Relationship between licensing, registration, and other gun sales laws and the source country of crime guns

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  1. D W Webster,
  2. J Due south Vernick,
  3. L M Hepburn
  1. Centre for Injury Research and Policy, Center for Gun Policy and Research, Johns Hopkins University, Bloomberg School of Public Health, Baltimore
  1. Correspondence to:
 Daniel W Webster, Center for Injury Research and Policy, Johns Hopkins School of Public Health, 624 North Broadway, Rm 593, Baltimore, MD 21205–1996, Us dwebster{at}jhsph.edu

Abstract

Objective—To determine the association between licensing and registration of firearm sales and an indicator of gun availability to criminals.

Methods—Tracing data on all crime guns recovered in 25 cities in the U.s.a. were used to estimate the relationship betwixt state gun police force categories and the proportion of crime guns get-go sold by in-land gun dealers.

Results—In cities located in states with both mandatory registration and licensing systems (5 cities), a mean of 33.seven% of crime guns were first sold by in-land gun dealers, compared with 72.7% in cities that had either registration or licensing just not both (seven cities), and 84.2% in cities without registration or licensing (xiii cites). Little of the difference between cities with both licensing and registration and cities with neither licensing nor registration was explained past potential confounders. The share of the population near a metropolis that resides in a neighboring state without licensing or registration laws was negatively associated with the consequence.

Conclusion—States with registration and licensing systems appear to do a better task than other states of keeping guns initially sold inside the country from beingness recovered in crimes. Proximity to states without these laws, notwithstanding, may limit their impact.

  • firearms
  • evaluation
  • law
  • gun command

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  • firearms
  • evaluation
  • police force
  • gun control

There is general consensus among scientists that firearm availability is positively associated with homicide risksi; assaults with firearms are, on average, much more lethal than assaults with other common weapons.2 However, there is much less agreement nearly the effectiveness of government efforts to control firearm availability. Skeptics of gun control laws argue that criminals tin easily evade regulations by acquiring guns through theft, straw purchases (those past legally eligible purchasers on behalf of individuals legally proscribed from purchasing guns), and other hard-to-regulate private sales.three, 4 Cook and colleagues argue that restrictions on legal gun sales can reduce the supply and consequently heighten the price of acquiring guns within illicit besides as licit gun markets. Restricted supplies and increased prices may reduce gun availability within these interconnected markets.5, six

In the United States, federal law proscribes gun sales to specific groups deemed to be potentially dangerous, such as persons convicted of serious crimes, and requires criminal background checks of persons ownership guns from licensed dealers. But in many states this requirement is fulfilled via "instant check" procedures vulnerable to the utilise of falsified identification cards and straw purchasers.7 Some states in the The states, however, have much more extensive regulatory systems that include registration of firearms, licensing of buyers, and very restrictive eligibility criteria for firearm purchases.

Permit-to-purchase licensing systems require prospective gun purchasers to have direct contact with law enforcement or judicial authorities that scrutinize purchase applications, and some allow these agencies wide discretion to disapprove applications. Some licensing laws require applicants to be fingerprinted and allow officials weeks or even months to conduct extensive background checks. Mandatory registration makes it easier to trace guns used in offense to their terminal known legal owner, and to investigate possible illegal transfers. In combination, these laws have the potential to significantly restrict gun acquisition past high take chances individuals through stricter eligibility criteria, safeguards against falsified applications, and increased legal risks and costs associated with illegal gun transfers to proscribed individuals. Recently, several The states gun control groups have made licensing of buyers and registration of handguns the centerpiece of their advocacy agenda.

Most industrialized countries identify broad restrictions on individual buying of firearms.viii, ix For example, Canada created a centralized registry for purchased handguns in 1951, and instituted very restrictive permit-to-purchase requirements for handguns in 1969. These restrictions were expanded to long guns in 1977.8 Evaluations of the 1977 police force were mixed, but suggested that the law was associated with a reduction in homicides.10– 12 In a cantankerous sectional study of gun command laws in the United States, Kleck and Patterson also present mixed testify that permit-to-buy laws were associated with lower rates of homicide.thirteen

With few exceptions,14, 15 previous evaluations of state gun sales laws have not examined the country in which the guns used to commit violence were sold. This study addresses this gap past examining whether states with licensing, registration, and other gun sales regulations accept proportionately fewer of their criminal offence guns that were originally purchased from inside the state. Having a depression proportion of crime guns with in-state origins would suggest that guns are relatively difficult for persons at risk for criminal involvement to obtain from in-state gun dealers, acquaintances, or homes that are burglarized. Interstate gun traffickers offering an alternative source of guns to criminals in states with restrictive gun laws, withal the costs, risks, and inconvenience are likely to be greater. These added costs might curtail access to guns amidst high chance individualsv, half dozen and consequently reduce rates of lethal violence.ii, 16

Methods

STUDY SAMPLE AND Information

This study uses metropolis level data for 27 cities located in 23 states that take participated in a federally funded plan called the Youth Crime Gun Interdiction Initiative (YCGII). Each of these cities agreed to submit information on all crime guns recovered by local law enforcement agencies to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms (ATF) for tracing. (Despite its proper name, the YCGII was not express to guns recovered from youth.) In virtually other jurisdictions, police simply attempt to trace a non-random sample of the criminal offence guns they recover, creating the possibility for pick bias.17 A offense gun was defined by ATF as whatever firearm that was "illegally possessed, used in a crime, or suspected to accept been used in a offense."18

Information were available for all 27 cities for all criminal offence guns recovered by constabulary from 1 August 1997 though 31 July 1998.18 For 17 of the 27 cities, data were also available for guns recovered from 1 July 1996 through thirty April 1997.xix To increment the reliability and sample size of our analyses, we combined data from the two reporting periods for those cities where it was available. Due to limited resources and the difficulty of tracing older guns, ATF did not ever attempt to complete traces for guns that were manufactured before 1990. Therefore, in order to written report a sample of criminal offence guns that were comprehensively traced, nosotros limited our analyses to recovered crime guns that were sold during or after 1 January 1990. With i exception, discussed below, all of the country licensing and registration laws of interest went into consequence well before 1990.

Proportion of crime guns from in-state gun dealers

Our primary outcome measure is the proportion of traceable criminal offence guns that were originally purchased from an in-land gun dealer. In our data, this issue measure was positively correlated with some other indicator of gun availability to high risk individuals—the proportion of homicides of males ages 15 and to a higher place that were committed with guns (Pearson'due south r = 0.xl, p=0.048).

State gun sales laws

Our primary explanatory variable of interest is the set of state level firearm sales laws. Data about these laws was obtained from ATF and United States Department of Justice publications,20, 21 and through legal research. Two key laws of interest were allow-to-buy licensing of firearm buyers and registration of firearms. Based on these laws, nosotros grouped all states into three categories. In category A, we grouped states with both permit-to-buy licensing and registration. Category B consisted of states with either licensing or registration (but not both). Category C groups those states with neither allow-to-purchase licensing nor registration.

Though our categorization was based on licensing and registration laws, states with both of these laws often have many boosted firearm sales restrictions that could enhance the effectiveness of their gun regulatory system (meet table 1). For case, states with let-to-purchase laws often require relatively long maximum waiting periods and prohibit gun sales to persons convicted of sure misdemeanor crimes. In add-on, states with both licensing and registration typically allowed criminal justice agencies to employ discretion in issuing permits.

Tabular array 1

State gun sales laws in result in 25 Youth Offense Gun Interdiction Initiative cities, overall classification of the prepare of these laws, and the per centum of the city'south crime guns that were first purchased from in-land gun dealers

There was only one land with a modify in its gun sales laws from 1 January 1990 though 31 July 1998 that would alter its category. Connecticut enacted its permit-to-purchase licensing and registration organisation beginning 1 October 1994; just permits for handgun sales were not mandatory until i October 1995. Before Connecticut's new law, Bridgeport (one of the YCGII cities) would have been placed in category C; subsequently the law, it would exist grouped in category A. Therefore, we excluded Bridgeport from our primary analyses. Instead, we conducted a split up analysis comparing the source state of Bridgeport's offense guns showtime purchased earlier and after its regulatory system became available in October 1994, and contrasted this pre-police force versus post-law difference with other cities in category C. Nosotros chose the 1994 appointment because it was the earliest date after which handgun buyers were obtaining permits.

Nosotros likewise excluded Washington, DC from our primary assay. In 1976, the District of Columbia banned most handgun possession and purchase. Therefore, its laws are not truly comparable to the other states we examined.

Potential confounders

Factors other than gun sales laws, such as proximity to persons living in other states, may too affect the source country of a city's criminal offense guns. The following hypothesized determinants of the proportion of a city's crime guns originating from in-state gun dealers, in add-on to gun sales laws, were considered in the analyses: (ane) nearest driving altitude from the city of interest to another land in category C, (two) the ratio of out-of-state to in-state population inside a 50 or 100 mile radius of the city, (3) the proportion of the population within a 50 or 100 mile radius of the city that reside in a state in category C, (4) the proportion of the land's population that had moved from some other land inside the previous year,22 and (5) the proportion of a metropolis'south crime guns that were recovered in cases involving drug crimes (illicit drug selling networks oftentimes extend across state borders).

Differences in gun ownership betwixt states, attributable to cultural and demographic differences, may be an important determinant of whether restrictive gun sales laws are passed in a state. Lower levels of gun ownership within a state that are independent of the effects of those restrictive laws that are not controlled for in our analysis could bias our estimates of the laws' effects. Decision-making for pre-law gun ownership levels is somewhat problematic, however, because direct measures of state level gun ownership are non bachelor and the implementation dates of the laws differ beyond states. Therefore, we used the per cent of a state's suicides during 1996–97 that were committed with firearms as a proxy measure out of gun buying based on the rationale that this fraction will be strongly influenced by gun availability.23 This measure, however, may underestimate the level of pre-law gun ownership not owing to restrictive gun laws in states that subsequently passed such restrictions considering the laws may take depressed gun buying levels in the effected states. If this is the case, this control variable may overcorrect the estimate of the laws' effects. Nosotros, therefore, included this covariate in a sensitivity analysis to provide a lower bound point approximate of the laws' effects.

Population data were obtained from the United States census,24 and the population residing within a l and 100 mile radius of the centre of each city was determined using the Demography' Primary Surface area Cake Level Equivalency program.25 Driving distances from key city locations to the borders of other states were determined using Map Adept 2.0 estimator mapping software.26

DATA ANALYSIS

Analysis of variance of the mean proportion of criminal offence guns originating in-country was used for comparisons across the 3 categories of gun sales laws. Dunnet's C statistic was used to compare between group ways with unequal variances.27 Ordinary least squares linear regression analysis was used to estimate the contained association between the hypothesized explanatory variables and the outcome. Theoretically relevant covariates were dropped from the model if their effects were not statistically significant and if their exclusion did not appear to influence the other estimates. Cook's distance28 and the standardized difference in the beta values were examined to assess whether particular observations exerted undue influence on the regression coefficients.

Results

For the 25 cities in our analysis, 108 000 crime guns were recovered by the police force during the written report flow. Considering we limit our assay to crime guns first purchased since 1990, to summate the proportion of guns in our dataset successfully traced to a source state, it is first necessary to eliminate from the denominator those guns bought before 1990. Using information on the sales dates and ATF's reasons for not completing a trace, nosotros estimated that 60 202 guns were kickoff purchased earlier 1990. Of the remaining 47 798 guns, 35 000 (73.2%) were successfully traced past ATF to a source state.

Table 1 depicts the categorization of the 25 YCGII cities based upon their gun sales laws. In general, the categories are ordered past the comprehensiveness of the laws. The mean percentage of law-breaking guns with in-state origins for category A cities (33.7%) was significantly less than that for cities in category B (72.7%) and category C (84.2%) (both differences significant at p<0.001; see fig one). Credible in fig ane and confirmed past a formal exam (Levene statistic = 8.58, df1=ii, df2=22, p=0.002) is that the variance in the outcome mensurate among the five cities in category A is larger than in categories B and C.

  Figure 1

Figure 1

Mean and 95% conviction interval for the percent of offense guns offset sold by in-state gun dealers by gun law category. Category A: licensing and allow to buy and at to the lowest degree ii other gun sales laws; category B: licensing or permit to buy but not both; category C: neither licensing or permit to buy.

The regression analyses indicated that the large bivariate differences between cities in category A and those in categories B and C remained later controlling for potential confounders (table 2). The estimates from model 1 indicate that the percentage of crime guns with in-state origins was 48.five percentage points lower in category A cities compared with category C cities (p<0.001). The percentage of law-breaking guns with in-land origins in category B cities was 12.eight percent points lower than in category C cities (p=0.039). The percentage of the population inside a 100 mile radius of a city that resided beyond the country border in a category C state was negatively associated with the percentage of crime guns with in-state origins (β = −19.ix, SE(β) = 7.5, p=0.016).

Tabular array 2

Results from ordinary least squares regression on the percentage of a city'south crime guns that were originally purchased from in-country gun dealers

Central points

  • Only a few states in the U.s. require firearm owners to be licensed and their guns to exist registered.

  • The proportion of a city'southward crime guns that come from in-state, verus out-of-state, is an important measure of how hard it is for criminals to get guns in those states.

  • Cities in states with both licensing and registration take a much smaller proportion of their crimes guns coming from in-state.

  • Licensing and registration laws tin make it harder for criminals and juveniles to get guns.

Model 2 in table 2 presents our findings with the surrogate measure of gun ownership within the land added to the model. This indicator of gun ownership was positively associated with the percentage of law-breaking guns that had been sold past in-state gun dealers (β = 0.682, SE(β) = 0.180, p=0.001). The magnitude of the gauge for the departure between category A and category C cities was reduced (β = −37.1, SE(β) = five.88, p<0.001) but remained big and highly meaning. Still, the approximate for the difference betwixt category B versus category C cities was reduced substantially and is no longer statistically significant (β = −4.25, SE(β) = four.95, p=0.402).

Population migration into the state and the proportion of recovered guns associated with drug offenses were not significantly associated with the proportion of a metropolis'southward law-breaking guns outset sold by an in-state gun dealer. Driving altitude from the city to the nearest land border and distance to the nearest country with weaker gun sales laws were non included in the models due to colinearity with other covariates. The proportion of total population inside a 50 mile radius of the city residing outside the country edge was not included in the models because its inclusion lead to an extremely large Cook's distance statistic for ane metropolis. This covariate did not accept a statistically pregnant event on the outcome measure, and its exclusion from the models did not substantially effect the gun law estimates.

The percentage of Bridgeport'southward criminal offence guns that had been sold past in-state dealers decreased from 84.nine% (124/146) for guns purchased before Connecticut's licensing and registration laws went into effect to 81.5% (44/54) for guns purchased afterward. In dissimilarity, among the other category C cities, the proportion of crime guns with in-state origins increased from 79.8% (6289/7883) to 87.9% (6798/7732) for guns sold during the aforementioned two time periods. While these divergent trends are suggestive of moderate effects from Connecticut's mandatory licensing and registration law, the 81.v% of Bridgeport'southward crime guns that had been sold by in-country dealers after the law'south effective appointment was significantly college than was observed in the five other category A cities.

Discussion

We found dandy variation among cities in the percentage of their crime guns that originated from in-state gun dealers. This variation was largely explained past the presence or absence of comprehensive state regulations of gun sales that fit our definition of category A—permit-to-purchase licensing and mandatory registration of handguns—and to a lesser degree by proximity to people in states with minimal restrictions on gun sales. After adjusting for confounders, the percentage of criminal offense guns recovered in cities in category A that had been purchased from in-country dealers was less than half equally high as would take been expected if the weakest state laws (category C) had been in result.

The wide variation in the proportion of crime guns from in-country dealers within category A suggests that there are of import determinants of our outcome other than the presence of licensing and registration systems. Some of the variance within this category appears to be explained by complementary sales restrictions. Category A cities with the lowest proportion of their criminal offense guns originating from in-state dealers—Boston, Jersey Metropolis, and New York—were in states that also allowed law enforcement discretion in issuing permits to buy handguns, had longer waiting periods, and required buy applicants to be fingerprinted. In contrast, St Louis, Missouri, with the highest proportion of crime guns sold by in-land gun dealers among category A cities, had none of these provisions.

The very strong cross exclusive association between allow-to-purchase licensing and registration laws, and lower proportions of criminal offence guns with in-state origins, is tempered somewhat by the small-scale alter observed in Bridgeport after Connecticut adopted a licensing and registration system. This relatively modest change in Bridgeport may exist due to the newness of law, the availability of older used guns purchased within the state prior to the new law, or to the lack of some of the other sales restrictions mentioned above that take been in place for years in other states with licensing and registration systems. In addition, our use of the engagement the licensing and registration system became operational as the intervention bespeak rather than the date, 12 months later, on which these regulations became mandatory may have created a bourgeois bias in our findings of the law's effect.

Interestingly, after adjusting for gun buying as well as other potential confounders, there was no significant difference between cities in categories B and C in the proportion of their law-breaking guns that had originated from in-land gun dealers. This finding suggests that country level gun control measures may not have a substantial impact on criminal gun availability unless the measures are very comprehensive, including both licensing, registration and other restrictions.

The potential benefits from comprehensive state gun control measures appear to be diminished by the lack of such controls in other states. Consequent with other research,eighteen, xix, 29 proximity to people living in states with weak gun laws increased the proportion of a urban center'south crime guns originating from out-of-state gun dealers.

There are several potential limitations to this report. Get-go, our outcome measure out may seem somewhat removed from the most of import public health outcomes such every bit homicides. Even so, in that location is general consensus among scholars that reduced access to guns among loftier risk individuals is likely to atomic number 82 to reduced rates of lethal violence,1 and the proportion of law-breaking guns that originate from in-state gun dealers should be directly related to how easy it is for high risk individuals to obtain guns. Indeed, we establish that the proportion of a metropolis's crime guns that had been sold past an in-state gun dealer was positively associated with another indicator of gun availability to high hazard individuals, the proportion of homicides of males ages 15 and above that were committed with firearms.

Criminals and delinquent youth tend to obtain guns in private transactions with acquaintances and to a lesser degree from thefts.29, 30 Although these transactions are difficult to regulate directly, laws that restrict legal gun ownership and gun transfers such every bit licensing and registration could constrain the supply of guns from these typical sources of crime guns.v With fewer guns from local sources, criminals and juveniles must identify out-of-state sources. Just interstate traffickers face barriers and risks that may limit their ability to make up for significant in-state supply restrictions. Peradventure every bit a outcome of these supply constraints, street prices of guns in places with very restrictive gun command laws tend to be significantly higher than in places with more lax laws.5

Omission or inadequate measurement of confounders is always a potential limitation in evaluations of gun policies. Past focusing on the furnishings of land gun sales law on the proportion of law-breaking guns originating from in-state gun dealers, withal, the findings from this study may be less vulnerable to sure threats to validity that can bias gun control evaluations that focus on the laws' effects on violent crime. Violent criminal offense is influenced by a large number of factors, many of which are hard to measure fairly. In dissimilarity, there are likely to be many fewer unmeasured factors that affect the proportion of criminal offense guns from in-land gun dealers—our final models explained 82% and 89% of the variance in this outcome.

The relatively small, not-random sample of cities, selected past ATF for their willingness to submit information on all crime guns recovered by police, limits the generalizabililty of the findings. Yet, the cities in this written report are diverse with respect to region and population size, and appear to be representative of their states based on the very loftier correlation betwixt the cities' and states' measures of our event variable (r = 0.97, p<0.001).

Kleck has suggested that police force in states with firearm registries may be less inclined to asking an ATF trace of a crime gun that is registered within the state because much of the data from the ATF trace may be obtainable from the state registry.17 If pervasive within YCGII cities, such practices could bias our findings. However, the police departments that submitted data for this study agreed to submit information to ATF on all recovered criminal offence guns. ATF devoted considerable resources to assistance local agencies making trace requests and to oversee the drove of data. ATF officials working on the YCGII signal that the protocols for initiating ATF trace requests used past the participating police departments were mostly independent from other constabulary investigations, whether or not a country had a registration organisation. Furthermore, the proportion of criminal offence guns sold by in-state dealers when the state had a registration system but no permit-to-purchase licensing system (v of the vii cities in category B) was quite loftier (67%–82%) indicating that the agencies were clearly submitting data to ATF for guns that should likewise be in the state registry.

Our analyses were limited to guns sold less than years years earlier recovery by the police because ATF did non trace all crime guns manufactured before 1990. Associations between state gun laws and in-state origins of criminal offense guns may differ for older versus newer guns. Any differences between older and newer guns, however, would have to be quite substantial to negate the very large magnitude of effect for category A land laws.

Finally, the way we cull to categorize state gun sales laws limits our ability to estimate of the contained effects of each of blazon of regulation of involvement. Due to the high correlation betwixt the presence of many of the laws nosotros considered, preliminary analyses revealed substantial multicolinearity when we attempted to generated separate estimates for each law of interest.

Implications for prevention

Understanding the benefits of restrictive firearm sales laws can help policymakers to make informed legislative choices. Our findings advise that comprehensive gun sales regulations that include permit-to-purchase licensing and registration tin can affect the availability of guns to criminals. Conversely, the absence of these regulations may increase the availability of guns to criminals in nearby states.

Acknowledgments

This study was supported past grant R49/CCR3028 from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to the Johns Hopkins Center for Injury Enquiry and Policy.

References

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