By Lily Robin, Josh Fording, Travis Reginal, Paige Thompson, Andreea Matei, Jerome Louison, Ramik Jamar Williams

Since the peak of violent crime in the early 1990s, New York City has experienced a sustained decline in violence but, like many cities across the country, has seen an increase in violent crime since 2019. In the 67th Precinct in particular, where the East Flatbush neighborhood is located, there were 34.5 shootings per 100,000 people in 2022. There are several community-led, government-led, and law enforcement–led initiatives in East Flatbush and surrounding areas to address violent crime and gun violence. This report examines gun violence and gun violence prevention and intervention initiatives in the 67th Precinct and surrounding neighborhoods.

WHAT WE FOUND

• Community organizations employ a holistic approach to violence prevention that addresses root causes of violence using a multifaceted approach to mitigate and address violence and diffuse tension between communities and law enforcement.

• Community members had negative views of criminal legal system actors and generally lacked awareness of community-based organizations involved in violence prevention work.

• Several barriers exist to community-led anti–gun violence, including limited funding, a lack of supports for staff, a lack of visibility in the community, and a lack of housing for people in crisis.

We make the following five recommendations:

• Rely on evidence to target research, funding, and initiatives to the areas most in need.

• Leverage and grow the existing strengths of communities.

• Identify and address drivers of gun violence.

• Develop funding opportunities for gun violence prevention and intervention programs that encourage collaboration and visibility in the community.

• Invest in community engagement and cultural competency for law enforcement and other criminal legal system actors.

HOW WE DID IT

With funding from the New York City Mayor’s Office of Criminal Justice (MOCJ), Urban, in partnership with the Kings Against Violence Initiative (KAVI), investigated gun violence and gun violence prevention and intervention initiatives in the 67th Precinct and surrounding neighborhoods through a review of existing literature, analysis of crime and shooting data, and interviews and focus groups with gun violence prevention and intervention initiative staff and community members.

Washington, DC: Urban Institute, 2025. 44p.

By Oluwole Ojewale and Raoul Sumo Tayo

This study presents evidence on the dynamics of cattle rustling in border regions of Cameroon and Chad. It identifies the drivers and enablers of the phenomenon and the networks of actors engaged in the criminal economy. The ungoverned spaces of border regions pose security challenges and accentuate the illicit economy of cattle rustling. Addressing cattle rustling in southern Chad and northern Cameroon requires a comprehensive, multi-stakeholder approach due to the complex interplay of economic, social and security dynamics in the regions. Key findings • The primary enablers of cattle rustling include transhumance and child labour, multiple conflicts, failure of governance, environmental factors, porous borders, cultural perception and social acceptance, corruption and ineffective justice system. • The link between cattle rustling and other forms of organised crime manifests through terrorism financing, cross-border smuggling, arms trafficking, abduction and money laundering. • In addition to the traditional cattle rustlers, the dominant actors perpetrating cattle rusting are ISWAP (71.4%), Boko Haram (9.5%), separatist groups (8.1%) and unidentified armed groups (5.4%).

ENACT, 2025. 36p.

   By John Lindsay-Poland. Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton and Giffords  

  The iron river of weapons transiting from the United States to Mexico and Central America that empowers criminal organizations and accelerates forced migration originates from hundreds of gun manufacturers and passes through thousands of local U.S. gun dealers, every year. In reaction to the flow of illicit weapons, a firearms race has developed, in which gun companies export more and increasingly militarized weapons to Mexican police and military forces. But the number of lives lost or disappeared through violence in Mexico continues to increase, while migrants fleeing through Mexico have become understandably more desperate to get to safety. Political discourse focuses on the U.S.-Mexico border. But the unregulated, massive and militarized U.S. gun market that feeds the violence, drug trafficking, and displacement is growing – and often ignored. The Stop US Arms to Mexico project obtained finely grained data, never before disclosed, on the origins of guns trafficked and exported to Mexico and Central America from the United States since 2015. We are publishing this data, in conjunction with this report, at stopusarmstomexico.org/iron-river  Gun violence in Mexico has spiraled in the last two decades since the expiration of the U.S. federal assault weapons ban in 2004 and the 2007 declaration of the drug war in Mexico with U.S. support. A modest decline in gun homicides since 2019 has not reduced violence even to the elevated levels of 2010-2011. Moreover, the growing number of forced disappearances, primarily carried out by criminal organizations armed with U.S. weapons and sometimes with collusion of Mexican security forces, has nullified the modest decline in gun homicides

San Francisco, CA:  Stop US Arms to Mexico, 2024. 12p.

By John Lindsay-Poland

The U.S. firearms market is generating growing storms of violence in neighboring countries. From Mexico – where traffickers in fentanyl and other criminal businesses are armed with thousands of U.S.- sourced assault weapons and .50 caliber rifles – to Haiti, where gangs armed with rifles easily purchased and smuggled from Florida and Georgia dominate and terrorize broad swaths of territory – the permissive, militarized and enormous gun trade in the United States is driving thousands of families to flee their homelands, arming the men who disappear people and commit femicide, empowering traders in narcotics that take thousands more lives, and looting economies. The damage is not limited to Mexico and Haiti. Firearms homicides – just one indicator of gun harms – have grown in Jamaica, Barbados, Central America and other nations, in tandem with the retail proliferation of U.S. weapons. In Guatemala, the exponential growth of exports of U.S. pistols has fed weapons trafficking and homicide rates. The United States is not exempt, of course: there were more shootings in U.S. schools in the last three years than any prior year.1 The concept frequently used for this violence is that of a pandemic: the health consequences of gun violence are severe and growing, with firearms and bullets as vectors and agents, respectively.2 But gun violence also behaves like a storm system in its violence and shattering effects. And the islands in which people may imagine that they are safe from these storms of gun violence are shrinking.

San Francisco, CA Stop US Arms to Mexico, 2025. 9p

By William R. Slomanson

An estimated quarter- to half-million guns are smuggled from the U.S. into Mexico each year. Seventy percent of guns recovered at Mexican crime scenes are traced back to the U.S. Many of these weapons are military-styled assault rifles, shipped into Mexico by U.S. drug gangs. This pipeline endangers citizens of the four U.S. border states, many of the nation’s counties, and the police who are outgunned by cartels. According to the complaint, 'tens of thousands of Mexico’s citizens have been wounded and killed.'

The typical precursor is sloppy or illegal practices in the manufacturer-wholesaler-retailer-buyer distribution chain. Data available to the gun industry could be used by its members to substantially reduce sales of guns to 'bad apple' retailers.

Mexico’s unique law suit  is the first whereby a foreign government has sued American gun makers. If ultimately successful, the trial judge has hinted that this novel filing would encourage similar litigation−in the U.S. and other nations.

Estados Unidos Mexicanos is not a lawsuit against the Second Amendment. Mexico instead hopes to trigger an exception to the federal statute that generally bars such suits against the U.S. gun industry. The plaintiff relies on lower U.S. court cases that have either interpreted that immunity from suit−in a way that allows such suits to proceed−or have considered this federal statute unconstitutional.

Mexico filed in the U.S. for several presumptive reasons. It seeks stratospheric damages of 'billions of dollars each year'. A large recovery is more likely in an American court than in Mexico. Securing the appearance of these U.S. corporations in a Mexican venue would be beyond wishful thinking. Mexico’s other major hurdle is whether a U.S. court can exercise personal jurisdiction, when all of the alleged harm has occurred in Mexico.

The case is now in the trial court. After that result is appealed, and case-split certiorari is sought, the reviewing courts may dismiss this case because: (1) it does not trigger the key exception to federal immunity from suit; and/or (2) the court lacks personal jurisdiction over the non-resident defendants.

56 Suffolk University Law Review (forthcoming 2022), 35p.

By Eugenio Weigend Vargas , Jason Goldstick, Laura Vargas

Background - Every year, thousands of people from Latin America and the Caribbean are migrating to the USA. Policy-makers have argued that US firearms are fuelling violence in these countries and are contributing to migration. The objective of this article is to examine the proportion of immigrants from Latin America and the Caribbean arriving at the US border who have previously been threatened with a firearm. This article further explores sociodemographic factors associated with the likelihood of previous firearm-related threats, whether those threats are associated with post-traumatic stress disorder, as well as the reasons behind those threats. Methods Data were obtained from a survey of migrants recruited at the southern US border from March 2022 to August 2023. To be selected, respondents had to be 18 years of age or older, had to speak English or Spanish and come from a Latin American or Caribbean country. We used descriptive statistics and a logistic regression. Results We analysed 321 cases. Roughly, 48% of respondents reported previous firearm-related threats. Males and respondents coming from Honduras, Venezuela and El Salvador were more likely to report previous firearm-related threats. There was a strong association between previous firearm-related threats and signs of post-traumatic stress disorder. Most threats occurred during robberies or extortions, but other threats were perpetrated by authorities, to prevent crime reporting, or by intimate partners. Conclusion Understanding the violence, particularly firearm-related violence, experienced by those migrating to the USA from Latin America and the Caribbean could help guide policy discussion and actions.

Injury Prevention, Epub ahead of print: . doi:10.1136/ip-2024-045369

By Kristen Rand. Additional research was provided by Kaya van der Horst

Fifty caliber sniper rifles are used by militaries around the world and can penetrate armor plating and shoot down aircraft on take-off and landing, but can be purchased under federal law in the U.S. as easily as a single-shot hunting rifle. The study’s release comes the day before the U.S Supreme Court will hear oral arguments by the government of Mexico in its lawsuit against gunmaker Smith & Wesson, another manufacturer of military bred weaponry utilized by the cartels.

VPC Government Affairs Director Kristen Rand states, “Fifty caliber sniper rifles are the guns most coveted by the cartels and most feared by Mexican law enforcement. The VPC has warned for years about the unique threat these anti-materiel guns present. Now they are being used to inflict maximum harm in Mexico. The U.S.-based manufacturers of these weapons must be held accountable.”

The VPC joined other gun violence prevention organizations in an amicus brief in support of the government of Mexico. The VPC has issued a wide range of studies on the threat posed by 50 caliber sniper rifles, including the risk they pose in the U.S. to infrastructure, civil aviation, and national security.

The study details the history of the Barrett, manufactured in Murfreesboro, Tennessee and the original 50 caliber sniper rifle, the gun’s unmatched combination of firepower and range, and the use of it and other 50 caliber rifles in numerous attacks and assassinations by Mexican cartels. Data contained in the study reveal that from 2010 to February 2023, the majority of 50 caliber sniper rifles (519 of 831) recovered by Mexican authorities were Barretts. Barrett and other 50 caliber sniper rifles have also been obtained by terrorists around the world, including Al Qaeda. In addition, the study:

• Cites numerous reports and research warning of the terror threat posed by the easy accessibility of 50 caliber sniper rifles, including: compromising command and control via assassination; the threat to aircraft (including civilian airliners); and, infrastructure.

• Offers numerous examples of terrorist and other criminal acts, including assassination, involving 50 caliber sniper rifles in Mexico, the U.S., and around the world.

• Details how the use of armor-piercing rifle rounds can further magnify the power – and the threat – of these deadly weapons.

• Includes profiles of companies manufacturing 50 caliber sniper rifles.

The study also puts forth policy recommendations including a federal ban in the United States of these uniquely destructive firearms.

Washington, DC: Violence Policy Center, 2025. 34p.

By The Center for Neighborhood Engaged Research & Science (CORNERS) at Northwestern University

Gun violence reduction initiatives that seek to engage individuals involved in violence must effectively identify and manage risk. Risk assessment informs participant recruitment, service provision, and program evaluation. Discussions around risk assessment often center quantitative metrics and researcher-designed assessment tools, deemphasizing the lived and professional experience of frontline professionals who work and often live in the communities they serve. The study outlined here analyzes the perspectives of frontline street outreach and victim services workers in Chicago on how they define, assess, and respond to gun violence risk on the job. The findings are based on a series of semi-structured focus group discussions and a participatory analysis session conducted in early 2021 by researchers at the Center for Neighborhood Engaged Research & Science (CORNERS). These discussions sought to answer the following 1. How do frontline violence prevention workers define risk for gun violence? 2. How do violence prevention workers assess and respond to risk? 3. What role do/should formal assessment tools play in violence prevention? Seasoned staff from both street outreach and victim services programs shared their experience identifying when, where, and who is at risk of shooting or being shot. It also gathers perspectives on strategies to mitigate this risk.

Evanston, IL: The Center for Neighborhood Engaged Research & Science (CORNERS) at Northwestern University, 2022. 28p.

By The Center for Neighborhood Engaged Research & Science (CORNERS) at Northwestern University

The Peacekeepers Program originally launched in Chicago in the summer of 2018 as the Flatlining Violence Inspires Peace (FLIP) Strategy. FLIP began as a summer-based community violence intervention program and grew to provide services in 16 Chicago community areas (CCAs) that held the lion’s share of violence in the city of Chicago. FLIP combined group violence intervention, violence prevention, and workforce development strategies designed as a street outreach apprenticeship program. Its immediate goal was to reduce gun violence in hotspots—areas with disproportionately high levels of shootings and victimizations. FLIP theorized that if gun violence could be reduced in these spatial pockets within a program community, it would create extended periods of peace across the broader community, ultimately contributing to a citywide decline in gun violence victimizations over time. In January 2023, the Illinois Office of Firearm Violence Prevention (OFVP), housed within the Illinois Department of Human Services (IDHS), supported FLIP’s transition into a year-round initiative, piloting their involvement and investment in the re-branded Peacekeepers Program (the Program). At the conclusion of the pilot period, two critical milestones occurred: the Program was integrated into the Reimagine Public Safety Act (RPSA) portfolio and, for the first time, received public funding to operate year-round. Moreover, with this funding, the Program was required to expand into RPSA priority communities, allowing the intervention to extend beyond Chicago and into surrounding Suburban Cook County  

  The report begins by providing an analysis of the 14 communities that implemented the Program for two consecutive calendar years. This exploration seeks to understand violence trends during the 2023-2024 year-round implementation of the Program compared to 2021-2022 calendar years, when the Program was only implemented during the summer months. Additional analyses will examine violence trends at both the community area and city-wide levels to assess the Program model’s claim that a reduction in hotspots might contribute to broader reductions across Program communities and the City of Chicago. The report also provides a brief overview of the year-over-year violence trends in the 13 Chicago-based Program expansion communities and their respective hotspots, during their launch year, to better understand violence trends following their start dates. This focus on both established and expansion communities highlights the progress made across all program community areas and offers insights into how implementation over consecutive 24-month periods aligns with observed violence trends. This report does not seek to establish causation or correlation between violence trends in program community areas and the implementation of the Program. Instead, it provides an exploratory analysis of gun violence trends in these areas, with a particular focus on program hotspots. Finally, the report concludes with early findings and recommendations on the implementation of the Program.  

Evanston, IL: Center for Neighborhood Engaged Research & Science (CORNERS) at Northwestern University 2025. 34p.

By Naomi Johnson, Austin Segal, Maya Simkin, Stephanie Agnew, Kareem Butler, and Briana Payton

Over the last two decades, the policing, prosecution, incarceration, and surveillance of people who carry guns has increased tremendously. This criminalization has majorly impacted Black communities in the state – especially in Chicago and Cook County – without improving safety. In fact, the criminalization of gun possession and the conflation of gun possession and gun use have made communities less safe by entangling more people in the criminal legal system. Time and time again, Black men, teenagers, and children are targeted, arrested, and criminalized for carrying guns that they feel are necessary for their own protection in areas with high rates of gun violence and low clearance rates by police. The purpose of this report is to analyze the policies, processes, and sociocultural realities that have led to the “War on Guns,” which parallels the historic War on Drugs1 and has similarly devastated Black and Brown communities for decades. In this brief report, we use public information to provide a set of facts that explain how the mounting public pressure to stop gun violence has regressively and ineffectively targeted the victims of violence and their neighbors who carry guns for protection. We detail how this approach has contributed to discriminatory policing, confusing laws, harsh sentencing, over-incarceration, and other unnecessary and long-term entanglements with the criminal legal system.   

Chicago: Chicago Appleseed Center for Fair Courts, 2024. 44p.

By Anne K. Mwobobia

This study sought to examine print media framing of gun violence in Kenya with reference to the Nation and Standard newspapers. The objectives of the study are to establish dominant frames in reporting gun violence by the Nation and the Standard newspapers; analyze the diction in framing gun violence by the Nation and the Standard Newspapers; to examine the figures of speech in framing gun violence by the Nation and the Standard Newspapers and; to assess the portrayal of gun violence as a serious societal problem by the Nation and the Standard Newspapers. The study was based on the Framing Theory and Goffman’s Frame Analysis. The study employed the descriptive research design and the mixed methods research approach. Purposive sampling technique was used to select suitable newspaper articles for the study. The study involved the collection of data on gun violence from Nation and Standard Newspapers for the period 1st September 2019 –30th August 2020. Data was collected using a code sheet and interview guide. The target population of the study consisted of 730 articles published by Nation and Standard Newspapers articles on gun violence. Two editors and three reporters experienced in reporting gun violence were also interviewed. Data was collected and analyzed using content analysis. Regarding the dominant frames in reporting gun violence by the Nation and the Standard newspapers, it is evident that most of dominant frame used to portray gun violence in both Nation and the Standard newspapers were fatality, terrorism, crime, citizen participation, cattle rustling, tactical response and accomplice. Cartoons and photos were also used as visual persuasion frames. Diction was also extensively used in the reporting of gun violence stories. In this regard, various catchwords and catchphrases were used in depicting gun violence. These included: silencing the guns, impunity, and proliferation of guns, dead, robbery, shootout and coup attempt. It was also made manifest that various figures of speech were used. These include idioms, similes, metaphors and idiomatic expressions. Lastly, the findings show that some of the major issues of societal concern focused by both newspapers included armed robbery, police brutality, cattle rustling and terrorism. It can thus be concluded that the print media plays a pivotal role in checking gun violence since it is widely viewed as the mirror of society and protective shield against violent gun crimes. The study recommends that the print media should expand the dominant frames used in reporting gun violence so as maximally show the various angles to the deep issue of gun violence. This could be through enhanced research on gun violence in Kenya. The use of diction and figures of speech could also be exploited within the process of enriching the presentation of gun violence stories. The print media should also increase the level to which they offer balanced coverage of gun violence stories in the whole country.

Nairobi: University of Nairobi, 2021. 92p.

By Jillian Peterson, ; Gina Erickson; Kyle Knapp, James Densley

Understanding the motivation of a mass shooter’s intent to do harm can help practitioners and policy makers develop more effective intervention strategies. OBJECTIVE To examine the prevalence of communication of intent to do harm, known as leakage, in a sample of 170 mass public shooters from 1966 to 2019; the characteristics of perpetrators who do and do not leak their plans; and whether leakage is a form of fame-seeking behavior or a cry for help among individuals who are in crisis or suicidal. DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS This cross-sectional study included perpetrators who killed 4 or more people in a public space from 1996 to 2019 and were included in a comprehensive database of US mass shootings. That database was built from August 2017 to December 2019, and analysis took place from January to May 2021. MAIN OUTCOMES AND MEASURES Leakage was identified and coded using publicly available records. Any communication to a third party of an intent to do harm prior to the shooting was coded as leakage. Logistic regression models were used to examine the risk factors associated with leakage. Models estimating leakage were examined to assess the 2 hypothesized pathways to leakage (the cry-for-help model and the fame-seeking model). RESULTS The 170 participants in this sample included 166 (97.7%) male perpetrators and 3 (2.3%) female perpetrators, with a mean (SD) age of 34 (12) years. Overall, 161 participants had known race and ethnicity: 11 (6.8%) Asian individuals, 35 (21.7%) Black individuals, 14 (8.7%) Latinx individuals, 7 (4.4%) Middle Eastern individuals, 3 (1.9%) Native American individuals, 89 (55.3%) White individuals, and 2 (1.2%) individuals with other race and ethnicity. Overall, 79 mass shooters (46.5%) leaked their plans. Of perpetrators who leaked their plans, 35 (44.3%) leaked specific plans about a mass shooting, and 44 (55.1%) leaked nonspecific plans about generalized violence. The study findings indicate that leakage was associated with receiving counseling (odds ratio, 7.0; 95% CI, 2.0-24.8) and suicidality (odds ratio, 3.7; 95% CI, 1.0-13.6), suggesting that leakage may best be characterized as a cry for help from perpetrators prior to their act. CONCLUSIONS AND RELEVANCE In this study, nearly half of the perpetrators of mass shootings leaked their plans. Leakage was associated with receiving counseling and suicidality. Leakage is a critical moment for mental health intervention to prevent gun violence. Opportunities to report threats of violence need to be increased. Traditional threat assessment models focused on specific threats of violence may miss critical opportunities for intervention. 

JAMA Network Open. 2021, 9p.

By Alex Nowraster

A total of 298 mass shooters were responsible for 1,733 murders and 2,459 people injured in the United States from 1966 through the end of 2024. Over the 59 years studied here, the chance of being murdered by a mass shooter was about 1 in 9.1 million per year, and the annual chance of being injured was about 1 in 6.4 million. The murder victims of mass shooters account for about 0.15 percent of all homicides from 1966 through the end of 2024, but that percentage has risen in recent years. The deadliest year for mass shootings was 2017, when 14 shooters murdered 130 people and injured 959 others, accounting for 0.7 percent of all homicides in that year. Of those 298 shooters, 255 were native-born and 43 were foreign-born. The chance of being murdered in a mass shooting committed by a native-born American was about 1 in 10.5 million per year, about 6.5 times higher than the chance of being killed by a foreign-born mass shooter, which was about 1 in 68.4 million per year. The annual chance of being injured by a foreign-born mass shooter was about 1 in 94.7 million, and the chance of being injured by a native-born shooter was about 1 in 6.9 million per year. About 14.4 percent of mass shooters were foreign born, and they were responsible for 13.3 percent of murders, roughly in line with their share of the population, and 6.8 percent of injuries in mass shootings, roughly half their share of the population.

Washington, DC: Cato Institute, 2025. 10p.

By Jacob D. Charles

Gun violence is a pressing national concern. And it has been for decades. Throughout nearly all that time, the primary tool lawmakers have deployed to stanch the violence has been the machinery of the criminal law. Increased policing, intrusive surveillance, vigorous prosecution, and punitive penalties are showered on gun offenders. This Article spotlights and specifies this approach—what it calls “firearms carceralism”—and details how a decades-long bipartisan consensus generated a set of state-centered solutions to gun violence that has not meaningfully impacted the problem. Instead, those policies have exacerbated racial inequity and compounded civic and community harms. The Article traces the escalating punitive measures imposed on gun offenders over the past half century. It first peers down into one microcosmic exemplar of firearms carceralism etched into federal mandatory minimum provisions and Supreme Court case law magnifying those penalties. It describes how criminal justice reforms have traditionally excluded those whose offenses are categorized as violent, and specifically and emphatically 2812 MINNESOTA LAW REVIEW [108:2811 those who offend with guns by their side. It then draws out promising hints of a path to including gun offenders in efforts to reform or reimagine the criminal legal system. Most fundamentally, however, the Article wages a sustained critique of the system of firearms carceralism that fronts aggressive law enforcement and draconian terms of incarceration. It describes the unjustifiable breadth and depth of these practices and the harmful, racialized, and exclusionary values they simultaneously draw from and reinscribe. Finally, the Article argues in favor of three alternative paths to equitable peace and safety. First, it outlines private sector steps to, for example, dampen illicit firearms supply. Second, it highlights civil legal interventions like red flag laws and tort lawsuits against irresponsible gun sellers. Third, and most prominently, it underscores the promise of community violence intervention and restorative justice programs to bring meaningful safety apart from the carceral tools of coercive control.

MINNESOTA LAW REVIEW [108:2811), 2024.

By Paul M. Reeping, Hannah S. Laqueur & Rose M. C. Kagawa

To date, there have been no peer-reviewed studies in the United States estimating the impact of gun-free zone policies in alcohol-serving establishments on rates of firearm violence in and around such establishments. In this study, we utilized a cross-sectional design to estimate the impact of Texas’s 51% alcohol law, which prohibits the carrying of firearms in establishments that generate over half of their revenue from alcohol sales. The analysis focused on the difference in shooting incidents in and around establishments with and without firearm carrying prohibitions in 2021 and 2022. After adjusting for establishment type (bar/restaurant), alcohol sales volume, census tract level demographic factors, and the number of nearby restaurants and bars, results indicated that gun-prohibiting bars experienced significantly fewer shootings compared to those that allowed guns. Specifically, establishments that were gun-prohibited had 37% fewer shootings within 50 m than those that were gun-allowing, with a 95% confidence interval ranging from 60% fewer to 0.2% fewer. This association was more prominent in bars than in restaurants. The protective association with gun-prohibited status diminished with increased distance from the establishments; results were not significant at 100 m. Our study findings align with research suggesting that gun-free zones can reduce firearm violence. However, future studies using quasi-experimental designs that can better support causal inference are needed to support such a conclusion, as are studies exploring the efficacy of such policies in various settings and over longer periods.

Texas. J Urban Health, 2024, 9p.

By Dru Stevenson

Firearm policy in the United States is subject to longstanding political gridlock. Up to now, most of the legal academic literature has focused on the constitutionality of various—or any—regulations regarding firearm possession, sales, or usage. This article inverts the problem and proposes a system for voluntary registration and certification of nonowners, those who want to waive or renounce their Second Amendment rights as a matter of personal conviction. The proposed system is analogous to both the registration of conscientious objectors during wartime conscriptions, and the newer suicide prevention laws whereby individuals can add their names to a do-not-sell list for firearm dealers—though the proposal made here is broader and more permanent. Voluntary registration, with official certification, would serve three important purposes. First, this would help create social identification markers for the gunless-by-choice movement, something that historically has been missing; formal signals and labels of identification with a movement are necessary for a movement’s success, especially with prohibition or abstinence movements. Second, registration and certification as gunless would be a personal moral commitment marker; all societies provide ways for solemnizing one’s vows and solidifying one’s resolve on serious, lifelong moral decisions. Third, certification allows for a market signaling effect, providing useful information that can trigger a beneficial response from the private sector; market responses, in turn, provide useful information about otherwise hotly-debated beliefs, such as whether guns in fact enhance or reduce safety for individuals and public places. This article develops each of these points and offers a unique and simple regulatory and statutory alternative for a new system of registration and certification.

86 Brook. L. Rev. (2021).

By C4ADS

Executive Summary

Gun violence in Guatemala is fueled by the licit import of handguns. Once weapons have entered Guatemala, illicit actors have greater opportunity to divert these firearms from their intended use and users, instead wielding them to pursue crime and perpetrate violence.

This report uses seizure data and supply chain analysis to assess how the international flow of weapons into Guatemala is vulnerable to diversion, or the rerouting of licitly transferred conventional arms from their intended recipient or use.

This analysis reveals:

Handguns are the predominant weapon type used in violent crime in Guatemala. Many of the seized handguns are produced by major international weapons manufacturers such as Glock, Israeli Weapons Industries (IWI), Taurus, and Beretta.

Diversion pathways in-country appear among private citizens, commercial, andgovernment actors, presenting opportunities for illicit actors to acquire licit firearms.

Handguns, predominantly those made by top manufacturers, continue to flow into Guatemala.

These weapons are most often manufactured in the U.S., Brazil, and Turkey.

Manufacturers or entities within the manufacturer’s corporate network account for most handgun exports to Guatemala.

Handguns entering Guatemala primarily do so via air. They often transit through third countries and/or third parties, complicating due diligence and creating greater opportunity for diversion.

The U.S., Canada, and Germany are the most common transit countries for Guatemalan handgun imports.

U.S. gun stores are the most common non-manufacturer exporters of handguns to Guatemala.

The majority of Guatemalan importers are not end-users, but retailers that sell to both government and civilian consumers.

This report uses cases of weapons seizure and diversion to explore each of these findings. Using new data, we re-examine a case of Israeli arms that were sold in Guatemala in exchange for weapons later diverted to paramilitary forces in Colombia.

These findings illuminate areas where Guatemalan and international stakeholders can do more to counter the diversion of firearms in Guatemala. To this end, the report makes targeted recommendations for closing gaps in current legislation and enforcement.

Washington, DC: C4ADS2025. 24p.

By Richard Stansfield, Daniel Semenza, Jie Xu, Elizabeth Griffiths

This study uses a combination of tract-level and street network-level analyses to exam-ine: (1) the overall association between federally licensed firearm dealers (FFLs) and homicides, (2) the relation-ship between dealers with serious violations (such as selling to prohibited buyers or failing to record sales)and homicide, and (3) whether the dealer–homicideassociation is moderated by community disadvantage.Results replicate and confirm a relationship between dealers and homicides in disadvantaged neighborhoods.Importantly, however, we also find that proximity to non compliant dealers specifically elevates the risk of lethal violence.Policy implications: We detail how a coordinated effort between federal, state, and local agencies to reg-ulate firearm dealers and ensure that legal compliance can be instrumental in reducing gun violence. There Is a clear need for increased oversight of gun dealers and more robust policies that hold negligent dealers accountable, including the necessary funding and regu-latory manpower to enable regular auditing and support consistent follow-up for noncompliant dealers. A com-prehensive policy framework that supports supply-side gun violence reduction should include additions to state-level laws that require record keeping, videotap-ing and store security, and regular inspection for firearm dealers.

Criminology & Public Policy, 22, 323–345.

By Rocco Pallin, Amanda J. Aubel, Christopher E. Knoepke, Veronica A. Pear, Garen J. Wintemute & Nicole Kravitz-Wirtz

Background

Following the 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, there was a dramatic increase in media coverage of extreme risk protection orders (ERPOs) and in state policy proposals for ERPO laws. This study documents the frequency of news coverage of ERPOs throughout 2018 and examines the narratives used by media outlets to describe this risk-based firearm policy.

Methods

Using a mixed-method descriptive design, we examine the frequency of national news media coverage of ERPO legislation in 2018, before and after the Parkland shooting, and analyze the content of news articles related to a sample of states that considered ERPO legislation after the shooting.

Results

We find a sharp increase in the frequency of articles related to ERPOs following the Parkland shooting and smaller increases in coverage surrounding ERPO policy proposals and other public mass shootings that year. Nearly three-quarters of articles in our content analysis mentioned the Parkland shooting. The news media often mentioned or quoted politicians compared to other stakeholders, infrequently specified uses for ERPOs (e.g., prevention of mass violence, suicide, or other violence), and rarely included evidence on effectiveness of such policies. More than one-quarter of articles mentioned a mass shooting perpetrator by name, and one-third of articles used the term “gun control.”

Conclusions

This study describes the emerging public discourse, as informed by media messaging and framing, on ERPOs as states continue to debate and implement these risk-based firearm violence prevention policies.

BMC Public Health 21, 1986 (2021), 13p.

By Elizabeth B. Klerman, Mahmoud Affouf, Rebecca Robbins, Jay M. Iyer|| , Cornelia Griggs, Peter T. Masiakos, Chana A. Sacks

Developing interventions to prevent firearm-related violence and to address its consequences requires an improved understanding of when these violent events are most likely to occur. We explored gunshot events in 6 of the most populated cities in the United States by time of day, day of week, holiday/ non-holiday, and month using publicly available datasets. In some of these cities, gunshot events occurred most often at nighttime, on holidays and weekends, and during summer months, with significant interaction effects. There were also time-related changes in characteristics of the victims. Primary prevention efforts aimed at curbing firearm-related violence should consider these differential risks.

J Biol Rhythms. 2024 February ; 39(1): 100–108.