Gun violence is fast overtaking automobile accidents as the leading cause of death and injury in the United States. In the year after the Columbine High School tragedy, Americans have issued strident calls for common-sense gun control legislation to protect themselves, their communities, and their families. Coloradans have held a particularly personal stake in the debate over gun violence, but despite clear popular mandates to take steps to prevent future tragedies, policymakers at the state and national levels have consistently rejected even modest efforts to require child safety precautions and improve criminal background check protections.

• The Violence Policy Center reports that on average in the US, at least one woman every day of the year was shot and killed by her husband or boyfriend during the course of an argument in 1996. (Glick, S. "When Men Murder Women: an analysis of 1996 homicide data." 1998)

Gun violence is specifically a women’s issue. As with other forms of violence, women, teens, and children are more often victims of firearm abuse than perpetrators. Domestic abuse, intimate acquaintance violence, accidental injury, and suicide attempts are many times more likely to escalate into fatal episodes when guns are present. As the primary caregivers of children and families, as well as for their own protection, mothers and women in general have made the establishment of common-sense gun control measures a national priority.

Leading Cause of Death and Injury

• The Centers for Disease Control recorded 536 gun-related deaths in Colorado for 1996. According to the National Center for Health Statistics, 465 people in Colorado died in gun-related incidents in 1997. FBI crime statistics show that in 1998, 102 people were murdered with handguns, 499 people were robbed at gunpoint, and 679 people were assaulted with guns in our state.
• According to the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence, the risk of homicide in the home is three times greater and the risk of suicide is five times greater in households with guns.
• A 1998 study in the New England Journal of Medicine found that guns kept in the home for self-protection are 22 times more likely to kill someone known to the owner than to kill in self-defense.
• The Center to Prevent Handgun Violence reports that a gun is used for protection in fewer than two percent of home invasion crimes when someone is at home.
• FBI statistics from 1996 recorded only 176 justifiable handgun homicides (i.e., committed in self-defense or by police) compared with a total of 9,390 handgun murders in the United States.

Children and Firearm Abuse

• There are over 200 million guns in America. A recent study by Peter Hart Research on behalf of the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence found that there are guns in 43% of US households with children.
• In 1997 --the most recent year for which the Center for Disease Control has produced national injury mortality statistics-- 4,205 children and teens were killed by gunfire. That averages out to one child’s death every two hours, or nearly 12 every day. For every child killed with a gun, four were wounded.
• Child Access Prevention laws have been passed by 17 states. These states hold gun owners criminally liable if children access their loaded weapons to hurt themselves or someone else. The Center to Prevent Handgun Violence found that in the states that had passed CAP laws by 1997, accidental deaths of children from firearms decreased 23% in the two years after the laws went into effect.
• The Center to Prevent Handgun Violence also found that in 1996, more than 1300 children aged 10-19 committed suicide with firearms. Unlike suicide attempts using other methods, suicide attempts with guns are nearly always fatal, so a temporarily depressed teenager will never get a second chance at life. Two-thirds of all completed teenaged suicides involve a firearm.

Policy Recommendations

1. Strengthen background checks and close the "gun show loophole" that currently enables purchasers to avoid criminal background checks when buying from unlicensed dealers.
2. Require licensing of all gun dealers.
3. Require gun manufacturers to provide safety measures such as "smart gun" technology and trigger locks on all firearms sold in Colorado. Establish criminal penalties for gun owners whose failure to utilize these and other safety features results in injury or death.
4. Require registration and licensing of all firearms.
5. Establish criminal penalties for persons who knowingly provide guns to those who are not legally able to purchase them, including children and criminals.
6. Restrict the sale of high-capacity automatic weapons and handguns.
7. Resist attempts to loosen restrictions on carrying concealed weapons.
8. Increase funding for arrest and prosecution of offenders who violate existing gun laws.

Resources

SAFE Colorado – Bipartisan organization that lobbies and advocates for gun control in Colorado. Contact them at (303) 563-7233.

Bell Campaign for Freedom from Gun Violence – San Francisco-based organization devoted to education, support, and advocacy for national gun control policy. Web site provides extensive factsheets on a wide variety of topics related to gun violence. Contact them at (800) RINGING.

Handgun Control and the Center to Prevent Handgun Violence – Sister organizations devoted to nationwide education, legal, and lobbying efforts for gun control. Contact their Washington, DC headquarters at (202) 898-0792.

Johns Hopkins Policy Center for Violence Prevention publication  -- Provides model legislation for gun control.

National Education Association – Focuses on "safe schools" component of gun control movement; offers background information, statistics and talking points.