Indianapolis Washington Square Mall shooting shooter
Courtesy Indianapolis Police

I gathered some more examples [of armed citizens stopping mass shootings] from over the years here, and then followed up with data based on FBI reports of mass shootings in 2016 and 2017: legal civilian gun carriers tried to intervene in 6 out of 50 incidents, and apparently succeeded in 3 or 4 of them.

The FBI also has 2021 data (I don’t expect the 2022 data until later this year). That reports 61 “active shooter” incidents, of which 12 were treated as “mass killing” incidents, and 4 of those active shooter incidents led to “shooters [being] killed by citizen,” all apparently involve gun-wielding citizens (PDF p. 4, 11-12). Two more incidents involved citizens detaining a shooter without using guns themselves. Some of the incidents I discussed in my earlier posts involved gun-wielding citizens stopping a shooter without killing him, but none seem to have occurred that way in 2021.

A few thoughts, which I’d mentioned before, but which I thought I’d repeat:

[1.] Unsurprisingly, sometimes the good guy (or, in the West Virginia incident, gal) with a gun succeeds and sometimes not. Sometimes the success might be a lucky break; sometimes a lucky break for the defender might have ended the incident more quickly. And it’s impossible to tell for sure how many lives, if any, were saved in the aggregate, because that’s generally a counterfactual. Still, the aggregate pattern seems to be that armed civilian self-defense takes place in a significant fraction of active shooter incidents.

[2.] None of this proves that broad concealed carry rights on balance do more good than harm (or vice versa). But it is a response to claims that I’ve heard that the good guy with a gun never helps; these incidents further show that there are potential pluses to broad concealed carry rights, and of course there are potential minuses as well.

[3.] Some shootings are in places where concealed carry is not allowed, such as on school premises or in jurisdictions where concealed carry licenses are often hard to get. … But it’s possible that there would have been more defensive uses of guns in some cases if people were legally allowed to have their guns there.

[4.] Finally, always keep in mind that public shooting situations should not be the main focus in the gun debate, whether for gun control or gun decontrol: Active-shooter mass shootings on average account for less than 1% of the U.S. homicide rate and are unusually hard to stop through gun control laws (since the killer is bent on committing a publicly visible murder and is thus unlikely to be much deterred by gun control law, or by the prospect of encountering an armed bystander). Likewise, shootings at malls when they’re open, whether they involve an active shooter or a fight that leads to a shooting and then the shooter running with possibly ambiguous intentions, are quite rare. But people talk about such public shootings a lot, so I thought I’d offer a perspective on them for those who are interested.

— Eugene Volokh in Private Gun Carriers’ Self-Defense Against Public Shooters

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

47 COMMENTS

  1. Guaranteed troll magnet article should be fun. Also good to see the beginnings of reliable data being compiled on this subject.

    • The “worst” day of armed criminals killing the innocents in the USA, pale PALE PALE in comparison to the “best” day under a MAO, STALIN, CASTRO, DING DONG DUNG, or even dare I say, a H-I-T-L-E-R.
      =
      The number of those killed by armed criminals in a year, match those who were killed under the kindness of a disarmed nation invaded by EVIL, said EVIL killing most in sight.
      =
      The USA, created by armed Citizens seeking liberty.
      =
      =

    • Not the real Dacian. We have a “fakey Dacey” who enjoys posting the occasional contrarian comment that’s opposite of what “troll Dacian” posts. Fake D usually makes sense and keeps it concise, while Troll D pounds on his keyboard in his grandma’s basement and is always TL;DR.

      A real treat would be a back-and-forth between the two…

      • Montana Actual,

        Yeah, like that is some major goal to aim for. My dog is smarter than dacian the demented (and my dog it dumb – sweet, but dumb. Too bad dacian isn’t at least sweet; he could be almost as useful as my dog.)

  4. How many “mass shootings” has the FBI stopped?

    Probably the same amount of skyjackings that the Federal Air Marshal Service (FAMS) have?

  5. “Active-shooter mass shootings on average account for less than 1% of the U.S. homicide rate”

    Doesn’t matter; mass shootings (as defined by whoever) happen in places where nice people congregate. Thus the fear that a nice person, in a nice place is likely to be shot by a legal gun owner who snaps and starts shooting everyone in sight.

    Mass shootings in areas where gangs and criminals abound are of no concern, because nice people don’t congregate there. Not to mention that media coverage of mass shootings in bad places is near zero.

    Quietly underlying all the anti-gun agitprop is the certainty that if there are no guns available, there can be no crimes, no deaths, due to the presence of a firearm (no, inner city shootings are not part of that equation).

    Now on a related un-related note: No one can ever determine how many violations of law are prevented either by the presence of a law, or the presence of signage declaring some act illegal/prohibited. Such conclusion is utterly impossible to demonstrate, much less prove. We can only loosely determine the number of violations that occur.

    • “…mass shootings (as defined by whoever)…”

      The GVR defines a “mass shooting” as a single shooter causing at least four innocent casualties. The MSM defines it as anything they want in the moment to support their narrative.

      • “The MSM defines it as anything they want in the moment to support their narrative.”

        Precisely.

        A few years back, city govt and media in Shytown got caught claiming a mass school shooting due to a gang incident, late at night, on a school yard.

    • Sam I Am: “No one can ever determine how many violations of law are prevented either by the presence of a law…”

      Are you seriously talking about violations of a non-existant law? *chuckle*

      • “Are you seriously talking about violations of a non-existant law? *chuckle*”

        Not quite understanding the question. Can you elaborate?

  6. 1. Active-shooter mass shootings on average account for less than 1% of the U.S. homicide rate. But when looked at in terms of serious injury OR death AND overall violent crime that are not mass shootings which results in serious injury or death, active-shooter mass shootings account for less than 0.005% of serious injury or death.

    2. The baseline overall odds of a law abiding armed ordinary citizen being present when an ‘active-shooter mass shooting’ happens is ~ 1 in 135,000 (varies a little state to state, increases exponentially in Blue states). Primarily, these odds are because of the restrictions placed on law abiding armed ordinary citizen, the random nature of the incident, and gun free zones.

    3. The definitions used by the FBI and anti-gun are exclusive and not inclusive, and both ‘purpose define’ for the desired result in their accounting. For example, the anti-gun overall define in selection and methodology that a law abiding armed ordinary citizen does not stop a mass shooting unless they actually shoot (hit) the attacker, the FBI uses the same basic selection and methodology. However, the definition of ‘stop’ includes…

    “stop
    [stäp]
    VERB

    *(of an event, action, or process) come to an end; cease to happen

    *cause (an action, process, or event) to come to an end

    NOUN

    a cessation of movement or operation”

    “Stop” applies to action or progress or to what is operating or progressing and may imply suddenness or definiteness.

    may imply … definiteness – and it is upon that word ‘definiteness’ the FBI and anti-gun hang their defining ‘selection and methodology’ thus their concepts that a law abiding armed ordinary citizen does not stop a mass shooting unless they actually shoot (hit) the attacker. This is why their figures are always lower than what really happens. Then they also simply exclude sometimes even if it does meet their defining ‘selection and methodology’.

    Not all law abiding armed ordinary citizens engaging a mass shooter actually shoot (hit) the attacker. Some fire and miss and some brandish and are prepared and present the hard target opposition the mass shooter does not want to encounter. These actions also stopped the mass shooting because in response the attacker either left the area or committed suicide on scene and this has happened many times over the years yet the media, FBI, anti-gun, do not acknowledge them as stopping mass shootings.

    For example, the anti-gun backed Texas study. By clever and careful tricks with ‘defining’ and cherry-picking, the Texas study turned 53.3% (231) of their 433 active shooter attacks stopped by ordinary armed citizens into only 12 of them (2.77%) stopped by ordinary armed citizens. But when the actual data behind the study is looked at in detail what we actually find is this:

    (note: in the below ordinary armed citizens mentioned employed DGU to stop the mass shooters, and that includes brandishing as well)

    In 185 of the 249 that ended before police arrived 133 of that 185 left the scene before police arrived and 72 committed suicide. The study does not tell you that of the 113 that left 108 of those left because an ordinary citizen (not security or law enforcement) with a gun brandished their firearm and repelled the attacker thus stopped the active shooter without firing a shot. This study also does not tell you that of the 72 that committed suicide 68 did so either while under fire by a citizen with a gun and they could not escape or keep firing being suppressed by the citizen weapons fire but were not hit by the citizen weapons fire or the citizen brandished and the active shooter simply stopped firing and killed their selves when seeing the citizen brandish.

    some math: 185 – 72 = 113 attackers left to subdue but they departed the scene before being subdued and before police arrived …. so 249 – 72 – 113 = 64 attackers left to subdue on scene.

    This 64 is interesting because you will notice it includes two categories of defenders as if there are those with firearms and those without – those that shot the attacker (22) and those that subdued by physical force (42). Of those defenders that shot 12 were citizens, 7 were security guards, 3 were off duty officers. Its interesting because it does not mention that of those subdued by physical force that the shooter was stopped first in 18 of them by a citizen (not security or law enforcement) brandishing a gun but not firing but the attacker stopped firing when confronted by that armed citizen then the attacker was able to be subdued by physical force.

    The Texas study also, like anti-gun does and I noted above, only credits an armed citizen (not security or police) with stopping the active shooter if they actually shot (hit) the attacker.

    So about now dacian, and Miner49er (AKA Innocent Bystander) are furiously crunching numbers and they are going to say 231 is wrong, and dacian is going to start posting his false again

    Ok then something else the Texas study didn’t tell: Go back up some and note the number 108. This is an example of the bias in the Texas study. They don’t tell you that there were 25 of the 108 the left that came back to try again and were stopped a second time by ordinary armed citizens before police arrived. This is important, they left these 25 additional attacks out because the police had been called and they could not account for them being stopped a second before police arrived without giving credit to the ordinary armed citizens who stopped them. This was literally 25 separate mass shooing attacks, 25 stopped then the 25 began again and were stopped again. The math for the whole: 108 + 68 + 12 + 18 + 25 = 231 attacks (53.3%) stopped by ordinary armed citizens (not security or police).

    108 + 68 + 12 + 18 + 25 = 231 attacks stopped by ordinary armed citizens (not security or police) with a gun

    So, to make this shorter as I have posted the full analysis before elsewhere… So of the 433 attacks in the study, based upon that excluded by the Texas study cherry picking and ‘defining’, 231 (53.3%) of those Texas study attacks were stopped by an ordinary armed citizen (not security or police or other bystanders).

    anti-gun and the media crowed about how rare it is, mostly a myth they said, for an ordinary armed citizen to stop a mass shooting and used the Texas study to substantiate their claims. They used a bogus biased study, and lied to the public about it.

    • This is the EXACT same rant you posted two days ago.
      Just so you know that when you do that, nobody reads it.
      You came across as Dacian or Miner49er but actually stupider.
      We get it, you have a file saved to your computer.
      Take your ADHD meds. 1+1= STFU

      • Then don’t read it.

        My post is on point for and in context with the article and this is a comments section for the article. Maybe you should look up what the concept of “on point for and in context with the article” mean because your post has absolutely zero point or context in relation to the article, and is a rant containing falsehood.

        • Yes it does because Grace Stevens keeps finding articles about mass shootings. Every 3 days or so she posts one. Then you post your dacainlike copy and paste file folder. Same shit, different day.

          Well the REAL dacian has now posted, now you can have an argument between two imbeciles or possibly morons. That has to better then the other day when you started arguing with yourself about your own math.

          I didn’t read it just like I don’t read dacians posts but I will read an exchange between you and dacian.

          It’s like when midgets fight, you have to watch it.

    • Thanks for posting this .40. That Texas study thing came up in a discussion I was having yesterday with someone on another site. I remember you doing the full analysis before but the search function here is horrible.

        • Hes talking about the full analysis he could not find with the search function. And apparently neither can you.

          What I, in reference to his statements, posted is only partial. He was asking about the full analysis which I did not post this time. He even says so with…

          “I remember you doing the full analysis before but the search function here is horrible.”

          Were you so blinded by your mock contrived rage that you missed the part where he wrote “full analysis”?

          So its not only me you want to accuse with your false claims. But now you go after someone calling him a “Schill”?

          In fact, my WHOLE POST to which you replied in your spit spewing delusional rant calling it “the EXACT same rant you posted two days ago” I had never posted before today.

          No matter, the post I made is still on point and in context with the article and you aren’t. If you don’t like to read what I post then don’t read it

        • You’re right Rodney L, quit being a SHILL.
          With all of the bullshit that .40 posted AGAIN and
          you have a problem with spelling?
          Why do I have a feeling that you and “John” are really Booger?
          “When Booger start doing math in a post it’s time to stop and move on”
          OMG he didn’t put an S on start and didn’t use punctuation but everybody did move on. Same shit, different day.

  7. Thanx for all that work.

    Unfortunately, none of it matters. All that matters is “guns:bad”. All that matters is “children shot”. All that matters is “guns:bad”. Orange Man:bad.

    What is curious is that school shootings seem to be isolated entirely to suburban areas, likely predominantly white majority student population. Seriously, has there been a study of why inner-city schools do not experience mass shootings?

    What seems to go unnoticed is the underlying demand that any solution legal gun owners pose must be 100% effective, in order to have credibility among the Leftists/Dims/Socialists/Statists/Authoritarians.

    • “How many of TTAGers open carry and believe they are stopping crime by doing it?”

      A serious question for you, Montana :

      How do you know for sure that some thug somewhere contemplating an attack or robbery of someone hasn’t been stopped by noticing someone nearby is open carrying?

  9. the armed citizens certainly have a better success rate than law enforcement. the Uvalde school shooting is a classic example. With the exception of off duty LEOs who were attempting to rescue their own children, the on duty cops cowered in the hallway outside the classroom door while they waited for the shooting to stop. in spite of having ballistic shields rated for 5.56mm, when the shooting resumed, they bravely ran away.

  10. “How many of TTAGers open carry and believe they are stopping crime by doing it?”

    Hhhhmmmm. Might want to rethink this one.

    An opposing question is “How many people, anywhere, believe that police openly carrying firearms are stopping crime?”

    Overall, it is impossible to know how many criminal acts are prevented by anything.

    I would be ashamed to open carry my Space Gun, but if I did, the purpose would be to make it more readily/easily accessible in an emergency. Preventing crime would never enter the decision.

  11. According to these numbers citizens with guns have ended a mass shooting only 3% of the time.

    https://mediabiasfactcheck.com/2018/03/03/fact-check-armed-citizens-equals-less-mass-shootings/

    It’s interesting to note that concealed carry causes more deaths than it saves because people either lose their tempers as in road rage or parking place murders or they become emboldened as in the George Zimmerman shooting of Martin or baby face Rittenhouse who antagonized people in a volatile situation . This is why most countries have outlawed concealed carry.

    • Using dacian’s standard, we can joyfully pass a law which revokes the legal status of ab0rtion if pregnant women only choose ab0rtions in 3% (or less) of pregnancies when ab0rtion was legal.

    • “…citizens with guns have ended a mass shooting only 3% of the time.”

      I’d say those at that 3% of mass shootings were quite pleased that an armed citizen kept them from being among the other 97%.

      You really are a very special kind of stupid, ‘dacian’… 🙂

    • “According to these numbers citizens with guns have ended a mass shooting only 3% of the time.”

      You bring up a valid point. There are not nearly enough police or armed citizens to cover everywhere lunatics congregate. Since a lot of the incidents take place where lawful carrying people are not allowed to carry, we should abolish these areas and allow the lawful carry of firearms. I think reasonable people can agree your point dictates we do more to thwart criminals.

      “It’s interesting to note that concealed carry causes more deaths than it saves because people either lose their tempers as in road rage or parking place murders or they become emboldened as in the George Zimmerman shooting of Martin or baby face Rittenhouse who antagonized people in a volatile situation . This is why most countries have outlawed concealed carry.”

      You do realize that juries returned not guilty verdicts on these two individuals? You must not have seen the same evidence as the rest of us. Go back to each trial and the expert testimony of the facts and not push the fictional narrative. You may be interested in what Rittenhouse said before your friends attacked him.

    • Lil d head
      the saying if it saves one life it’s worth it.
      thanks for backing that up you even supplied supporting evidence

  13. Thank you for giving me another source, of firearm self-defense of others, in the public places.
    Keep calm and carry guns.

  14. I don’t give a damn if the good guy with a gun is a myth. The 2nd amendment is short and easy to understand. Just exactly what is so hard to understand about the clause,” The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”?

    • “I don’t give a damn if the good guy with a gun is a myth.”

      The myth meme is designed to make the conversation about utility, usefulness, need. The hidden line is that a utility, need, necessity can be regulated with simple regulation, which is manifest as “majority rule”.

      Anti-liberty/freedom types get really cranky when you pose that if firearms are subject to majority rule, then so is slavery.

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