000 according to the NCVS than the UCR—53 versus 27 percent, respectively (Maguire and Pastore, 2002: Table 3.120; Rennison, 2001: Table 8).

PATTERNS OF FIREARM-RELATED VIOLENCE

65

	500
	400
100,000	300
per										Total
	200
Rate										Nonfirearm
										Firearm
	100
	0
	1964	1968	1972	1976	1980	1984	1988	1992	1996	2000

FIGURE 3-4 Rates of aggravated assault by firearm involvement. SOURCES: Calculated from Zawitz (2001); Maguire and Pastore (2002).

Robberies

In 2000, the NCVS and the UCR provided similar estimates for 157,623 firearm-related robberies in the United States—157,623 (NCVS) and

166,807 (UCR)—remarkably consistent estimates given the methodological and coverage differences between the two data sources. For all weapon categories besides firearms the NCVS reports higher estimates than the UCR. The close correspondence on firearms therefore suggests that most firearm-related robberies are reported to the police. The NCVS data indicate that 90 percent of firearm-related robberies in 2000 were committed with a handgun.

Figure 3-5 presents rates of robbery stratified by firearm involvement for the years 1974 to 2000. The robbery rate rose and fell several times before reaching its peak of 271.9 per 100,000 in 1991; the rate then decreased by nearly half to 144.6 per 100,000 in 2000. Firearms robberies accounted for 24 percent of the rise from 1974 to 1991 and 39 percent of the decline from 1991 to 2000. Like the trends for aggravated assault and in contrast to the trends for murder, the robbery rate was not much influenced by the rates of offenses committed with firearms.

66	FIREARMS AND VIOLENCE

	300
	200
Rate per 100,000	100
							Total
							Nonfirearm
							Firearm
	0
	1974	1978	1982	1986	1990	1994	1998

FIGURE 3-5 Rates of robbery by firearm involvement.

SOURCES: Calculated from Zawitz (2001); Maguire and Pastore (2002: Table 3.120); U.S. Census Bureau (2001a, 2001b, 2002).

Rape and Sexual Assaults

According to the NCVS, 84 percent of the rapes and sexual assaults reported in 2000 were committed without a weapon. There were an estimated 6,550 firearm-related rapes or sexual assaults in 2000; these constituted less than 3 percent of NCVS-reported rapes.

Firearms and Self-Harm

Historically, the number of successful suicides in the United States has far exceeded the number of homicides. In 1999, the number of suicides was nearly double the number of murders. In contrast, nonfatal injuries resulting from suicide attempts are much less common than injuries caused by violent assaults, regardless of weapons used. In this section, we describe the patterns and trends for death and nonlethal injuries resulting from self-inflicted, firearm-related harm.

Suicide

In 1999, there were 29,199 suicides in the United States—57 percent of them involving the use of a firearm. Males of all ages are at higher risk of

PATTERNS OF FIREARM-RELATED VIOLENCE

67

suicide; in 1999, males committed 14,479 (87 percent) of firearm-related suicides. Whites are at higher risk of suicide than blacks, but the suicide rate for young black males has been rising and by 1999 was nearly the same as the suicide rate for young white males. Figure 3-6 shows the number and rate of firearm-related suicides per 100,000 by five-year age groupings for 1999. As the figure shows, more firearm-related suicides were committed by those 35 to 39 years old than any other five-year age grouping, although those 80 to 84 years old committed suicide at the highest rate, 13.7 per 100,000.

The total suicide rate has remained relatively constant in the United States, but the proportion of suicides committed with a firearm increased steadily from the 1960s to the early 1990s before beginning a moderate decline. The age distribution of suicides over this period also changed, with a rise in suicide among the young and the old and a small decline among working-age adults. Figure 3-7 shows trends in the suicide rate

3,000																																																						15
			Suicide
			Number
			Suicide
			Rate
2,000		10
Number																																																						per 100,000
																																																						Rate
1,000																																														5

0																																																			0
		4		9		14			19			24			29			34			39			44			49			54			59			64			69			74			79			84		85+
-			-
0			5		-			-			-			-			-			-			-			-			-			-			-			-			-			-			-
				10			15			20			25			30			35			40			45			50			55			60			65			70			75			80

Age

FIGURE 3-6 Number and rate of firearm-related suicides, 1999.