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Annually, Dr. John Lott at the Crime Research Prevention Center gives a report on updated statistics concerning so-called “mass shootings.” The data set that Lott used are statistics from 1998 to 2023. The FBI aggregates this information and annually releases it as the Uniform Crime Report. While getting to the bottom of the numbers is sometimes difficult, that’s because there are so-called “news sources” reporting on alleged mass shootings that do not fit the accepted definition by the government. On January 12, Lott released his findings.

When another shooting happens at a place such as a school or a mall, politicians and the media are apt to claim that many hundreds of mass shootings occur each year. “Over the last year since Uvalde, our country has experienced a staggering 650 mass shootings,” President Joe Biden claimed last year. After a shooting in Lewiston, Maine in late October, CNN said that there had already been “586 mass shootings” that year.

These statements give an incorrect impression that there are massacres every day, like the infamous 2022 Uvalde shooting, which claimed the lives of nineteen students and two teachers, or the one in Lewiston, which claimed eighteen lives. 

The numbers cited by Biden and CNN come from the Gun Violence Archive, which broadly defines mass shootings to include any case with four or more people shot or injured. The injuries could occur in the course of running away, and not from actually being shot. However, the GVA has also included cases with only three injured people (e.g., a July 22, 2023 attack at a residence at 10700 Rosehaven Dr, Houston, Texas.

Lott observed the same thing that several of our colleagues have observed, that the use of Gun Violence Archive’s data is not consistent with what’s the standard. Lott noted, “Traditionally, the FBI has classified ‘mass’ as four or more people being murdered. Academic studies have used a similar definition.”

One of the other problems with the data from GVA is that the information collected is based on news reports rather than police reports. Better yet, the FBI aggregates all the data from the law enforcement side of things and at this time we can look at those numbers to have some trustworthiness. We should not be leaning on conjecture through news reports.

Some high points in Lott’s report involve the statistics on demographics concerning those with veteran status or who have formerly sought mental health help. “From January 1st, 1998, to October 25th, 2023, 51% of mass murderers have seen mental health care professionals before their attacks.” The report noted. “In 2022, about 6% of the US were veterans, but almost 20% of mass public shooters were veterans.”

Other areas of interest involved the race of both perpetrators and victims in these events. Overwhelmingly, by the percentages, the majority of instances for both victims and perpetrators involved white individuals. 3.9% of all the shooters were female, the rest male.

The percentage of victims and shooters who are white are at the national average of the population, with only a deviation of +/- a percent in either instance. Whereas the report noted that “blacks are underrepresented as a share of the victims. Blacks comprise 16.7% of the murderers but only 9.9% of the victims. That 9.9% is less than their 13.6% of the general population.”

Most damaging of all to the anti-liberty movement are some of the final numbers that Lott’s report brought up. “Eighty-two percent of the attacks since 1998 and 94 percent since 1950 have occurred in places where guns are banned. For those who read these murderers’ diaries or manifestos, these numbers aren’t too surprising.”

The fact that disarmed persons make a better target does not get lost statically in California’s numbers. With The Golden State having some of the strictest gun laws in the Union, it also sees a higher number of mass shooting events than the national average, “Since 2000, California’s rate is 0.33 per million, and for the rest of the US, it was 0.25. Since 2010, California’s rate is 0.28 per million and 0.15 for the rest of the US. Since 2020, it has been 0.13 for California and 0.05 for the rest of the US.”

Lott’s look into these statistics is important work. If you get a chance, I’d recommend reading the whole thing in its entirety, as I’ve only scratched the surface. One of the takeaways here is that Lott continues to prove time and time again that more guns equals less crime. The number of mass shooting events in so-called “gun free zones” and the way California’s numbers look, it certainly does prove that being disarmed does not help. To read all of Lott’s findings, head over to the Crime Research Prevention Center and check out “Updated information on Mass Public Shootings from 1998 through October 2023.”

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

66 COMMENTS

  1. I sort of like using the Gun Violence Archive’s database. For example, it shows that assault weapons were used in about 6% of all mass shootings last year. And an assault weapon hasn’t been used in any mass shootings this year so far.

    • Mark you are (more or less) correct regarding that 6% figure but even that number is incorrect since by definition there is no such thing as an “assault weapon” which is a wholly made up term.

      • Anything long, black, and therefore frightening to left-wing men who are insanely jealous because they don’t have anything remotely like that in their pants! It’s pen-is envy by left-wing men.

      • If necessary my eight pound splitting maul makes a GREAT assault weapon. And it only cost me $53 delivered!! Never needs any ammunition, but I sure do have to eat a lot more when I am out “shooting” it.

        • I bet it’s got a fiberglass or plastic handle.
          For some reason that stuff makes your hands get sore?
          I guess it doesn’t have the give wood does.

        • A Cross pen works well as a single assault assault weapon. I just hate cleaning it after shoving it all the way up someone’s nose. Or through their eyeball. Pro tip: plastic pens don’t work as well, and there’s no point in cleaning them afterward.

  2. The GVA is as screwed up as a soup sandwich. Its full of stuff that are not actually the ‘mass shootings’ they claim, their numbers are falsely inflated by this. They have even been including cases where there were no guns fired, and they did that because they take information from media sources and the media sources were wrong. In at least 120 cases they included a victim count that didn’t actually exist because when some people ran away they fell and were injured in the fall but they counted them as ‘shooting victims’ to make their made-up magic number of four, and in half those no one got shot or wounded except the bad guy. Then they say they don’t count the perpetrator, but there are many cases where they do to make their number of ‘victims’ 4. The whole thing is full of BS like this.

  3. Lott does excellent work, but the one knock on this study is the use of the FBI statistics. I believe it has been shown time and again that, for one, not all police departments report, and secondly, that not all use the same reporting criteria, the net result of which is the some types of crime are underreported. I do not know is this applies to mass shooting events, but I have to wonder when we hear about all of the shootings at parties and bar closings in places such as Chicago.

    • This study is about mass public shootings, which the FBI defines as four or more people being murdered, within one event, and in one or more locations in close geographical proximity.

      Using that definition, what is the FBI missing?

      • I believe the FBI also filters out shooting that take place in conjunction with other criminal activity.

        • as they should. Such incidents are not primarily events where the perp is seeking a body count just to “make a statement”. This is a far different, and far more dangerous, motive then, say, robbing a grocery store or bank and using guns to try and take out resistance, or a bus hijacking because they want the bus.

          The FBI, for once, are being wise in distinguishing between deaths as collateral damage of other motives, and dead people as the end goal of the perps. These stats are meaningful.

        • Yes, I knew that. But it sounded like they were missing out elsewhere. I’ve never heard Lott say that, and if they were bad with their data, or leaving out significant events (it’s hard to suppress non-gang, 4+ murders in public), he’d mention it.

    • “I believe it has been shown time and again that, for one, not all police departments report,…”

      Most likely, for political reasons…

  4. “mass public shootings, which the FBI defines as four or more people being murdered“

    It’s a mass shooting only if they’re murdered?

    So you could have an incident with 100 people being shot and it would not qualify as a mass shooting, as long as none of them died?

    I’d say that metric was clearly flawed.

    • minor49iq…”So you could have an incident with 100 people being shot and it would not qualify as a mass shooting, as long as none of them died?”

      It would be an incident where 100 defenseless people were subjected to Gun Control and the perp was the worst shot in history.

    • You and dacian KNOW how to eliminate gun violence.

      By eliminating ALL gun owners, except for those in protected classes (Elites, alleged victims, etc).

  6. Over and again, “statistics” are useless in moving the needle on protecting the Second Amendment. The opposition never moves from “if it saves only one”. Lotts statistics are interesting from a data perspective, but not persuasive to the ant-gun mob.

    About GFZs: such declarations/signs would actually be effective if people obeyed the signs, QED. People refusing to obey laws (uuhhmmm, like, people with guns) is at the core of all the carnage. With such widespread ownership, the body count proves no one needs a gun, because they will likely misuse it.

    If an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure, it is a no-brainer that removing guns from non-criminals will prevent 93million gun deaths, per year. Better we create a society where criminals shoot and kill each other at rate higher than the replacement rate of the population. Actively disarming criminals would lead to more police deaths and injuries, so that is out. Can’t we just all get along?

      • “FckU ESAD, Sam I Am.”

        I’m a bit surprised at two things: I actually understood your comment; I actually slipped one past you.

        • I *suspect* a nip of ‘Marsupial Moonshine’ may be the cause of that particular outburst… 🙂

    • Lotts statistics are interesting from a data perspective, but not persuasive to the ant-gun mob

      but these stats are not intended to be for the anti-gun mob… think it through. I kniw that’s tough for you, but try……

  7. Researcher John Lott falsely claims that two-thirds of peer-reviewed literature shows concealed carry laws reduce crime.
    Lott’s false claim relies on obsolete work and studies in which right-to-carry (RTC) laws are not the variables of interest.
    Most studies with a national scope published since 2005 find that RTC laws increase crime, particularly aggravated assaults. In short, more guns in public means more crime.

    https://www.gvpedia.org/gun-myths/more-guns-mean-less-crime/

    The problem with John lot is that he is dishonest.

    He uses fraudulent accounts to post bogus reviews in support of his so-called ‘scholarly reports’.

    He’s the George Santos/Anthony Delawder of gun research.

    “Scholar Invents Fan To Answer His Critics
    By Richard Morin
    February 1, 2003
    Mary Rosh thinks the world of John R. Lott Jr., the controversial American Enterprise Institute scholar whose book “More Guns, Less Crime” caused such a stir a few years ago.

    In postings on Web sites in this country and abroad, Rosh has tirelessly defended Lott against his harshest critics. He is a meticulous researcher, she’s repeatedly told those who say otherwise. He’s not driven by the ideology of the left or the right. Rosh has even summoned memories of the classes she took from Lott a decade ago to illustrate Lott’s probity and academic gifts.

    “I have to say that he was the best professor I ever had,” Rosh gushed in one Internet posting.

    Indeed, Mary Rosh and John Lott agree about nearly everything.

    Well they should, because Mary Rosh is John Lott — or at least that’s the pseudonym he’s used for three years to defend himself against his critics in online debates, Lott acknowledged this week.

    “I probably shouldn’t have done it — I know I shouldn’t have done it — but it’s hard to think of any big advantage I got except to be able to comment fictitiously,” said Lott, an economist who has held senior research positions at the University of Chicago and Yale.

    Moreover, the AEI resident scholar acknowledged on Friday that he permitted his 13-year-old son to write an effusive review of “More Guns, Less Crime” and then post it on the Amazon.com Web site. It was signed “Maryrosh.”

    Lott said that he frequently has used the name “Mary Rosh” to defend himself in online debates. The name is an amalgam of the first two letters of his four sons’ first names. In a posting to the Web site maintained by Tim Lambert, an Australian professor who has relentlessly attacked Lott’s guns studies, “Mary Rosh” claims to be a former student of Lott at the University of Pennsylvania, where the economist taught between 1991 and 1995.“

    When a reporter attempted to read the posting to him over the telephone, Lott stopped him after the first few words. “I’m sure I did that. I shouldn’t have done it.”

    Julian Sanchez, a Cato Institute staffer, is the cybersleuth who tracked Mary Rosh back to John Lott.

    “I compared that IP with the header of an email Dr. Lott had sent me from his home address. And by yet another astonishing coincidence, it had originated at the very same IP address. Now, what are the odds of that?” he wrote in a posting on his Web site. “Sarcasm aside, we’re a little old to be playing dress up, aren’t we Dr. Lott?”

    Lott said he initially used his own name in online debates with critics. “But you just get into really emotional things with people. You also run into other problems.” So he started using the name Mary Rosh. “I should not have done it, there is no doubt. But it was a way to get information into the debate.”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/2003/02/01/scholar-invents-fan-to-answer-his-critics/f3ae3f46-68d6-4eee-a65e-1775d45e2133/

    • “He uses fraudulent accounts to post bogus reviews in support of his so-called ‘scholarly reports’.”

      Yet you take the Gun Violence Archive stats to be the gospel, along with the other anti-Freedom media and groups

      Why can you use faulty stats but you complain about others? Are you and them somehow special?

    • I see that Dacien’s garbage posts have finally made it out of moderation.

      Too bad that they didn’t find their way directly into the trash bin.

  9. Now, that’s good reading. There’s a reason I keep reading TTTTTTTAG – you provide me with good links.

    Nothing new or exciting in those stats. I’m embarrassed at the high percentage of veterans. Liberals and progressives should be embarrassed at the high number of trans. We should ALL be embarrassed at the number crazies, of whatever variety. WTF can’t crazies be identified, and placed on the prohibited persons lists? We have no problem identifying felons. In many cases, crazies are far more dangerous than felons!

    Hippocratic oaths and HIPAA requirements should all be set aside when a person poses a threat to public health and safety. Once again, I call on the head doctors and law makers to create the means for shrinks to call the law when a nutcase gets too nutty.

    • Yes it is sad there are so many veterans on this list. I am convinced this is because of the rotten care they (don’t) get through the VA, the FedGov agency tasked with.. taking care of their medical needs during and after service. I can think right off of four cases.. the recent one in Maine, the Sutherland springs Church massacre, Fort Hood One and Two. In all four, they were known to be problematic…. and not dealt with adequately. At least two of them SHOULD have been prohibited persons but got arms anyway. ALL of thm were “on the radar” of some agencies that SHOULD have stepped up and taken action but did not.
      The VA desparatey needs a reorganisation. Maybe if we manage to get a rEAL president net fall something MIGHT happen.. someday.

      • Same conclusion. The poor to non-existent service from the VA which has evolved into a self-serving bureaucracy.

    • “WTF can’t crazies be identified, and placed on the prohibited persons lists?”

      Because, Paul, from *their* point-of-view, we are the nutjobs brainwashed by guns and religion.

      Meaning, they can exploit it against us…

    • “I’m embarrassed at the high percentage of veterans.”

      Because veterans have a higher incidence of mental illness than the general population.
      And most mass shooters have some form of mental illness, as we’ve discussed ad nauseum.

      In 2020, 29.97% of Veterans who received care through VHA had a confirmed mental health diagnosis and an additional 37% had a possible mental illness recorded in their health records. — https://www.mentalhealth.va.gov/suicide_prevention/docs/FSTP-Ways-Veterans-Differ-from-the-General-Population.pdf

  10. quote——————With The Golden State having some of the strictest gun laws in the Union, it also sees a higher number of mass shooting events than the national average———-quote

    Far Right Propaganda at its most obscene and pandered to the unwashed bib overalls crowd.

    In reality thousands of second hand guns are shipped into “California” every day because Capitalvania does not have Universal Background Checks making Capitalvania a heaven on earth for Gun Runners who run guns into states that have tough gun laws rendering those laws completely useless. “Two Chicago studies” proved the average crime gun was 13 years old and had been through many hands before being shipped in from other Redneck States having lax gun laws into Chicago proving how insane it is not to vet all second hand gun purchases.

  11. Massacre
    Mass acre
    Massacres = One or more acres of dead.
    The rest are just shutezings
    It all got screwed up on Valentine’s day.

  12. Does anyone have a good reference/web address/link to a reliable source claiming GVA includes any shooting event within line of sight of a school?.

    Thanx.

      • Hey, MajorLiar!!

        Yeah, it WAS a good one . . . because we actually care about the quality of our data. You understand sweet f*ck all about statistics, the mechanics of surveys, or data analysis. I mean . . . citing VOX, Slate, Mother Jones, the NYT, and WaPo??? SERIOUSLY????

        But you don’t actually give a sh*t about the QUALITY of the data; your only concern is whether it supports your narrative. You wouldn’t recognize reliable experimental/survey data if it fell out of the sky, landed on your face, and started to wiggle. ALL you care about is “Does it comport with my predetermined ‘conclusions’, and DOES IT SUPPORT THE NARRATIVE??”

        At least from the outside, being a Leftist/fascist seems very simple (as are most Leftist/fascists) – glom onto every Leftist talking point, IF you are motivated to go beyond the talking points, go find some reliable Leftist/fascist source, and cite some bullsh*t “study” or “survey” (that has zero scientific rigor) . . . lather, rinse, repeat.

  13. Whatever confirms a persons bias is what they believe.

    This used to be the realm of children and their fantasies but now it applies to everyone at all levels of society.

    • “This used to be the realm of children and their fantasies but now it applies” to Trump voters.

      • Miner, what is the difference between a capitalist fairy tale and a s0c-ialist fairly tale?

        The capitalist fairy tale starts with “Once upon a time…”.

        The s0c-ialist fairy tale starts with “One day there will be…”

        • MajorLiar,

          Not true, but . . . you STARTED there, and have only gotten worse.

          Tell me again how Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution authorizes universal gun control, you complete imbecile.

  14. Gangs make up most shootings and mental illness covers most others! Guns save thousands every year! If they kept the criminals in jail instead of letting them post or in some godforsaken dem city’s no bail, aka shitholes! What do they expect?

  15. The only good thing about the Gun Violence Archive is that once you see its data cited in a story, you can stop reading. The article is a work of fiction

  16. “I *suspect* a nip of ‘Marsupial Moonshine’ may be the cause of that particular outburst… 🙂”

    Perhaps he ran out of the good stuff, and had to revert to beer. I have experience with that condition.

  17. “Crime Research Prevention Center” – I thought I had developed dyslexia!

    Doesn’t TTAG have an editor anymore? The same error was made twice and the 2nd was a link to the page with the correct name.

    I don’t think John is trying to prevent crime research.

      • You need to be more careful when you’re cross-dressing, Liar — maybe use a full-length mirror before you go out in public. That would cut down on your embarrassing “wardrobe malfunctions.”

        Now if you could figure out a way to cut down on your embarrassing mental malfunctions …

        • That would cut down on your embarrassing “wardrobe malfunctions.”

          Such as the “Jatz cracker” slipping out of the costume?

  18. Lachesis. Viperdea
    I read somewhere a Bushmaster killed 12 oxen and and two headers at a river crossing.
    That’s one bada$$ snake.

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