Every so often, a local news story about a victim of crime goes national. Most recently, it was Sarah McKinley, 18, home alone with her 3 month old son, a few days after Sarah's husband had died of lung cancer. Two men apparently looking to steal pain medicine prescribed for the husband broke in. Sarah grabbed a shotgun and a pistol and killed Justin Martin as he forced entry into her home. How often do such incidents happen? While the results from studies vary, the numbers are large. The National Crime Victimization Survey, for various procedural reasons, is at the low end, showing 108,000 such cases a year (although this was some years back, when crime rates were higher than now). The widely reported Kleck/Gertz study, which has its own set of problems, showed a range of 830,000 to 2.45 million defensive gun uses per year. Other studies have fallen solidly in the middle, with hundreds of thousands of defensive gun uses per year.
Cramer: On the right side of the bullet
Friday, February 10, 2012
Monday, April 1, 2024
NRA Members Among the Largest Class Protected from Draconian Rule
Monday, April 22, 2024
On Friday, ATF provided the unpleasant surprise of yet another rulemaking to implement the noxious Bipartisan Safer Communities Act (BSCA).
Sunday, April 21, 2024
After holding late-night votes until close to midnight on Saturday, April 20th, the Colorado House passed three anti-gun bills on their third reading, including liability insurance mandates, an 11% excise tax, and a state-level permitting systems for FFL's.
Friday, April 12, 2024
We have long been warning of the rule the Biden ATF has been preparing to redefine who is considered a firearm “dealer” under U.S. law. The administration’s explicit objective was to move as close to so-called “universal background ...
Friday, April 26, 2024
On Monday April 29th, Representatives in the Minnesota House will be casting floor votes on House File 601, House File 4300, and House File 2609. The bills penalize gun owners for failing to report lost ...