{"id":2336427,"date":"2024-09-04T08:36:58","date_gmt":"2024-09-04T12:36:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/feds-hiding-data-showing-good-guys-with-guns-stop-shootings\/"},"modified":"2024-09-04T08:37:39","modified_gmt":"2024-09-04T12:37:39","slug":"feds-hiding-data-showing-good-guys-with-guns-stop-shootings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/feds-hiding-data-showing-good-guys-with-guns-stop-shootings\/","title":{"rendered":"Feds Hiding Data Showing Good Guys With Guns Stop Shootings"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"&quot;\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">20<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Ffeds-hiding-data-showing-good-guys-with-guns-stop-shootings%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2336427&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>The \u200barticle discusses \u2064the ongoing debate surrounding gun control and the effectiveness of\u200b armed, law-abiding citizens in deterring mass shootings. \u200cGun control activists \u2063have \u200clong criticized the &#8220;good guy with \u200ca gun&#8221; narrative, arguing that it undermines efforts\u200d to implement\u200c stricter regulations on firearms. However, the article presents evidence suggesting that armed citizens can significantly prevent mass casualty events. \u2062 <\/p>\n<p>In 2022, an example is highlighted where Elisjsha Dicken used his concealed handgun\u200c to intervene in a \u200bmass shooting, a rare \u200binstance that received some media coverage, albeit\u2062 with headlines suggesting \u200bsuch occurrences are\u200d uncommon. The article also emphasizes the role of government agencies, like the\u2064 CDC, \u200cin allegedly suppressing data \u200cregarding defensive gun\u200b use, particularly \u2062after lobbying efforts aimed at removing \u2063this information from\u200d their reports.<\/p>\n<p>The author, who previously worked at the U.S. Department of Justice, criticizes \u200dthe \u200cFBI&#8217;s methods of data collection regarding\u2063 active\u2063 shooter\u2064 incidents, pointing out that they have \u2063misidentified\u2064 and missed numerous cases where civilians successfully stopped attacks. According \u200cto the Crime\u2062 Prevention Research Center (CPRC), \u2062a much higher percentage \u2064of active\u2062 shootings are stopped by armed civilians than the FBI reports\u2014estimates suggest that \u2062law-abiding citizens have prevented \u2063approximately 35-39.6% of active shootings\u2064 in the\u200c last decade, significantly higher than the FBI&#8217;s claim of just 4%.<\/p>\n<p>the article advocates for recognizing the\u200c contributions of armed citizens in preventing violence and questions \u200bthe narrative perpetuated by gun control advocates and certain media outlets.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<div>\n<p>For years, gun control <a href=\"https:\/\/www.americanprogress.org\/article\/debunking-the-guns-make-us-safer-myth\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">activists<\/a> have sought to <a href=\"https:\/\/www.everytown.org\/debunking-gun-myths-at-the-dinner-table\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">&ldquo;debunk&rdquo;<\/a> the so called &ldquo;good guy with a gun myth&rdquo; in an effort to pass more stringent controls on one of our nation&rsquo;s most cherished liberties. In support of this agenda, the federal government in conjunction with legacy media has sought to suppress the abundant evidence in support of the truth that armed, law-abiding citizens are one of the most effective deterrents against public mass casualty attacks.<\/p>\n<p>For instance, in 2022, 22-year-old Elisjsha Dicken stopped a mass public shooting using his legally carried concealed handgun. The story became an unusual instance in which the national media covered this heroic action. But an Associated Press headline claimed: &ldquo;<a href=\"https:\/\/madison.com\/news\/national\/rare-in-us-for-an-active-shooter-to-be-stopped-by-bystander\/article_1da6b63c-ee3a-5475-a547-aef3c9f6432c.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Rare in US for an active shooter to be stopped by bystander<\/a>.&rdquo; Meanwhile, a Washington Post headline declared:&nbsp;&ldquo;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/nation\/2022\/07\/18\/greenwood-mall-shooting\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Rampage in Indiana a rare instance of armed civilian ending mass shooting<\/a>.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>That same year, Time Magazine <a href=\"https:\/\/time.com\/6182970\/good-guys-guns-mass-shootings-uvalde\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">published<\/a> an article politicizing the tragic school shooting in Uvalde, arguing that local law enforcement&rsquo;s controversial <a href=\"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/2022\/06\/10\/the-uvalde-school-shooting-was-a-failure-of-leadership-not-gun-laws\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">response<\/a> proves that &ldquo;good guys with guns keep failing to stop mass shootings.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) under the Biden Administration has sought to suppress data proving that armed citizens help prevent crime by removing its estimates of defensive gun uses from its website. For almost a decade, the&nbsp;CDC referenced a 2013&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20220713172632\/https:\/nap.nationalacademies.org\/login.php?record_id=18319&amp;page=&amp;cc=1\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">National Academies of Sciences<\/a>&nbsp;report noting that people used guns to stop crime&nbsp;anywhere from about 64,000 to 3 million times a year.<\/p>\n<p>This decision was taken after gun control activist Mark Bryant, founder of the Gun Violence Archive, lobbied the CDC to remove &ldquo;misinformation&rdquo; regarding defensive gun use estimates because of they are cited by &ldquo;gun rights folks&rdquo; to stop gun control legislation. Soon after, the CDC took down these estimates and now lists no numbers.<\/p>\n<p>The FBI has also shown itself to be susceptible to political pressure.&nbsp;The&nbsp;FBI <a href=\"https:\/\/crimeresearch.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/10\/U-_ActiveShooter13B_FBI.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">defines<\/a> an active shooter attack&nbsp;as occurring when an individual actively kills or attempts to kill people in a populated, public area. This measure includes everything from just one person shot at, even if the target isn&rsquo;t hit, to a mass public shooting.&nbsp;It doesn&rsquo;t include, however, shootings involving other crimes, such as robbery or fighting over drug turf.<\/p>\n<p>To compile its list, the FBI hired researchers at Texas State University. Police departments don&rsquo;t record these cases, so the researchers relied on Google searches to find news stories about these incidents. As such, the FBI&rsquo;s evidence relies on a dataset that is actively hostile to the truth.<\/p>\n<p>During 2020 and the beginning of 2021, I worked as the senior advisor for research and statistics at the U.S. Department of Justice. My job included evaluating the FBI&rsquo;s active shooting <a href=\"https:\/\/papers.ssrn.com\/sol3\/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3857331\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">reports<\/a>.&nbsp;During my time with the DOJ, I discovered that the FBI either missed or misidentified many <a href=\"https:\/\/crimeresearch.org\/2024\/07\/massive-errors-in-fbis-active-shooting-reports-from-2014-2023-regarding-cases-where-civilians-stop-attacks-instead-of-4-the-correct-number-is-at-least-35-excluding-gun-free-zones-it-avera\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">cases<\/a> of civilians using guns to stop attacks. For instance, the FBI continues to report that armed citizens stopped only 14 of the 350 active shooter cases that it identified in the ten years from 2014 to 2023.<\/p>\n<p>The Crime Prevention Research Center (CPRC), which I run, has found many more missed cases and is keeping an&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/crimeresearch.org\/2024\/07\/updated-cases-where-armed-citizens-have-stopped-active-shooter-incidents\/?_thumbnail_id=16421\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">updated list<\/a>. As such, the CPRC <a href=\"https:\/\/crimeresearch.org\/2024\/07\/massive-errors-in-fbis-active-shooting-reports-from-2014-2023-regarding-cases-where-civilians-stop-attacks-instead-of-4-the-correct-number-is-at-least-35-excluding-gun-free-zones-it-avera\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">numbers<\/a> tell a much different story: Out of 515 active shooter incidents from 2014 to 2023, armed citizens <a href=\"https:\/\/crimeresearch.org\/2024\/07\/updated-cases-where-armed-citizens-have-stopped-active-shooter-incidents\/?_thumbnail_id=16421\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">stopped<\/a> 180, saving countless innocent lives. Our numbers even excluded 27 cases where a law-abiding citizen with a gun stopped an attacker before he could fire a shot.<\/p>\n<p>Overall, the CPRC estimates that law-abiding citizens with guns have stopped over 35 percent of active shootings over the last decade and 39.6 percent in the last five years. This figure is eight times higher than the four percent estimate made by the FBI.<\/p>\n<p>This figure increases even more when controlling only for areas where citizens are legally allowed to carry a firearm; after all, you can&rsquo;t except that law-abiding citizens will stop attacks in gun-free zones. In places where law-abiding citizens are allowed to carry firearms, we estimate that armed civilians stopped 51 percent of active shootings over the past decade. Over the last five years, that figure was 53.1 percent.<\/p>\n<p>One such case ignored by the FBI occurred in Conyers, Georgia in 1999 when an active <a href=\"http:\/\/www.cnn.com\/US\/9905\/20\/conyers.school.shooting.03\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">shooter<\/a> at Heritage High School was disarmed by an assistant principal. When I presented this case, among others, to the FBI, a bureau official acknowledged that &ldquo;the FBI did not come across this incident during its research in 2015, but it does meet the FBI&rsquo;s active-shooter definition.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>When <a href=\"https:\/\/crimeresearch.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/08\/FBI-Response.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">questioned<\/a> about their omission of this and other instances, the reason the bureau official gave for this mistake was that their reports &ldquo;are limited in scope.&rdquo; It&rsquo;s not surprising that researchers miss cases or occasionally misidentify them. But&nbsp;the&nbsp;FBI refuses to fix its errors and even the blatant omissions that I pointed out have still not been corrected.<\/p>\n<p>The FBI dataset is missing so many defensive gun uses that it&rsquo;s hard to believe it isn&rsquo;t intentional and the fact that they never correct mistakes that are brought to their attention is even more damning. All the while, the news media unquestioningly reports the FBI&rsquo;s numbers, actively distorting the truth regarding the pivotal rule responsible gun owners have played in preventing crime and limiting casualties during mass public shootings.<\/p>\n<hr>\n<div>\n<p>   John R. Lott, Jr. is the president of the <a href=\"http:\/\/crimeresearch.org\/\">Crime Prevention Research Center<\/a> and the author most recently of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Gun-Control-Myths-politicians-botched\/dp\/B08C95PD1K\/ref=pd_bxgy_img_1\/133-2149164-9424358?pd_rd_w=mIIiz&amp;pf_rd_p=c64372fa-c41c-422e-990d-9e034f73989b&amp;pf_rd_r=JTJF6AD46AW0G6XN2TZ3&amp;pd_rd_r=2859765f-c7a7-46d5-b6f0-5ec029296295&amp;pd_rd_wg=p9TqC&amp;pd_rd_i=B08C95PD1K&amp;psc=1&amp;pldnSite=1\">&ldquo;Gun Control Myths.&rdquo;<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>For many years, gun control advocates have aimed to disprove the &#8220;good guy with a gun&#8221; narrative to implement stricter regulations on one of America&#8217;s fundamental rights. To further this goal, the federal government and mainstream media have attempted to downplay substantial evidence showing that armed, law-abiding citizens are among the most effective deterrents against mass casualty events. For example, in 2022, 22-year-old Elisjsha Dicken intervened in a public shooting with his legally carried concealed weapon. This incident received some national media attention; however, an Associated Press headline stated it was &#8220;rare in US for an active shooter to be stopped by bystander,&#8221; while a Washington Post headline referred to it as &#8220;a rare instance of armed civilian ending mass shooting.&#8221; <\/p>\n<p>That same year, Time Magazine published an article politicizing the tragic Uvalde school shooting and claimed that local law enforcement&#8217;s controversial response demonstrated that \u201cgood guys with guns keep failing to stop mass shootings.\u201d Additionally, under the Biden Administration, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has worked to suppress data indicating that armed citizens help prevent crime by removing estimates of defensive gun uses from its website. For nearly ten years prior, the CDC had referenced a 2013 National Academies of Sciences report estimating that people used guns defensively between approximately 64,000 and 3 million times annually.<\/p>\n<p>This change followed lobbying from gun control activist Mark Bryant of Gun Violence Archive who argued these estimates were \u201cmisinformation\u201d used by \u201cgun rights folks\u201d against gun control legislation. Consequently, the CDC removed these figures and now provides no statistics on defensive gun use.<\/p>\n<p>The FBI has also shown vulnerability to political influence. It defines an active shooter event as occurring when someone actively kills or attempts to kill individuals in public spaces but does not include shootings related to other crimes like robbery or drug disputes. To compile its data on active shooters, the FBI employed researchers at Texas State University since police departments do not track these incidents; thus relying heavily on Google searches for news reports about such events\u2014creating a dataset potentially biased against revealing accurate information.<\/p>\n<p>During my tenure as senior advisor for research and statistics at the U.S. Department of Justice from late 2020 into early 2021\u2014where I evaluated FBI reports\u2014I found numerous instances where civilians using firearms successfully thwarted attacks were either overlooked or misclassified by the FBI. The agency reported only 14 cases where armed citizens intervened out of approximately 350 identified active shooter incidents between 2014 and 2023.<\/p>\n<p>In contrast, my organization\u2014the Crime Prevention Research Center (CPRC)\u2014has documented significantly more instances where civilians successfully stopped attacks and maintains an updated record reflecting this reality: out of 515 active shooter events from 2014-2023, armed citizens intervened in stopping around180 incidents\u2014potentially saving countless lives\u2014even excluding cases where law-abiding individuals halted attackers before any shots were fired.<\/p>\n<p>Overall CPRC estimates indicate that over one-third (35%) of active shootings over recent years have been prevented by responsible firearm owners\u2014a figure eight times higher than what is reported by the FBI (4%). This percentage increases even further when considering only areas permitting legal firearm carry; we estimate around half (51%) of such incidents were interrupted during this period within those jurisdictions allowing lawful carry\u2014with slightly higher rates observed over just five years prior at roughly53%.<\/p>\n<p>One notable case overlooked occurred back in1999 during an incident at Heritage High School in Conyers Georgia when assistant principal disarmed an assailant\u2014a fact acknowledged later by an official who admitted it met their definition yet was missed due limited scope parameters set forth within their research methodology.<\/p>\n<p>Despite presenting evidence regarding omissions like this one directly pointing out discrepancies\u2014the bureau remains unresponsive towards rectifying errors made throughout its reporting process which raises concerns about intentionality behind missing data points altogether while simultaneously perpetuating narratives through unquestioning media coverage distorting realities surrounding responsible ownership\u2019s role preventing violence during critical situations involving mass casualties.<\/p>\n<p>John R.Lott Jr., president Crime Prevention Research Center author latest work titled \u201cGun Control Myths.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2336428,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Gun-e1725031482390.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[546],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2336427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-the-federalist"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/thefederalist.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Gun-e1725031482390.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2336427","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2336427"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2336427\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2336428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2336427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2336427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2336427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}