“Tracking the movement of firearms from legal purchase to use in crimes can help inform prevention of firearm injuries and deaths,” explained Hannah S. Laqueur, senior author of the study. Laqueur is an associate professor in the UC Davis Health Department of Emergency Medicine.

Gun characteristics associated with weapons being recovered at a crime include:

• Lost and stolen
• Cheap (made by a low-cost manufacturer)
• Semiautomatic
• Large and medium caliber (compared to small caliber)

Buyer characteristics associated with guns being recovered at a crime include:

• First-time purchasers
• Younger, female, Black, Hispanic, Native American or Pacific Islander or other race/ethnicity (versus white)
• People who bought more than 12 guns in a year
• A history of arrests during the past 10 years (gun crime, intoxication, major property crime and major violent crime)
• Those who lived in a more socially vulnerable census tract

Dealer characteristics associated with guns being recovered at a crime include:

• Average sales per year
• Percentage of transactions that were administrative denials
• Percentage of sales that were pawns or pawn redemptions in the previous calendar year
• Percentage of sales in the past calendar year that became crime guns in the next calendar year

A first-of-its-kind study examining records of gun purchases in California found that mass and active shooters have distinct patterns of buying guns compared to other legal purchasers. The UC Davis Violence Prevention Research Program (VPRP) research was published in the Journal of Criminal Justice.

The researchers identified several distinct patterns of gun purchases for buyers who went on to commit mass shootings. Compared to other legal gun purchasers, mass and active shooters who perpetrated an attack between 1996 and 2018 and had a history of authorized purchasing:

• purchased more handguns in the year before the attack
• purchased their first gun at an older age
• were more likely to have a history of purchase denials

Abstract

A study from the Violence Prevention Research Program (VPRP) at UC Davis suggests machine learning, a type of artificial intelligence, may help identify handgun purchasers who are at high risk of suicide. It also identified individual and community characteristics that are predictive of firearm suicide. The study was published in JAMA Network Open.

“While limiting access to firearms among individuals at increased risk for suicide presents a critical opportunity to save lives, accurately identifying those at risk remains a key challenge. Our results suggest the potential utility of handgun records in identifying high-risk individuals to aid suicide prevention,” said Hannah S. Laqueur, an assistant professor in the Department of Emergency Medicine and lead author of the study.

People who own guns and those living with gun owners are substantially less worried about the risk of firearm injuries than individuals living in homes without guns, says a new study by violence prevention experts at UC Davis Health.

“People usually say they purchase firearms for self-protection,” said Julia Schleimer, lead author of the study and an epidemiologist with the UC Davis Violence Prevention Research Program (VPRP). “However, homicides from gunshots in the home are much more often criminal than self-defensive, and the risks of murder associated with firearm ownership are greater for women than for men.”

Patterns in gun ownership-related characteristics and motivations, such as the types and number of firearms owned and reasons for ownership, offer insights into how those owners might view proposals designed to prevent firearm-related harm.

Using the defining characteristics of the different classes of firearm owners, the UC Davis Health researchers then examined support for three firearm policy proposals. Two of the proposals involved a ban on the possession of high-capacity ammunition magazines, including either amnesty for handing in the high-capacity devices or a buyback. The third focused on regulating firearm access for individuals with multiple driving-under-the-influence (DUI) convictions.

A surge in firearm purchasing in the U.S. during the coronavirus pandemic – estimated to be over 2.1 million excess purchases – is linked to a significant increase in firearm violence. 

The study findings are consistent with the significant body of research linking greater firearm access with increased rates of firearm violence at the population, household and individual levels.

The study included data from 48 contiguous states in the U.S. and the District of Columbia, excluding Hawaii and Alaska due to missing or incomplete data. The researchers also controlled for confounding factors, including monthly COVID-19 cases and deaths per population, state stay-at-home orders, average monthly movement as a measure of compliance with physical distancing recommendations, and average monthly temperature and precipitation.

Legal purchasers of handguns with a prior DUI conviction have a greater risk of a future arrest for a violent offense -- including murder, rape, robbery, and aggravated assault and for firearm-related violent crimes.

“Alcohol use is a well-established risk factor for firearm violence,” said Rose Kagawa, assistant professor of emergency medicine and first author of the VPRP study. “Our study suggests that handgun purchasers with a DUI conviction on their record at the time of purchase have a higher incidence of future violence and crime compared to purchasers without DUI convictions.”