Interesting data..

While looking at data for another post, I noticed something.

http://www.fbi.gov/ucr/cius2008/offenses/expanded_information/data/shrtable_10.html

This table is from the 2008 FBI stats on crime, Murder Circumstances by Relationship- ie, it relates the relationship between victim and offender.

We often hear that guns are dangerous because they're more likely to be used on one's spouse or children. Simply put, the stats don't back it up.

Of the groups of relationships between offender and victim that are known, 'acquaintance' is the leading relationship, followed by 'stranger'- not husband, not wife, not father, not mother, friend, etc.

Considering that a majority of murders are committed by those with previous convictions of violent crime, I'd say 'acquaintance' covers a multitude of sins- 'drug dealer', 'mule', 'pimp', 'cohort', 'bag man', 'co-conspirator'...

:toast:

I love going through the stats there. Makes everything in the Brady Campaign vanish in a puff of black-powder smoke.

The stats say that you are more likely to be shot by someone you know (family member, acquaintance, employee, etc) than a stranger. There is no picking this apart. You're assuming a bit too much in the word "acquaintance" aren't you?

After all you have admitted breaking the firearms law of the UK.

Oneshooter
Armed and Livin in Texas

Don't be ridiculous.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=118x284761#285011

You broke the law by being in possession without the proper permit.

Turn yourself in and you may not get more than a year or so, and then kicked out as a undesirable.

Oneshooter
Armed and Livin in Texas

I didn't own the gun in question and the person who owned it was right next to me at the shooting range. He carried it around and reloaded it for me. And we were actually at a police-approved clay shoot. That's perfectly legal.

So cut your bullshit.

Sections 11(5) and 11(6) -Firearms Act 1968 allow non-certificate holders to shoot shotguns in the
following circumstances ONLY:

a) when using the occupier’s gun, on the occupier’s private land and in his/her presence

or

b) when at a police approved clay shoot.


If you were not a registered competitor, the law was broken. Simply being at a range during a match does not mean you are legal to handle a firearm.

Read and understand the law.

Oneshooter
Armed and Livin in Texas

And he said it was okay, not against the law.

I think it should be against the law to declare that you're armed in public. I think that's even more dangerous than a clay shoot.

At the bottom it has the breakdown


NOTE: The relationship categories of husband and wife include both common-law and ex-spouses. The categories of mother, father, sister, brother, son, and daughter include stepparents, stepchildren, and stepsiblings. The category of acquaintance includes homosexual relationships and the composite category of other known to victim.

Is comparing "'drug dealer', 'mule', 'pimp', 'cohort', 'bag man', 'co-conspirator'..." to homosexual relationships?

Hm.

At the bottom of the page is their :NOTE: which is what I cited there.. I guess I should have added quotation marks for the ones who comment without actually reading the pages linked to.

I did read the link but didn't see the bottom bit. Thanks for the correction.

You can always make assumptions of what "acquaintances" are.

You choose to comment it is always best to double check the facts before you make statements about them...been guilty of that lapse a couple of times....

The way this data is broken down, "Acquaintance" is separate from "Husband, Wife, Mother, Father, Son, Daughter, Brother, Sister, Other Family, Friend, Boyfriend, Girlfriend, Neighbor, Employee, Employer".

Now.. who do you know that is none of the above categories that you might call "acquaintance" (since these categories are exclusive of one another)? Co-workers? The guy that you see in line at starbucks every morning? The fed-ex delivery guy? The guy who brings sandwiches to the office?

If you add up the family categories, you only get 1841, still less than "acquaintance" at 3068, and only slightly more than stranger at 1742.

Add in Friend, Boyfriend, Girlfriend, Neighbor, Employee, Employer.. then it overtakes 'acquaintance'- but only just, at 3102.

Of course the largest category by far is 'unknown'. Hrmm.. wonder why the police couldn't determine a relationship for perpetrator and victim.. Nobody's talking, eh?

Is probably unsolved murders. Probably a body that was found shot dead and the police couldn't determine who the person's killer was. Or people who were shot dead by stray bullets, etc. Or perhaps a suicide but it couldn't be conclusive. Lots of assumptions about "unknown" we can make.

I counted sixteen categories in which the person knew their killer (including acquaintance) and the numbers in those categories exceed that of Stranger killings. The stats show you are more likely to be killed by someone you know, and the percentage reduces (in which you do) if you pigeonhole your stats to certain categories, such as comparing family member killings with acquantaince.

Acquaintance could be a classmate that you're not friends with but worked with them. Houskeepers could be acquaintances. It's someone who you see a lot but not particularly friends with. However, you do know about them and they know about you and if your experiences with that acquaintance is positive, you don't expect them to kill you.

the familiarity of an individual known to the owner of the firearm usually revolve around the possibility of someone other than the owner gaining access to the gun (child, spouse etc.) In that respect, most acquaintances are a lot more like strangers.

Actually, knowing somebody even a little bit would offer a measure of reaction time before a firearm had to be used. If you have a problem with someone or they have a problem with you, it is possible to negotiate, file a restraining order, or just plain stay away from each other. A stranger kicking in your door offers almost no other recourse but to shoot them.

edited for lack of coffee

I'm sorry you don't like healthy debates. There is no need to be so rude. No one has been corrected here, it's a debate over the wording acquaintance.

Kind regards,

Funky

I like healthy debates, and I was not rude. You can "pick" the word "acquaintance" apart as you seem wont to do, but it is still baloney, rather mild stuff term considering these threads. In the future, however, I will try to use the term "sophistry."

Respectfully,

SteveM

Not sure what you meant by this- "You can "pick" the word "acquaintance" apart as you seem wont to do".

Acquaintance can mean anyone you know in passing. To say that "acquaintances" mean drug dealers and other undesirables, as the OP said, is a bit of a narrow definition of the word.

Certainly, if "acquaintances" were limited to drug dealers and other undesirables, it would be too narrow. The larger point is that acquaintances in a study of this sort is a poor term as most people (IMO) view "acquaintances" as merely folks several steps removed from the status of friend, or even business partner (this is how I and my friends would view the term). In fact, I would say that the term is far too promiscuous and does not take into account drug dealers and other undesirables. This is the gripe I have with these studies: they fail to take into account that most gun-related homicides are concentrated into inner-city enclaves, and involve "acquaintances" in crime. Thus it is hard to picture (let alone believe) that some family living in (what's left of) an upper-middle class status is as likely to be "touched" by gun crime/accident as a different family living in different conditions. Fact is, they aren't.

I don't have the link readily available, but there is a "scatter shot" statistical analysis of homicides in Baltimore which show the vast majority of these crimes being concentrated in the poor, inner-city and mainly African-American portions of that city. I rather suspect that the same could be seen in other cities as well. It is not racist to point this out, for the vast majority of African-Americans do not engage in homicidal behavior. But this phenomenon does point up the big problem of generalizing from the specific to the whole.

The category across the top is the status of the victim. I am a son, but Dad died about 25 years ago and my mother is in a nursing home, so I am pretty safe in the "son" category.

I am a husband, but my wife and I have a very loving relationship. Domestic murders almost always have a history of violence before the murder. Zero violence between us. We haven't even argued for years. I think I am safe here.

Being male, I am not a mother, wife, daughter, or sister, so those don't apply to me.

I am a father, but my grown daughter lives several states away and is a peaceful person. I feel safe on that one.

I am an only child, so no brothers or sisters.

Other family? All my uncles and aunts are dead. I have lost track of most of the cousins. The ones I do have contact with live far away.

No boyfriends or girlfriends. Safe on that one.

Friends. Looking at the breakdown, we find that friends kill friends over alcohol, drugs, money agruments and stuff like that. Violent felons have friends who are usually other violent felons. I am not a violent felon, nor do I hang out with any. I don't argue with my friends. I am very safe on that one.

Neighbors. Extremely quiet town, on very peaceful terms with them. Again, such murders almost always have a build-up. I am safe on that one.

Employer. Nope, I don't employ anyone.

Employee. I have a job, but it is for a big corporation, and I am too small to be noticed. If I become a problem they will simply fire me.

That leaves ACQUAINTANCE. From http://www.cardozolawreview.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=138:kates201086&catid=20:firearmsinc&Itemid=20


Did you get that? Most murderers are - Surprise - violent criminals already.

I am not involved in any criminal enterprise and I don't hang out with criminals. So I am extremely safe from my acquaintences.

So for me, my primary threat is random violence from strangers.

Your situtation may be different due to the level of violent behavior those around you may have demonstrated.

It is overwhelmingly stranger-murder. That is because stranger murder is extremely difficult to solve as it is lacking in relationship clues. There is very little to investigate. Relationship murders are usually rich in clues and are quickly solved. IOW - You can almost completely merge the "stranger" and the "unknown" categories.

I believe you are probably right based on logic - that "unknown" is likely to be "stranger"... but the fair approach is to divide the unknown group amongst all other categories in ratios represented by those categories. This assumes that, knowing the makeup of a well diversified portion of a population, the unknown portion of population should fall within the same ratios/trends.

Example: If you sample 90% of a population and the population prefers "A" over "B" 2:1... then it can be assumed that 6.67% of the unknown population prefer "A" and 3.33% of the unknown population prefer "B".

I understand your reasoning. Due to the lack of firm knowledge the temptation is to assume the distribution that is already known. However, we do have some experience that we can bring to the problem. Stranger murders are the most difficult to solve. Consider the case of serial killers, like Ted Bundy, or the Beltway Snipers. Because they were strangers, there were few clues to follow.

The worst are the traveling serial killers. Several of these are believed to be truck drivers who lure women into their truck with offers of seeing the country, kill them and dump the body in a different state.

Even a murder by a local mugger is hard to solve, even with witnesses. So I believe that almost all of the unknowns are stranger murders.