More Guns Less Crime (52 page)

NOTES TO PAGES 235-241/307

County edition, p. Bl; and "Homeowner Shoots Man Climbing into Window," Knoxville (TN) Knox-News Sentinel, Aug. 1, 1999.

121. While I find the claims greatly exaggerated, another recent study has come out claiming that sixty-four children under the age of two die every year from sleeping with their parents (Shari Roan, "Baby's First Year: Dangerous to Doze with Baby Alongside?" Los Angeles Times, Oct. 4, 1999, p. SI).

122. Brenda Rodriguez, "Notes Begin to Tell Story of Rampage in Atlanta: Killer Wanted to Exact Revenge," Dallas Morning News, July 31, 1999, p. 1A.

123. Rhonda Cook, "To the Rescue: Salesman Grabs Gun, Prevents Tragedy," Atlanta Journal and Constitution, Aug. 3, 1999, IB; Lyda Longa and David Pendered, "Armed Patient Shot in Grady," Atlanta Journal and Constitution, Aug. 4, 1999, p. IB; Hannity and Colmes, Fox News Network, Aug. 11, 1999 (21:30 EST); and "Armed Georgia Defenders Thwart Two Gunmen," Washington Times (from Reuters), Aug. 4, 1999, p. A9.

124. Carol Robinson, "Gunman Opens Fire at Alabama Business," New Orleans Times-Picayune, Aug. 6, 1999 p. A17.

125. Editorial, "Lethal Weapon," Daily News of Los Angeles, May 6, 1999, p. N20.

126. Elaine Gale, "Grieving Mother Haunted by Crash Scene," Los Angeles Times, May 6, 1999, p. Al.

127. A Nexis search of news stories for the one week after both incidents indicates that Buford Furrow was mentioned in the news about five times as often as Steve Abrams, and that while news accounts of Furrow tended to be full-feature news stories, virtually all of the mentions of Mr. Abrams were fairly minor recounts of the Associated Press story that ran on him. Later in the day it was discovered that Furrow had killed a U.S. Post Office worker, but the initial news coverage was based upon the attack at the community center.

Other writers have done an excellent job of pointing out these biases (Sowell, "Why Does Media Hide Benefits of Arming Citizens?" p. L3; JefTJacoby, "Media Bias Revealed by Crimes That Go Unnoticed," San Jose Mercury News, Aug. 24, 1999).

128. This total includes 427 incendiary bombings. Eleven deaths and 29 injuries were classified as "noncriminal" (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms, "Arson and Explosives: Incidents Report, 1997" [Department of the Treasury, 1999]). For an example of a recent knife attack that injured several people on an Amtrak train see Editorial, "Speak Up," Dayton Daily News, Sept. 2, 1999.

129. For example, CNN's Late Edition with WolfBlitzer, May 2, 1999, 12:00 a.m. EST.

130. Fox Butterfield, "Study Exposes Illegal Traffic in New Guns," New York Times, Feb. 21, 1999, sec. 1, p. 22.

131. Tom Diaz, Making a Killing: The Business of Guns in America (New York: New Press, 1999).

132. Teichroeb, "Hearing Today for Boy Expelled over Squirt Gun," p. Bl; Mike Mar-tindale, "OU Acts after Police Take Youth into Custody after Call," Detroit News, Aug. 13, 1999; Pete Falcone, "Student Expelled for Toting BB Gun," Bloomington (IL) Pantograph, May 27, 1999, p. A2; Cathy Cummins, "Expulsion Law's Author Says Schools Have Gone Too Far," Rocky Mountain News, Feb. 23, 1998, p. A4; and "Howitzer Picture Cut From Yearbook," Associated Press Newswire, Oct. 28, 1999, 3:16 EDT These different incidents were said to violate schools' "zero tolerance" policy.

133. This information on the number of words in different gun-control laws was compiled by Alan Korwin (Alan Korwin, The California Gun Owner's Guide [Phoenix: Bloomfield Press, 1999], The Texas Gun Owner's Guide [Phoenix: Bloomfield Press, 1998]; and Gun Laws of America [Phoenix: Bloomfield Press, 1997]).

134. From the Web site of the Australia Bureau of Statistics at www.abs.gov.au.

135. Nicholas Rufford, "Official: More Muggings in England Than US," Sunday Times (London), Oct. 11, 1998.

308 / NOTES TO PAGES 241-253

137. Paul M. Barrett, "Lawsuits Trigger Gun Firms' Bankruptcy Filings," Wall Street Journal, Sept. 13, 1999, p. BIO. The story lists three major gun makers filing for bankruptcy: Sundance Industries, Davis Industries, and Lorcin Engineering Company.

138. Vanessa O'Connell and Douglas A. Blackman, "New UPS Rules Are Latest Jolt to Gun Makers," Wall Street Journal, Oct. 7, 1999, p. Bl. There is at least some skepticism of UPS's motives. As one large handgun dealer said, "We get as many handguns from UPS here as anybody. We haven't missed a handgun in years. This is not a problem. It is just window dressing to make a political statement" (Timothy Burn, "UPS Won't Ship Guns on Ground: Air Delivery OK," Washington Times, Oct. 8, 1999, p. Al).

139. Terry L. Anderson, Charles W Baird, Randy E. Barnett, et al. [letter signed by 290 academics], "Disarming Good People," Washington Times, June 16, 1999, p. A17. The correct number of 294 signatories was noted in John R. Lott, Jr., "More Gun Controls? They Haven't Worked in the Past," Wall Street Journal, June 17, 1999, p. A26.

140. Dale Anema, "A Father at Columbine High," American Enterprise, Sept./Oct. 1999, pp. 48-50.

APPENDIX ONE

1. Although this jargon may appear overwhelming, it is actually fairly simple. Consider the following example. Suppose we wish to present findings that height and SAT scores are correlated among college-bound students. Instead of reporting that an additional inch is related to an increase in test scores of so many points, we can compare standard-deviation changes, which would be equivalent to reporting the results as comparisons of changes in percentile height with percentile changes in the SAT-scores.

2. To phrase this in terms of the earlier discussion of standard deviations, with a symmetric distribution, there is a 32 percent probability that a variable will take on a value that is more than one standard deviation different from its mean, and only a five percent probability that it will be more than two standard deviations away from the mean.

APPENDIX THREE

1. U.S. Department of Justice, Crime in the United States, 1994 (Washington, DC: U.S. Department of Justice, 1994.) I also wish to thank Tom Bailey of the FBI and Jeff Maurer of the Department of Health and Human Services for answering questions concerning the data used in this paper.

2. The Inter-University Consortium for Political and Social Research number for this data set was 6387, and the principle investigator was James Alan Fox of Northeastern University College of Criminal Justice.

3. Dropping the zero crime values from the sample made the "shall-issue" coefficients larger and more significant, but doing the same thing for the accident-rate regressions did not alter "shall-issue" coefficients. (See also the discussion at the end of the section headed "Using County and State Data for the United States" in chapter 4.

4. For further descriptions of the procedures for calculating intercensus estimates of population, see ICPSR (8384): U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, In-tercensal Estimates of the Population of Counties by Age, Sex, and Race (United States), 1970—1980 (Ann Arbor, MI: ICPSR, Winter 1985). See also Bureau of the Census, Methodology for Experimental Estimates of the Population of Counties by Age and Sex: July 1, 1975, Current Population Reports, series P-23, no. 103, and Census of Population, 1980: County Population by Age, Sex, Race, and Spanish Origin (Preliminary OMB-Consistent Modified Race).

5. U.S. Department of Commerce, Bureau of the Census, Methodology for Experimental Estimates of the Population of Counties by Age and Sex: July 1, 1975, Current Population Reports,

NOTES TO PAGE 254/309

series P-23, no. 103; see also Bureau of the Census, Census of Population, 1980: County Population by Age, Sex, Race, and Spanish Origin (Preliminary OMB-Consistent Modified Race), pp. 19—23.

6. U.S. Department of Commerce, Statistical Abstract of the United States, 114th ed., table 746, p. 487.

7. Thomas B. Marvell and Carlisle E. Moody, "The Impact of Enhanced Prison Terms for Felonies Committed with Guns," Criminology 33 (May 1995): 259—60.

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