Government Does Not Know Which Guns Are Used in Homicides

By Douglas A. McIntyre Updated Mar 19, 9:31AM EDT · Published Jan 24, 11:00AM EST

Follow 24/7 Wall St. on Google

This post may contain links from our sponsors and affiliates, and Flywheel Publishing may receive compensation for actions taken through them.

The federal government does not know what kinds of guns are used in homicides, except on the broadest level. That makes the debate over assault rifles and other semi-automatic rifles and pistols more difficult to frame.

24/7 Wall St. put questions about gun data to several federal agencies and to Vice President Biden’s office through the White House. What we found is that data on guns used in the commission of homicides can only be broken down into five very broad categories. As Stephen G. Fischer Jr. of the FBI wrote to us:

Data reported to the FBI Uniform Crime Reporting Program via the Summary Reporting System is an aggregate total of the type of weapon. The system does not allow for the distinction of type of weaponry. Data reported are general such as handgun, shotgun, rifle, or firearm.

The two agencies most likely to keep detailed numbers are the Office of Justice Programs: Bureau of Justice Statistics and the FBI’s division that issues the annual crime report. Neither has the ability to collect or report data on whether guns used in the commission of a crime are single shot, semi-automatic, revolvers, single-barrel or double-barrel shotguns, or rifles that can hold magazines with a large number of bullets.

The Uniform Crime Report for 2011, the most recent full year for which data are available, breaks “murder by types of weapon” into the following categories:

Total murders, total firearms, handguns, rifles, shotguns, firearms (type unknown), knives or cutting instruments, and “hands, fists, feet, etc”.

Use of handguns in homicides as a percentage of total guns used runs between 70% and 80% in most states. Use of rifles is below 5% in most cases, and use of shotguns around 5%. The use of knives is almost always greater than that of rifles or shotguns, measured state by state.

The problem that the lack of data causes is about how to determine which guns might or might not be regulated more carefully. Sturm, Ruger & Co. Inc. (NYSE: RGR) makes several single-shot rifles, which probably pose little threat as instruments that might be used in mass killings. Ruger also makes “takedown” rifles, which auto load and have a standard clip capacity of 10 rounds. Ruger’s center-fire pistols take clips that hold up to 15 rounds. It also makes single-action revolvers, which can carry a maximum of six rounds.

Also, Ruger makes guns that use bullets ranging from 22 caliber to 45 caliber.

The federal government does not attempt to gather information about guns used in homicides from local authorities, according to 24/7 Wall St.’s conversations with several police departments and sheriff’s departments. So, whether this information is kept locally is academic.

Based on the importance of gun control, the lack of availability of data on which guns are used in homicides is astonishing.

About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.