By Marc L. Swatt, Craig D. Uchida, Anna M. Goedert, and Alese Wooditch

Gun violence remains a challenging problem for law enforcement agencies across the country. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC, 2023), there were 20,958 firearm homicide deaths across the United States in 2021 resulting in a rate of 6.3 per 100,000 residents. This rate understates the problem, as the risk for firearm homicide is not evenly distributed and certain segments of the population have a considerably higher risk of firearm homicide victimization. For example, for 15-19-year-old Black males, the rate of firearm homicide death is 98.9 per 100,000 residents and for 20-24-year-old Black males, the rate is 134.4 per 100,000 residents (CDC, 2023). Further, firearm homicide is concentrated within impoverished areas within cities (Kravitz-Wirtz, Bruns, Aubel, Zhang, & Buggs, 2022). Recent research suggests that firearm violence has increased in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic (Kegler, Simon, Zwald, Chen, Mercy, Jones, et al. 2022; McDonald, Mohler, & Brantingham, 2022). While the causes of firearm homicide are complex and involve both risk and protective factors (see American Psychological Association, 2013; Gaylord-Harden, Alli, Davis-Stober, & Henderson, 2022; Mattson, Sigel, & Mercado, 2020; Pardini, Beardslee, Docherty, Shubert, & Mulvey, 2020), there are strategies that law enforcement can adopt to reduce the prevalence of firearm violence (see Braga, Turchan, Papachristos, & Hureau, 2019; Braga, Weisburd, & Turchan, 2019; Uchida & Swatt, 2013). Recently, law enforcement agencies have sought to leverage forensic evidence from gun discharge events to improve gun violence suppression efforts. Traditionally, firearm forensic evidence – namely retrieved firearms and spent casings – were used mainly to enhance prosecutorial efforts at obtaining convictions. However, by rapidly entering and retrieving information from the ATF’s National Integrated Ballistics Information Network (NIBIN) and electronic gun tracing database (eTrace), law enforcement can proactively use this information to identify linkages between seemingly disparate cases to apprehend likely shooters and disrupt gun trafficking networks (see Pierce, Braga, Hyatt, & Koper, 2004). To maximize the efficacy of this strategy, several agencies have been adopting coordinated interagency firearm enforcement programs – Crime Gun Intelligence Centers. The Baltimore Police Department (BPD) is one of 46 agencies across the country that received funding from the Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) to set up a CGIC. In 2018, BPD planned its CGIC and over the next five years implemented key components of it. Justice & Security Strategies, Inc. (JSS) served as the research partner on the grant and evaluated the program. This report details the results of this evaluation effort. In this chapter, we first discuss the CGIC concept, how CGICs can decrease gun violence and the results of CGIC evaluations. In the second chapter, we discuss the City of Baltimore, the BPD, the implementation of CGIC, and the unique challenges facing this implementation to provide context for our findings. In the third chapter, we discuss the results of the process evaluation for CGIC and discuss CGIC activities,  challenges, and successes. The fourth chapter presents the results of the impact evaluation and examines whether CGIC was successful at reducing violent gun crime. The final chapter provides additional discussion of the conclusions of this research and provides several recommendations to BPD for the continuation of CGIC. 

Los Angeles: Justice & Security Strategies, 2024. 123p.

By Daniel W. Webster, | Cassandra K. Crifasi, Rebecca G. Williams, | Marisa Doll Booty  | Shani A. L. Buggs

This report is the product of the Reducing Violence, Building Trust: Data to Guide Gun Law Enforcement in Baltimore project. Researchers from the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research (JHCGPR) collected and analyzed data relevant to the enforcement of laws restricting the possession of firearms by prohibited individuals and unlawful carrying of concealed firearms to provide data-driven recommendations for more fair and effective practices. The project was designed to help inform the response to the dual crises in Baltimore—extraordinarily high rates of gun violence, and gun law enforcement practices that, in some cases, have violated the law and more generally weakened community members’ trust in the police. In 2017, Baltimore experienced its highest homicide rate on record during two out of the past three years and had the highest murder rate among cities with a population greater than 500,000 in the U.S.1 Homicides declined in 2018, but in 2019, Baltimore’s per capita homicide rate eclipsed the 2017 record, ending the year with 348 total homicides (58.6 per 100,000 population). Nine out of 10 homicides (291) in the city were committed with firearms. The number of nonfatal shootings in 2019, 771, was also higher than that seen in the past five years.2 Because illegal gun possession is often a precursor to shootings, making arrests for illegal gun possession has long played a prominent role in the Baltimore Police Department’s strategy to combat violent crime. While BPD arrests for drug-related crimes have plummeted by 70% from 2014 to 2019, arrests for weapons violations, principally illegal possession of firearms, have changed relatively little during that time period. Police units focused on illegal gun carrying in hot spots for shootings have helped to reduce shootings, but less focused enforcement practices have not always translated into measurable reductions in violence.3 Past efforts to get illegal guns off the streets and deter illegal gun possession without adequate oversight enabled civil rights violations, facilitated alarming criminal activity by BPD’s Gun Trace Task Force, and increased distrust of the police in many communities. These practices and their aftermath have lasting and harmful implications for public safety and justice. They also motivate current efforts by BDP to facilitate reforms and build trust with community members in compliance with the Consent Decree. Researchers from JHCGPR drew from a variety of sources of data from Baltimore and studies from other cities to summarize key findings concerning proactive gun law enforcement practices—legal issues, impacts of police stops and searches on individuals, impacts on gun violence, community members’ views on the appropriateness of police practices and their desire for greater police accountability, and measures some law enforcement agencies are taking to improve the effectiveness and prevent abuses from proactive gun law enforcement. The report cites prior systematic and expert reviews of relevant research, especially the 2018 report by the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s committee on proactive policing.a Several sources of data from Baltimore were used, including: 1) findings from a recent JHCGPR report on the effects of law enforcement and city-led strategies on gun violence (2,3) the United States Department of Justice’s City of Baltimore Consent Decree and reports from the selected Independent Monitor;  3) new data from court records on case dispositions for cases involving charges for illegal firearm possession; and 4) household surveys and focus group interviews with residents living in some of Baltimore’s neighborhoods most impacted by gun violence. The JHCGPR study team sought to identify promising models for effective and fair proactive gun law enforcement through interviews with law enforcement officials in 24 other jurisdictions. This report provides 13 specific research findings relevant to eight recommendations informed by evidence that is intended to guide future proactive gun law enforcement efforts capable of reducing crime and enhancing community confidence and trust.  

Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University, Bloomberg School of Public Health, Center for Gun Violence Solutions, 2020. 65p.