​Defensive Gun Use Frequency

I’m not interested in being political. I am interested in truth and reality. I am firmly convinced that neither truth nor reality are portrayed in the media, except by accident. I have tried to teach my family to look critically at what they hear and see in their various information sources.

With that being said, let’s look at what a defensive gun use, it is likely the first thought that comes to mind is shooting someone in self-defense. While that is definitely a defensive gun use it isn’t the only kind. It is possible that a threat can be dissuaded by merely announcing the possession of a gun. It is also possible that the treat is mitigated by drawing the firearm without pointing it at the threat. Pointing your firearm at the threat does require pressing the trigger, but will be a strong motivator to disengage the attack.

As you can see there is a spectrum of possible responses to a threat that does not include discharging and injuring or killing the threat. Unfortunately, the defensive gun use we hear about in the various media sources are narrowed down to someone using a gun and shooting an attacker.  It gets more coverage when the attempt to stop the attacker results in an innocent bystander getting injured or killed.

The media doesn’t cover the many times a crime in progress is terminated or a crime prevented altogether. This might be to avoid weakening their agenda. But that is not the only reason we don’t hear about them.

The biggest reason is that when the mere presence of a firearm prevents a crime, such as a mugging, the victim usually doesn’t report it to law enforcement. This might be due to a very miniscule possibility that the crime would be investigated and even smaller possibility the perpetrator would be prosecuted. It is more likely the potential victim is relieved to have survived the encounter and goes on with their intended activity.

How do we know how many times an armed citizen protects themselves? One type of source are the various gun magazines such as Concealed Carry, from the USCCA, or Shooting Illustrated by the NRA to name two. These magazines have a feature that lists times an armed citizen defends themselves. If one does the math, the 12 or so listed in the July Concealed Carry could equate to 144 times reported by that one magazine alone. The June Shooting Illustrated lists only 7. If that is consistent then we could add another 84 times giving a total reported through those two magazines as 228 times

These are only two sources, and my math may not be correct since I took a snapshot of two issues. There are more firearms magazines being distributed. Those are the two I get. With just those two sources there are more than 200 times a year that guns are used in self defense.

What is the real number? How many times are guns used in self defense? On 10 December 2020, the American Journal of Criminal Justice published an article: What Do CDC’s Surveys Say About the Prevalence of Defensive Gun Use?  (https://doi.org/10.1007/s12103-020-09562-0)
 
The plurality of survey indicates the CDC did many surveys, 21 to be exact. The surveys were taken over a three-year period from 1996 – 1998. The raw numbers were weighted to adjust the sample population numbers to reflect total population of gun owners. I am not a statistician and cannot explain or defend their numbers. Like you, I am accepting them at face value.
 
Here is where it gets interesting. We are starting with the idea that the numbers reported by the two referenced magazines were in the neighborhood of 220 times a year. The CDC numbers are significantly higher. To quote the report “There is currently no feasible way to measure the prevalence of DGU other than with surveys. Certainly police data cannot provide meaningful estimates given the unwillingness of most crime victims to even report their victimizations to the police (Hart & Rennison, 2003), never mind the controversial fact that they had threatened or attacked another person with a firearm during the crime event.”
 
Surveys rely upon accurate reporting by the participants. As such the skeptic can dismiss the results altogether. I know if my primary care physician asks me if I have firearms in my home, he will get a ‘none of your business’ answer or an evocation of my 5th amendment rights. Let’s get to the CDC numbers now.  
 
- 1996 the weighted total cases were 5,336,378
- 1997 the weighted total cases were 5,835,973
- 1998 the weighted total cases were 5,869,842
 
That is an average of 5.6 million times a year that a gun owner is reporting using a firearm in self-defense! Since those surveys were taken there has been an explosion of new gun purchases. In 2000 there were 8 million NICS checks. They peaked at 39 million in 2020 and dropped to 31 million in 2022. There were more than 22 million concealed carry permit holders by August of 2023. It is reasonable to believe the number of defensive gun uses have gone up also. However, violent crime has dropped over the period between 2000 and 2019. We must keep in mind that the crimes numbers don’t include those instances where a crime was stopped or prevented, but not reported.
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I have heard a range of 500,00 to 3,000,000 quoted. We know that it is difficult to know the real number for the many factors already mentioned. That does not dismiss the reality that firearms are used many more times to stop a crime and save a life than they are to take a life.