DOI: 10.3886/icpsr38191.v1
title: The Epidemiology of Crime Guns: From Legal Sale to Use in Crime, Louisiana and Maryland, 2010-2016
title: Version 1

description: The International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP), collaborating with research partners, conducted a 48-month, two-phase research initiative to enhance their understanding of how firearms move from legal purchase to involvement with a crime. Phase 1 used trace data from Chicago, New Orleans, and Prince Georges County, MD to establish the path of firearms from purchase to usage in a crime. Interviews of the first legal purchaser and incarcerated inmates who committed a crime of violence in New Orleans and Prince Georges County were conducted to seek an understanding of how firearms enter the unregulated market. Phase 2 examined the use of the Group Violence Reduction Strategy (GVRS) in New Orleans as a strategy to reduce gang and gun-related homicides. Overall violence patterns in New Orleans were examined from 2010-2016.
description: To understand regulated and unregulated gun markets, how guns move from the former to the latter, and how law enforcement can limit access to guns by those who will use them to commit a crime.
description: This study consisted of two phases: Phase 1 was an analysis of trace data from three jurisdictions (Chicago, New Orleans, Prince Georges County, MD) to establish the path from legal purchase of a gun to use in a crime. Interviews were also conducted of inmates then incarcerated for violent crimes involving a firearm to hypothesize how one would obtain a firearm; and of first legal purchasers who were not offenders. Phase 2 was an examination of the impact of the Group Violence Reduction Strategy in New Orleans, a deterrence framework to reduce gang and gun-related homicides, which was implemented in 2012. Violence patterns from 2010-2016 were looked at to encompass the the beginning and end of GVRS.
description: Dataset 1: interview questions related to the hypothetical obtainment of a firearm in Prince Georges County, MD and New Orleans under various circumstances. Dataset 2: gun descriptors, location of purchase, owner contact and outcomes, date purchased, recovery date after a crime, how gun was separated from successive owners, how offender acquired the gun, and dealer/seller demographics. Datasets 3 and 4: month and year of crime, victim demographics, neighborhood and police district where crime occurred, various types of crime counts, and homicide case motive description in New Orleans. Dataset 5: GIS shapefiles projected into the NAD83_Louisiana_South_ftUS projection system and re-geocoded to the nearest street centerline centroid for public release.
description: Not applicable.
description: Response Rates: Not available.
description: Presence of Common Scales: None.
description: Datasets: DS0: Study-Level Files DS1: Deidentified Inmate Surveys Restricted-Use Data DS2: Deidentified Gun Tracking Restricted-Use Data DS3: New Orleans Monthly Crime Counts Restricted-Use Data DS4: New Orleans Homicides Restricted-Use Data DS5: New Orleans Hot Spot Stability Restricted-Use Data
description: Violent crimes committed with firearms in Chicago, New Orleans, and Prince Georges County, MD. Smallest Geographic Unit: City
description: record abstracts; face-to-face interview; mixed modeThe International Association of Chiefs of Police commissioned two research teams under award funds for this study, resulting in two NIJ final reports.