In October of 2024 in FBI Credibility? I wrote, in part:
John R. Lott, the President of the Crime Prevention Research Center, drives Democrats/socialists/communist (D/s/cs) crazy. He does it the old-fashioned way: he does factual, honest, reproducible research about crime, guns and related issues and provides his data sets and methodology on request. Anti-liberty/gun “researchers” like the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) don’t do that.
In Lies, damned lies and statistics, I noted the FBI’s crime statistics are grossly underreported. A substantial number of law enforcement agencies no longer report crime statistics to the FBI. Worse, among those not reporting are America’s largest, most crime-ridden, D/s/c ruled cities. This purposeful gaslighting of the American public has allowed D/s/cs to claim crime is down across America, and just in time for the election. What a coincidence! Then along comes Lott, making them crazy again…
The topic of that article was the FBI’s underreporting of crime, to the benefit of Democrat/socialist/communist (D/s/c) politicians and their narratives. If blue cities and states don’t report crime to the FBI, and the FBI doesn’t accurately compile and publish crime data, that allows D/s/cs to claim they’re tough on crime, setting the terms of political debate and keeping campaign and federal funds flowing.
But there’s another area of data collection and dissemination where the FBI has been deceiving the public, and Lott, once again, exposes their lies:
Graphic: Chris Muir, Day By Day Cartoon, used with permission
I’ve seen many cases of politicized data. Until January 2021, I worked in the U.S. Department of Justice as the senior advisor for research and statistics in the Office of Justice Programs, and part of my job was to evaluate the FBI’s active shooting reports. During my time with the DOJ, I discovered that the FBI either missed or misidentified many cases of civilians using guns to stop attacks. For instance, the FBI continues to report that armed citizens stopped only 14 of the 350 active shooter cases identified between 2014 to 2023.
The Crime Prevention Research Center (CPRC), which I run, has found many more missed cases and is keeping an updated list. As such, the CPRC numbers tell a much different story: Out of 515 active shooter incidents from 2014 to 2023, armed citizens stopped 180, saving countless innocent lives. Our numbers even excluded 27 cases where a law-abiding citizen with a gun stopped an attacker before he could fire a shot.
The FBI’s lack of accuracy on this issue is no surprise. One of the most enduring D/s/c narratives is the idea that Normal Americans shouldn’t be allowed to have guns. They’ll just shoot themselves or their families, and worse, they might shoot criminals! Only the police should be armed because they’re the professionals. So of course, the FBI would support that narrative by claiming citizens virtually never stop active shooters.
Graphic: Glock 43X, Author
Unfortunately, honest cops know most in their ranks aren’t gun guys and girls. For most, the only shooting their do with their duty handguns is yearly qualification. They commonly shoot no more than 50 rounds at stationary targets at known distances with a 70% passing score. They can miss 30% of their shots and are given an unlimited number of tries to meet that low standard. Were that not the case, far too many would fail and be fired.
They commonly do worse on duty. From 1994-2000, in shootouts from 0-2 yards—police muzzles were essentially touching criminals--NYPD officers missed 31% of their shots. From 3-7 yards they hit only 19% of the time and from 15-25 yards, only 2%. In some parts of the country, officers do much better, but donning a blue suit and badge doesn’t magically bestow shooting powers beyond those of other Americans as Lott further explains:
Overall, the CPRC estimates that law-abiding citizens with guns have stopped more than 35 percent of active shootings over the last decade and 39.6 percent in the last five years. This figure is almost nine times higher than the four percent estimate made by the FBI.
Another favored D/s/c narrative maintains the importance of “gun-free zones,” which are actually free-fire zones for criminals who are assured there are no armed and capable people present to stop them.
This figure increases even more when looking only at areas where citizens are legally allowed to carry a firearm. After all, you can’t expect that law-abiding citizens will stop attacks in gun-free zones. In places where law-abiding citizens are allowed to carry firearms, we estimate that armed civilians stopped 51 percent of active shootings over the past decade.
The police are virtually never present when and where attacks begin, but armed Normal Americans are, and they can immediately identify and stop attackers. Lott’s facts are deadly to D/s/c anti-liberty/gun narratives, but they’re life savers to Normal Americans.
On a different subject, if you are not already a subscriber, you may not know that we’ve implemented something new: A weekly newsletter with unique content from our editors for subscribers only. These essays alone are worth the cost of the subscription.
Mike McDaniel is a USAF veteran, classically trained musician, Japanese and European fencer, life-long athlete, firearm instructor, retired police officer and high school and college English teacher. He is a published author and blogger. His home blog is Stately McDaniel Manor.