NEW YORK TIMES: The New York Times editorial board published a scathing condemnation of concealed carry laws Wednesday.
NEW YORK TIMES: The New York Times editorial board published a scathing condemnation of concealed carry laws Wednesday.
Citing a report on gunshot fatalities that found more than 720 shooting deaths since 2007 were attributable to shooters with a conceal-carry permit.
There is no central tally of the effects, with states often barring release of concealed-carry data and Congress hewing to the gun lobby’s opposition to research on guns’ effects on public health. But a methodical gleaning of eight years of news accounts by the Violence Policy Center, a gun safety group, found that in research involving 722 deaths in 544 concealed-carry shootings in 36 states and the District of Columbia, only 16 cases were eventually ruled lawful self-defense — even though this has been a major gun rights selling point for the new laws.
More gravely, the study found that the fatalities included 17 law enforcement officers shot by people with legal permits along with 705 slain civilians. There were 28 mass shootings (involving three or more victims) in which 136 people were killed — even though concealed carry has also been sold as a defense against massacres like the one in Newtown, Conn.
Read the whole editorial here.
