Crime Down, Gun Ownership Up--Is Their Correlation?

Brand New FBI Stats DESTROY Liberal Gun Control Arguments

BY KIMBERLY MORIN - 44 COMMENTS · IN SECOND AMENDMENT

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Once again the FBI has released previous year statistics on violent crime in the United Sates and once again violent crime has gone down.

Gun ownership, based on NICS background data checks, is down compared to 2013 but overall still up over past years.

 

From the National Shooting Sports Foundation:

The FBI this month released the 2014 edition of Crime in the United States , and it revealed that the estimated number of reported violent crimes decreased 0.2 percent when compared with 2013. And the estimated number of property crimes decreased 4.3 percent from 2013 levels.

Homicides with firearms in 2014 were down 3.9 percent on a year-over-year basis. Consistent with previous years of this ongoing work, the vast majority of these murders were committed with handguns, although all categories of gun murders were lower. Rifles of all kinds were involved in just 3 percent of gun murders in 2014, lower than the number of deaths attributable to knives, blunt objects, and even fists or feet.

Using NSSF-adjusted National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) data over a ten-year period since 2005, the best proxy we have for firearms sales, we see a 74.1 percent increase in background checks even as the violent crime fell 16.2 percent.  The 15-year trend is even more dramatic, showing an 81.8 percent increase in NICS numbers even as violent crime fell 18.2 percent.

Put simply, more firearms in the hands of the mostly law-abiding American population have not yielded an increase in crime.

You’ll never see facts like this discussed from the gun control crowd. Facts are not their friend.

The trend over the past 10 to 15 years has been a steady increase of gun ownership with a steady decrease of violent crime. How can one not believe these aren’t related?

Another Attempt To Stop Mentally Ill From Getting Guns Will Only Effect Average Americans

House Approves Measure To Increase Funding For Gun Background Checks

May 29, 2014 by Sam Rolley

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In response to last week’s mass shooting in Santa Barbra, Calif., House lawmakers approved a funding increase for the Nation’s background check system for firearms on Thursday.

An amendment to a 2015 appropriations bill provides an additional $19.5 million in grant funding for the FBI National Instant Background Check System (NICS). The background check system has been championed as a tool which keeps firearms out of the hands of criminals and the mentally ill in the U.S.

“Right now, all of the information isn’t getting in. When the information doesn’t get into the system, we can’t enforce the law, and dangerous people who otherwise wouldn’t pass a background check can slip through the cracks and buy guns,” the amendment’s sponsor, Representative Mike Thompson (D-Calif.) said.

Thompson said that the additional funds are intended to strengthen the background check system, particularly with regard to mental illness red flags.

Currently, States are encouraged to report information about illegal immigrants, domestic violence offenders and the severely mentally-ill to NICS, but not all do. The Thursday funding approval is aimed at incentivizing States to provide that information.

“Our states need more resources to get all their information into the NICS system. If we give them the resources, we can stop dangerous people from getting guns, and we can save lives,” Thompson said.

In 2007, problems with the NICS’s ability to keep track of people deemed a potential threat because of mental disturbance were revealed when 23-year-old Virginia Tech student Seung-Hui Cho killed 32 people on and near the campus of his college. Two years earlier, Cho had been declared mentally unstable by a Virginia judge; he was never flagged in the system.

The amendment, co-sponsored by Republican Representative Peter King (R-N.Y.), was able to muster modest GOP support.

Representative Frank Wolf (R-Va.), the chairman of the House Appropriations Commerce-Justice-Science subcommittee, said “Enforcing existing laws that keeps guns out of the hands of prohibited individuals is a goal we all share.”

The National Rifle Association took a “neutral stance” on the amendment, which will bring grant funding for NICS to $78 million for FY2015 if passed by the Senate and signed into law. That’s up from $59 million this year and just $18 million in FY2013.

Historically, the NRA has supported NICS funding.

“Look, NRA’s all for the Instant Check. We were there before anyone else was even talking about it,” Wayne LaPierre said back in 2011. “We need to fund it, we to make the sure the states turn over their records.”

The Administration's Solution To Every Problem--Throw Money At The Situation, Even Though They Don't Understand The Issue.

Holder Pursues $15 Million To Fund Active Shooter Cop Training

April 15, 2014 by Ben Bullard 

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Advancing the Obama Administration’s philosophy that regards law enforcement professionals as the only legitimate response to put down an immediate armed threat, Attorney General Eric Holder tied this week’s shootings in Kansas City to an appeal to Congress to fund more police training to address “active shooter” situations.

Focusing his weekly video message to Congress on the request, Holder justified the request based on his belief in the effectiveness of similar training that’s already received Federal funding.

“This vital work must continue — but to provide training, we need adequate funding. This critical funding would help the Justice Department ensure that America’s police officers have the tools and guidance they need to effectively respond to active shooter incidents whenever and wherever they arise,” he said.

The text summary accompanying the video on the DOJ website explains the need for more active-shooter-trained police (no mention of concealed carry on military bases, faithful interpretation of the 2^nd Amendment or renewing the focus on the maze of local laws that currently go unenforced) as a function of the “alarming” increase in “active shooter incidents since 2009…”

Amid an alarming rise in the number of active shooter incidents since 2009 – and following the recent tragedies at Ft. Hood and at a Jewish Community Center in Kansas – Attorney General Eric Holder urged Congress to approve $15 million in funding for active shooter training and other officer safety initiatives. These initiatives are critical to providing front-line officers-who are usually first on the scene of an active shooting incident-with the tools, training, and equipment they need to respond to threats, to protect themselves, and to save innocent lives.

It’s worth noting that, after a cavalcade of post-Sandy Hook reports from left-leaning and mainstream media outlets decrying a recent and dramatic increase in mass shootings, those who bothered to follow up had to eat crow after a Boston criminologist and academic debunked that myth.

Holder evidently didn’t read that report – or the report from the FBI’s own NICS database that shows violent crime has decreased as more and more law-abiding citizens seek to obtain firearms.