Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/07pdf/07-290.pdf
Page Number: 132

Cite as:  554 U. S. ____ (2008) 

19 

BREYER, J., dissenting 

www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/fuo.pdf;  see  also  Weapon 
Use  and  Violent  Crime  2  (Table  2)  (statistics  indicating 
that handguns were used in over 84% of nonlethal violent 
crimes involving firearms from 1993 to 2001).  And hand-
guns  are  not  only  popular  tools  for  crime,  but  popular
objects  of  it  as  well:  the  FBI  received  on  average  over 
274,000 reports of stolen guns for each year between 1985
and  1994,  and  almost  60%  of  stolen  guns  are  handguns. 
Dept.  of  Justice,  Bureau  of  Justice  Statistics,  M.  Zawitz, 
Guns  Used  in  Crime,  p.  3  (July  1995),  online  at 
http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/guic.pdf.  Department 
of Justice studies have concluded that stolen handguns in
particular  are  an  important  source  of  weapons  for  both
adult and juvenile offenders.  Ibid. 

Statistics further suggest that urban areas, such as the
District,  have  different  experiences  with  gun-related
death,  injury,  and  crime,  than  do  less  densely  populated 
rural  areas.  A  disproportionate  amount  of  violent  and 
property crimes occur in urban areas, and urban criminals 
are  more  likely  than  other  offenders  to  use  a  firearm 
during  the  commission  of  a  violent  crime.  See  Dept.  of
Justice,  Bureau  of  Justice  Statistics,  D.  Duhart,  Urban, 
Suburban, and Rural Victimization, 1993–98, pp. 1, 9 (Oct.
2000),  online  at  http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/pub/pdf/ 
usrv98.pdf.  Homicide appears to be a much greater issue 
in urban areas; from 1985 to 1993, for example, “half of all 
homicides  occurred  in  63  cities  with  16%  of  the  nation’s 
population.”  Wintemute, The Future of Firearm Violence 
Prevention,  282  JAMA  475  (1999).    One  study  concluded
that although the overall rate of gun death between 1989 
and 1999 was roughly the same in urban than rural areas,
the  urban  homicide  rate  was  three  times  as  high;  even 
after  adjusting  for  other  variables,  it  was  still  twice  as
high.  Branas,  Nance,  Elliott,  Richmond,  &  Schwab,  Ur-
ban-Rural Shifts in Intentional Firearm Death, 94 Am. J. 
Public Health 1750, 1752 (2004); see also ibid. (noting that