It's nice to think that there are clear answers to the heart-wrenching tragedies that befall small children. In Lansing, Democratic lawmakers waited all of 48 hours after Kayla was killed to excoriate their Republican colleagues for failing to act on a trigger-lock bill that had been pending in the Michigan House since last fall. The bill has since stalled. But the hard, scientific evidence that trigger locks prevent gun violence is scanty, sometimes misinterpreted and often irrelevant to the public-policy debate. It also sheds no light on the larger question of what has caused the dramatic overall reduction in some kinds of U.S. gun violence in recent years.
Some evidence does exist, however.
The CAP laws provide criminal penalties for gun owners who fail to use trigger locks or otherwise adequately restrict access to their firearms by children. Using the 23 percent figure, the researchers estimated that the lives of 39 children were spared in the CAP law states. In states without the laws, it was estimated that 216 children who died could have been saved. Since then, the JAMA report has been cited dozens of times as support for proposed gun restrictions, especially trigger locks. Baird acknowledged that the adults in the shooter's home, alleged drug users in possession of a stolen gun, were not good candidates for safe storage.