How many self-defense firearm killings are there?

B

BTR

New member
I have been trying, without success, to find a good answer to this question. Most pro-gun sources I have found say something like 2000-3000 by private citizens yearly. The anti-gun sources say under 200, usually 160-170. Now, someone must be lying, these numbers in no way match.

And also what are the numbers of self-defense killings for police yearly?

Can anyone point me to an unbiased, completely reliable source on information? It would help greatly in defending self-defense when I argue with people, rather than having to be unsure about the actual numbers. Thank you.
 
BTR, usually I see this question framed a bit differently. As I recall, it is usually referred to as the number of times in a year a firearm is used in self defense / to prevent a crime. I've heard that Dr. Gary Kleck at the University of Florida (right one?) has estimated 2.5mm times per year. I believe Dr. John Lott also discusses this in 'More Guns, Less Crime', but I haven't read his book yet (on the list) - did hear him mention it in his Congressional testimony.

Specifically to your question, I have heard that more civilians have killed in defense than LEO's to enforce the law. Check http://www.gunowners.org/ for data.

The statistic of actually killings should be pretty tight, for legal reasons. The statistic for defensive uses of firearms is a tough one, leading to significant differences of opinion between researchers. Not everyone reports when they pull a gun to stop a crime, and often neither party reports the incident if there is no discharge of the firearm.

Hope I didn't waste your time. I'm sure we have a few folks here that can give you much tighter answers. Probably with page numbers! ;)

[This message has been edited by Jeff Thomas (edited July 20, 1999).]
 
Apples and oranges.

There is no reason to disbelieve that guns are used in some form of defense a million times a year or more. One problem is that many of these cases are never reported to the police for one reason or another, or have no serious consequences and are ignored.

But just looking at newspapers in the Baltimore-Washington area, I would have to think that the number of actual killings in self defense is rather low, closer to 200 than 2000. Part of the reason is the definition of self-defense.

It would seem that the term would apply only to cases in which the prosecutor or the court decides that the shooting was legally self-defense.

Even if the shooter feels that his/her life was threatened and the shooting self-defense, the prosecutor may not agree and may opt to charge the shooter with manslaughter, murder, etc. If a conviction is obtained, the case then is not reported as self defense.

Some of these cases are not good ones for self-defense advocates (of whom I am one).
Joe Heroindealer stiffs his supplier, Pete Scuzbag. Pete draws, but Joe is faster. Self-defense? Well, yes. But does anyone really want to use Joe's case as an example of an honest citizen defending his life?

Jim
 
The Gun Owners of America site you recommended gave the numbers as 606-1527:

Citizens shoot and kill at least twice as many criminals as police do every year (1527-606).

That's much higher than HCI and the VPC's numbers, but not as high as many gun advocates numbers. I would still like to find some more detailed information about this subject, if possible. The there are more than a thousand fatal firearms accidents per year (though the rate is extremely low), and we need some hard numbers to point in debate on the side of self-defense killings, rather than only relying on a vague, extremely large (but not necessarily innacurate) number of nonfatal uses. Thanks for the input...
 
Various articles in gun magazines have commented that the federal keepers of the statistics do not separate categories of shooting-homicides. Apparently death from guns is only separated into homicides, accidents and suicides.

FWIW, Art
 
Thanks Pii.

BTR, while I'm sure it is worthwhile to track down the actual data on killings, I respectfully suggest that if you only focus on that statistic you are allowing your adversary to frame the argument. That perspective alone is not the logical basis for determining whether it makes sense for civilians to be armed - ignoring Constitutional arguments.
 
You are right about that- but when someone says something like "Oh yeah? Well in 199# there were only 150 justifiable self-defense killings!" I want to be able to zing back and say, "No, the average is actually X, and your number is wrong because of blah, blah, blah..."
 
I can tell you that in the Nashville area there are about 20-30 justifiable Police shootings a year, for the past few years. I can only remember a handful of justified CCW shootings, and TN is a Shall-issue state.

So, it seems that my experience differs from some of the numbers being reported. I am talking about "shootings" not just killings, but I think the number would be even more spread towards LEOs on the "killings" side.
 
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