By Kenneth J. Novak and William R. King

This report presents the findings and methodology of an evaluation of the implementation and impact of the Kansas City Crime Gun Intelligence Center (CGIC) for the years 2017 and 2020, a multi-agency approach for collecting, managing, analyzing, and using information or intelligence derived from or associated with firearms. The CGIC business model involves collaborative partnerships among local agencies in addressing gun-related crime. CGIC activities include the comprehensive collection of ballistic evidence, timely entry and correlation, crime-gun tracing, ATF analysis, identification of NIBIN leads, collaboration between local and federal law enforcement agencies, and prosecution of offenders who commit gun crimes.

Washington, DC: National Gun Crime Intelligence Center Initiative Bureau of Justice Assistance, U.S. Department of Justice 2020. 100p.

By Craig Uchida, Marc L. Swatt, Allison Q. Land, Kyle Anderson and Samantha Hock

Denver’s CGIC was conceived as a program that would “focus on gun violence” -- emphasizing shooters and those who commit gun-related crimes (J. Russell, personal communication October 2020). Using data- and forensic-driven approaches, an interagency collaboration was developed between ATF and DPD. Relying on research on gun violence and crime lab forensics, ATF and DPD leveraged the ATF’s National Integrated Ballistics Information Network (NIBIN) to identify critical links between gun casings, gun-related incidents, and those using firearms. NIBIN information and eTrace were used to link ballistics evidence recovered from firearms and casings to other shooting incidents. They showed the ability to identify heretofore unknown perpetrators and generate forensic evidence leading to the arrest and convictions of gun-crime offenders.

Los Angeles: Justice & Security Strategies, Inc., 2020. 102p.

By Jillian Peterson

This is the Final Report on the goals and achievements of a project that created a database on patterns in the lives of mass shooters to assist in informing policymakers and practitioners in developing and implementing prevention and intervention strategies for mass shootings. Informed by existing datasets, the research literature, and frequently asked questions about mass shooters, this project compiled a list of variables to be coded and developed a codebook. The codebook was piloted on a small random sample of test cases and refined. Open-source lists of mass shootings were developed from major news outlets. Among the variable categories are leakage of the killers’ plans, crisis signs, victim characteristics, firearms possession and use, role of psychosis in the shooting, behaviors related to violence, mental health, family characteristics, and social and interest groups. The report also contains findings from the database on mass shooting trends; shooter demographics; trauma, suicidality, and crisis; mental health; and warning signs

St. Paul, MN: Hamline University, 2021. 38p.

By The U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation

In 2014, the FBI published its first report, A Study of Active Shooter Incidents Between 2000-2013, and subsequently published annual and bi-annual reports reflecting its continued research into active shooter incidents based on the FBI’s definition of an active shooter. Through its initial research, the FBI identified and reported on 305 active shooter incidents occurring in the United States between 2000-2019. It was later determined there were potentially other active shooter incidents fitting the FBI’s active shooter definition that had not previously been identified. …. As a result, the FBI evaluated and identified an additional 28 active shooter incidents that occurred between 2000 and 2019, bringing the total designated active shooter incidents during this time period to 333. … This valuable information is intended to assist law enforcement and the public in developing strategies to stop active shooter threats, prevent acts of violence, and prepare for, respond to, and recover from such incidents.

Washington, DC: FBI, 2021. 35p.

Jillian J. Turanovic, Travis C. Pratt, Kristen Neville, and Antonia La Tosa

“…mass shootings encompass all incidents with four or more gunshot fatalities, not including the shooter, within 24 hours. Existing publicly available databases on deadly mass shootings often focus only on those that occur in public spaces (and that are neither family- nor felony-related). We include public mass shooting incidents, but we also assess all the other deadly mass shootings that occurred over this period (e.g., those that happened in private spaces among family members, and those that occurred in public spaces but were part of another criminal event). Our effort to be more inclusive allows for the examination of not only the characteristics of deadly mass shootings that occur in public, but to also examine how similar (or not) these incidents are to deadly mass shootings that take place in other contexts. In all, our database contains information on 720 incidents that occurred in both public and private spaces between 1980 and 2018. Consistent with prior research, we used open-source data (e.g., media reports, official police and court records) to code each deadly mass shooting incident according to a host of characteristics.

Tallahassee: College of Criminology and Criminal Justice, Florida State University , 2022. 53p.

By Yvon Dandurand

This literature review focuses on the role that firearms have in injuries, unintentional deaths, suicides, and violent crimes, especially in Canada; the report also examines role of firearm regulation in reducing such incidents and addresses other ways to promote the responsible use of guns. Survey research indicates that Canada's household rate of gun ownership is about 26 percent. Canada's rate is in the middle range of the countries studied.

Ottawa: Canadian Firearms Centre, Department of Justice Canada, 1998. 108p.

By Scott R Kegler, Linda L Dahlberg and James A Mercy

Firearm homicides and suicides represent a continuing public health concern in the United States. During 2015-2016, a total of 27,394 firearm homicides (including 3,224 [12%] among persons aged 10-19 years) and 44,955 firearm suicides (including 2,118 [5%] among persons aged 10-19 years) occurred among U.S. residents (1). This report updates an earlier report (2) that provided statistics on firearm homicides and suicides in major metropolitan areas during 2006-2007 and 2009-2010, and places continued emphasis on youths, in recognition of the importance of early prevention efforts.

MMWR Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report 2018 Nov 9;67(44):1233-1237

By Scott R. Kegler, et al.

Introduction: The majority of homicides (79%) and suicides (53%) in the United States involved a firearm in 2020. High firearm homicide and suicide rates and corresponding inequities by race and ethnicity and poverty level represent important public health concerns. This study examined changes in firearm homicide and firearm suicide rates coinciding with the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Conclusions and Implications for Public Health Practice: During the COVID-19 pandemic, the firearm homicide rate in the United States reached its highest level since 1994, with substantial increases among several population subgroups. These increases have widened disparities in rates by race and ethnicity and poverty level. Several increases in firearm suicide rates were also observed. Implementation of comprehensive strategies employing proven approaches that address underlying economic, physical, and social conditions contributing to the risks for violence and suicide is urgently needed to reduce these rates and disparities

MMWR Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report 2022 May 13;71(19):656-663

By The Anti-Defamation League (ADL)

Right-wing extremists have been one of the largest and most consistent sources of domestic terror incidents in the United States for many years, a fact that has not gotten the attention it deserves. n The Anti-Defamation League’s Center on Extremism has compiled a list of 150 rightwing terrorist acts, attempted acts, and plots and conspiracies that took place in the United States during the past 25 years (1993-2017). These incidents were perpetrated by white supremacists, anti-government extremists, anti-abortion extremists and other types of right-wing extremists.

New York: The Anti-Defamation League (ADL), 2017. 28p.

By Erin Dauphinais-Soos

Every year people with ties to a variety of extreme movements and causes kill people in the United States; the ADL Center on Extremism tracks these murders. Extremists regularly commit murders in the service of their ideology, in the service of a group or gang they may belong to, or while engaging in traditional, non-ideological criminal activities.

In 2021, domestic extremists killed at least 29 people in the United States, in 19 separate incidents. This represents a modest increase from the 23 extremist-related murders documented in 2020 but is far lower than the number of murders committed in any of the five years prior (which ranged from 45 to 78).

The report provides additional insight on perpetrator affiliations, police officer killings, information on the perpetrators and incidents from 2021, an analysis of white supremacist killings in the United States from 2012-2021, and information on the PROTECT plan, ADL’s “seven-part plan to mitigate the threat posed by domestic extremism and domestic terrorism while protecting civil rights and civil liberties.”

By Ulrich Garms, Lara Wilkinson, and Amrita Kapur

Women and men, girls and boys are among the victims of acts of terrorism, such as hostage-taking, explosives attacks in public places, or aeroplane hijacking. Terrorist groups, however, also specifically target women through acts of sexual and gender-based violence – such as rape, sexual slavery and forced marriage – as a means of achieving tactical, strategic and ideological aims. Many terrorist groups encroach on women’s human rights and impede their socioeconomic development, including by restricting their movement. In some contexts, women disproportionately experience internal displacement as a result of terrorist threats, and lose access to livelihoods owing to terrorist attacks. Women may also face gender-specific difficulties when attempting to access justice and seeking remedies as victims of terrorism.

Vienna: UNODC, 2019. 214p.

By Naureen Chowdhury Fink, Rafia Barakat and Liat Shetret

The roles of women as they relate to terrorism and counterterrorism issues have remained underexplored by policymakers and international counterterrorism actors. As the international community shifts from a reactive to a more preventive approach regarding terrorism and violent extremism, the need for a more comprehensive multi-stakeholder approach to addressing these challenges has become apparent. Yet, little attention has been paid to integrating a gender dimension into UN and many national efforts to address the problems of terrorism and violent extremism. This policy brief explores the conceptual and operational challenges in integrating a gender dimension into counterterrorism policy and programming and offers a set of recommendations for the United Nations and other actors to consider when developing effective and sustainable counterterrorism efforts.

Goshen, IN: Center on Global Counterterrorism Cooperation, 2013. 18p.

By Seran De Leede, Renate Haupfleish,, Katja Korolkova, and Monika Natter

This study, commissioned by the European Parliament’s Policy Department for Citizens' Rights and Constitutional Affairs at the request of the Committee on Women’s Rights and Gender Equality, focuses on Islamist radicalisation and violent extremism in the EU and has two aims: 1) to explore and assess the question of women’s radicalisation and their involvement in violent extremism in the EU as well as to look into the mechanisms in place to prevent women and girls from radicalisation and propose further actions; and 2) to identify the potential of women in preventing radicalisation, in particular by looking into women’s current role in counter-radicalisation strategies and to explore potential gendered approaches and best practices to counter-radicalisatio

Brussels: European Parliament, Policy Department for Citizens' Rights and Constitutional Affairs, 2017. 100p.

By The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe

This handbook reflects the OSCE’s commitment to supporting a gender-aware approach for the security sector in preventing and countering VERLT. The OSCE participating States have recognized the significance of gender in several commitments, including the OSCE Ministerial Council Declaration No. 4/15 on preventing and countering VERLT, which was adopted in Belgrade in December 2015. The OSCE also supports the UN Security Council Resolution 2242 (2015), which calls for the greater integration by States of their agendas on women, peace and security, including on counter-terrorism and P/CVERLT.

Vienna: Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe, 2019. 142p.

By Catrina Doxsee, Seth G. Jones, Jared Thompson, Grace Hwang, and Kateryna Halstead

There has been a significant rise in the number of domestic terrorist attacks and plots at demonstrations in the United States, according to new CSIS data. The result is escalating violence in U.S. cities between extremists from opposing sides, a major break from historical trends. In 2021, over half of all domestic terrorist incidents occurred in the context of metropolitan demonstrations. In addition, the most frequent targets of attacks were government, military, and law enforcement agencies, who are increasingly at the center of domestic terrorism by extremists of all ideologies.

Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), 2022. 15p.

By Chelsea Daymon and Devorah Margolin

This report compares women’s participation in far-right and salafi-jihadist movements in the United States through the examination of four case studies: the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, Al-Qaeda, and the Islamic State. To do so, the authors apply a unique analytical framework that examines three key aspects of women’s participation to compare similarities and differences. First, the report takes a top-down approach to analyze how organizations conceptualize women’s roles. Second, it takes a bottom-up approach to explore how women have participated in violent extremism in the United States. Finally, it uses a gendered lens to address how groups have responded when women have participated in violent extremism in America.

Washington, DC: Program on Extremism at George Washington University., 2022. 67p.

By Editor James J.F. Forest and Bart Schuurman

The first article by Deven Parekh, Amarnath Amarasingam, Lorne Dawson and Derek Ruths offers a detailed critique of Twitter data collection methods and propose suggestions for improving the collection of data in future research on terrorists use of social media. Then Ariel Koch examines the impact of Islamic State beheading videos among jihadists and other extremists. Next, Adesoji Adelaja, Abdullahi Labo and Eva Penar examine how the Nigerian public’s views about the root causes and objectives of Boko Haram differ from those of the government. And in our final article of this issue a team of researchers at the International Center for Study of Violent Extremism (ICSVE’s) report on their recent Facebook ad-campaign aimed at raising awareness about the realities of living under ISIS and protecting vulnerable potential recruits from considering joining.

Terrorism Research Initiative (TRI), headquartered in Vienna, Austria, and the Institute of Security and Global Affairs (ISGA) of Leiden University, Campus The Hague. Vol.XII, Issue 3, June 2018. 189p.

By Nils Duquet and Dennis Vanden Auweele

Executive summary. The main findings of Project TARGET were that gun trafficking is a multifaceted phenomenon that predominantly impacts criminal and terrorist gun violence (rather than domestic violence or other sorts of disputes). Armed robbers and lower-level criminals generally acquire firearms to threaten or for the status they afford, and they are increasingly doing so through purchasing (converted) non-live-firing firearms. The predominant type today has become Turkish blank-firing weapons purchased in countries with lenient legislation regarding these weapons. There is also an influx of easy-to-convert Flobert guns being trafficked in(to) Europe and converted in transit or at their place of destination. Higher-level criminals have more access to firearms, including sometimes also military grade firearms, through the smuggling of conflict legacy weapons or the trafficking of reactivated firearms. While jihadi terrorists tend to acquire their firearms predominantly through criminal connections, rightwing terrorists more often tend to rely on legal purchases, firearm assembling and internet purchases. We noted that a proliferation of gun availability can lead to an arms race among criminals, increased rates of gun violence and general sentiments of insecurity among the population.

Brussels: Flemish Peace Institute, 2021. 212p.

By Violence Prevention Research Program, University of California Davis

This series of slides presents an overview of firearm-related deaths in the U.S.

Davis, CA: Violence Prevention Research Program, University of California Davis, 2021. 14p.

By European Commission, Directorate-General for Enterprise and Industry

This report presents the results of the evaluation study commissioned by Directorate General Enterprise and Industry with the aim of assessing the implementation of the Firearms Directive in all MS. The evaluation aims at providing the necessary input for the report that the European Commission shall, by the end of July 2015, “submit […] to the European Parliament and the Council on the situation resulting from the application of this Directive, accompanied, if appropriate, by amending proposals”. This evaluation is also included in the Commission's Regulatory Fitness and Performance Programme (REFIT), which aims at reviewing the entire stock of EU legislation to identify burdens, inconsistencies, gaps, overlaps and obsolete measures and to make, where necessary, proposals to follow-up on the findings of the review (COM(2013)685 and Annex). The evaluation study addresses five evaluation criteria identified in the Terms of Reference (ToR) that are: 1. Consistency of the implementation of the Directive’s provisions, of the interpretation of the key terms and an overall coherence of the Directive with other pieces of legislation dealing with weapons; 2. Relevance of such provisions with respect to the existing needs in the area of internal market functioning and EU citizens’ security; 3. Effectiveness in terms of the extent to which provisions have contributed to the achievement of set targets, i.e. their actual impacts; 4. Efficiency of procedures and obligations introduced by the Directive, namely if results have been achieved at reasonable costs; 5. Added value of EU intervention as opposed to national legislation and actions.

Brussels: Publications Office, 2014. 106p.