Americans with CCW Permits Almost Never Commit Crime.

national homicide rate dropped . This happened everywhere; in the antigun states forced to issue CCW permits for the first time, in pro-gun states like Ohio and Florida which went further and adopted "constitutional carry" (meaning no permit is required to carry if you can legally own a gun), and even in individual cities like Philadelphia

that began issuing permits more liberally as a result of litigation. Miami even had its l owest year for homicides since it began keeping track of them in the 1940s.

So why were the antigun politicians and their allies in the gun control groups so hilariously wrong? Why didn't every argument turn into a shootout? Why didn't our homicide rate spike?

In short: because Americans with CCW permits almost never commit crime. If an individual goes through the process to get a permit in order to carry a firearm legally, they are demonstrating a tremendous predisposition to following the law and thus are not likely to commit crime. On the other end of the spectrum, the raw number of criminals carrying likely did not budge. They were carrying illegally before Bruen anyway, and continued to do so afterwards, so the adoption of constitutional carry in some states also did not change anything (besides making it less of a hassle to exercise a constitutional right for the law-abiding).

All of this is very intuitive and squares with common sense. But we need not only rely on common sense, as there is extensive data to prove it. Several states keep track of CCW permitting and crimes committed by those with permits, and they all show just how rare it is for someone with such a permit to commit violent crimes.

State-level data proves those issued CCW permits rarely commit crime.

Part of what was amusing about politicians predicting Bruen would cause an increase in violence was that we had seen this movie before, several decades ago.

From the early 20th century until the 1980s, only a handful of states permitted carrying concealed firearms by regular citizens in an expansive sense. But with Florida becoming by far the largest state expanding the right to carry in 1987, a media firestorm ensued. Gun-control activists insisted that the state would devolve into a sort of “wild west.”

So, did Florida come apart at the seams with every disagreement turning into the O.K. Corral? Not at all, according to the data. Florida’s homicide rate actually fell following the passage of its “shall-issue” gun-carry law. In 1987, it had 11.4 murders per 100,000 people. But, by the start of the new century, the rate had been cut to 5.6 per 100,000.

While we cannot conclude the carry law caused murder in Florida to drop, it is safe to say that it certainly did not cause it to increase, and the decline refuted opponents’ predictions of dire consequences.

“There are lots of people, including myself, who thought things would be a lot worse as far as that particular situation [carry reform] is concerned,” Florida Representative Ronald A. Silver (D), who opposed the law, said in 1990. “I’m happy to say they’re not.”

John Fuller, general counsel for the Florida Sheriffs Associated, added: “I haven’t seen where we have had any instance of persons with permits causing violent crimes, and I’m constantly on the lookout.” See Clayton E. Cramer & David B. Kopel, “Shall Issue”: The New Wave of Concealed Handgun Permit Laws, 62 Tenn. L. Rev. 679, 692-93 (1995).

Overall in 2020, Texas license holders were 5.7% of the state’s population, yet they were convicted of just 0.43% of the state’s serious crimes. There were 114 convictions for license holders out of 26,304 convictions for the state as a whole. And many of the offenses listed do not involve a firearm at all.

But even if all 71 incidents were crimes, that would come out to CCW permit holders in Illinois having a two one-hundredths of a percent chance of committing a crime using a gun at any point in the six-year period the Tribune examined.

Similarly, for crimes against property, the general population had a rate of 2,747.2 per 100,000 people, while permit holders had a significantly lower rate of 44.3 per 100,000—a difference of more than 60 times. When focusing on cases where the permit holder was carrying a firearm, the rate drops to an astonishing 0.9 per 100,000, making permit holders 3,000 times less likely to commit property crimes while carrying.

Courts as well as the RAND organization have recognized that CCW permit holders are an overwhelmingly law-abiding demographic.

Similar data exists for many other states, and data to the contrary is nonexistent. As a result, several courts have recognized the lack of evidence supporting efforts to tie criminality to those lawfully carrying for self-defense. “[D]espite ample opportunity for an evidentiary hearing, the State has failed to offer any evidence that law-abiding responsible citizens who carry firearms in public for self-defense are responsible for an increase in gun violence.” Koons v. Platkin, 673 F. Supp. 3d 515, 577 (D.N.J. 2023). “Simply put, CCW permitholders are not the gun wielders legislators should fear.” May v. Bonta, No. 23-cv-01696, 2023 WL 8946212, at *19 (C.D. Cal. Dec. 20, 2023). “[T]he vast majority of conceal carry permit holders are law abiding.” Wolford v. Lopez, 686 F. Supp. 3d 1034, 1076 (D. Haw. 2023).

In the case I work on for CRPA (May v. Bonta), what was especially striking is that the California DOJ didn't even try to rebut the data we presented. They effectively conceded that those with CCW permits are not a criminal threat, even as they tried to treat them like lepers by defending a law that banned them from most public places while carrying.

The Violence Policy Center attempts to smear those with CCW permits as "killers", but instead ends up further proving how rare it is for them to commit crime.

But according to the website itself, of the 2,512 total people purportedly killed by “concealed carry killers” from May 2007 to January 2024, over 1,500 were suicide victims who killed no one but themselves:

The Violence Policy Center’s website thus exploits the deaths of those who died by suicide to inflate its count in service of its anti-gun goals. Worse yet, it disparages their memory by calling them “killers,” no different than criminals who intentionally harm others. They are not the same, and their deaths do not support the notion that concealed carry permit holders present a grave risk to the public at large. Moreover, the data does not say where these deaths took place. Presumably, the overwhelming majority of those who died by suicide died in their own homes. This makes much of the data entirely irrelevant to concerns about carry of firearms in public places by those with CCW permits.

In any case, what is most remarkable is that the "Concealed Carry Killers" data actually supports the argument that Americans with CCW permits are overwhelmingly law-abiding. After removing the 1,505 suicide victims from the data, 1,007 total people killed by “concealed carry killers” remain. Only 544 of these are killings with resulting convictions. The rest are some mix of unintentional shootings, murder-suicides, claimed self-defense shootings, and cases still under investigation. But for the sake of argument, let's assume that all 1,007 involved cold-blooded killers.

From May 2007 to January 2024, 1,007 killings across nearly 16 years is an average of about 63 killings per year. To put this figure in its proper context, one must compare it to the number of Americans who lawfully carry firearms. According to data from the University of Washington, “in 2019 approximately 16 million adult handgun owners had carried a loaded handgun on their person in the past month.” According to the Crime Prevention Research Center , the figure has risen to 22 million as of 2022.

Going with the lower 2019 figure for the sake of argument, if about 16 million Americans legally carry, and 63 killings result per year, that is an annual homicide rate of around 0.39 per 100,000 people. According to the CDC, the overall national homicide rate was 7.5 per 100,000 people in 2022.

In other words, even according to the questionable "Concealed Carry Killers" data, and making every assumption in the Violence Policy Center's favor, Americans who legally carry firearms are about 19 times less likely to commit homicide than the general population. If they were their own country, it would be a safer country than Switzerland. This hardly supports claims that such persons are so uniquely dangerous that they must be disarmed in most places.

Conclusion: antigun politicians should quit harassing people with CCW permits, as they are clearly not the problem.

If the goal is reduced crime, passing laws harassing those with CCW permits simply does not make any sense. Politicians determined to continue to attack this group with endless anti-carry legislation are dangerously ignorant of the plentiful data. Or much worse, they are aware of the data and support anti-carry laws anyway, as their goal is not increased safety, but rather punishment of a politically disfavored group that generally does not vote for them.

To support more work like this in addition to our litigation efforts, please become a member and/or donate to CRPA:

Moros is a young lawyer who is an associate at Chuck Michel's firm in Long Beach, who has been doing some great work for the CRPA the past few years, and who also takes the trouble to post a lot of good information on his Twitter account. Though this particular topic is evergreen, he does a good job laying out the case, again, that puts the lie to the gun controller's long-standing fearmongering about armed civilians exercising their God-given 2A rights.

A good account to follow if you don't already.

Americans with CCW Permits Almost Never Commit Crime.

There's a very strong and obvious logic underlying this statement, which should be obvious to legislators and leftists

Unfortunately, such people form opinions solely on emotion.

Unfortunately, such people form opinions solely on emotion.

When the facts are not in my favor, I have to try something. Desperate times call for desperate measures.

I am now following on Twitter.👍