Good guys with guns do, indeed, stop active shooters.
The FBI’s 2021 report on “active shooter incidents,” which was published this month, indicated that armed private citizens terminated four active shooters.
The FBI defines “active shooter incidents” as “one or more individuals actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a populated area.”
There are additional restrictions to the definition. For example, drug violence and gang violence are excluded. To better understand how the FBI defines “active shooter incidents,” consult the full report below.
In a press release, Second Amendment Foundation founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb said this data underscores the need to embrace carry rights under the 2A as these incidents are, unfortunately, on the rise.
“It is important to acknowledge these citizen first responders, and the countless lives their heroic actions saved,” said. “Truly, these were good guys with guns.”
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“There is one revelation in the report for 2021 that underscores the importance of right-to-carry laws,” Gottlieb noted. “According to the FBI, active shooter data shows an upward trend in such incidents.”
“People have a right to defend themselves and their loved ones if they are caught in the middle of such mayhem,” he continued. “Unquestionably, in each of the four cases cited by the FBI report, lives were saved.”
In total, there were 61 active shooter incidents last year and all but one of the perps were males. While four of them were slain by armed citizens, 30 were taken into police custody, 14 were killed by law enforcement, one was killed in a vehicle accident, 11 committed suicide and one remains on the loose, per the report, which is embedded below:
“Each year,” said Gottlieb, “there are tens of thousands of cases in which private citizens use firearms in self-defense. The four incidents in which the criminals were killed represent a small but significant part of this larger story. The bottom line is that our Second Amendment rights are just as relevant today as they have ever been.”
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At a time when the nation is searching for solutions to these attacks in the wake of a racially-motivated shooting at a supermarket in Buffalo, NY, and a school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, the subject of armed citizen responders as means to deter and stop these killers must be part of the conversation.
Because the sad reality is evil and deranged men will continue to attempt to take the lives of innocents regardless of what laws are on the books. And when they do, responding swiftly with force, including deadly force, is the optimal way — really the only way — to ensure they stop.