FBI provides inaccurate data on active shootings, armed citizens stopping gunmen, researcher says

Federal data undercounts both the number of active shooter incidents across the country and how often concealed carry holders stop gunmen before police can, says a leading crime researcher who investigated the numbers.

The FBI’s database of active shooter incidents either misclassifies or leaves out several instances that meet its own criteria of the kind of crime that grabs headlines and influences legislative changes around gun laws, according to a recent study by John Lott from the Crime Prevention Research Center.

Between 2014 and 2024, the agency recorded 374 active shooting incidents, with armed citizens stopping just 14 of those attacks.

Active shootings are defined by the FBI as a gunman killing or attempting to kill people in a public place. Gang slayings and homicides stemming from other crimes, such as robberies or carjackings, are not included in the statistics.

After combing through media reports over that same time frame, Mr. Lott said in his study published at the end of September that the true number that meets the FBI’s own standards is 561 active shooting incidents. But of those, 202 — or 36% — were thwarted by a concealed carry holder who happened to be in the area.

The FBI’s incomplete data, Mr. Lott said in an interview with The Washington Times, is a reference point for media coverage, courtroom arguments, academic research and policy debates that frequently seek to curtail gun ownership by means such as gun-free zones.

“This flawed data that they use is used constantly in those things,” he continued. “It just seems if we care about trying to make people safer, then we’ve got to have accurate data on these things.”

The researcher said gun-free zones create an easy target for successful mass shooters.

Robin Westman, the gunman who killed two children and wounded 21 other people in an August shooting at Annunciation Catholic Church and School in Minneapolis, said in his manifesto that he drew inspiration from other killers who sought out places where firearms were banned.

“I recently heard a rumor that James Holmes, the Aurora theater shooter, may have chosen venues that were ’gun-free zones.’ I would probably aim the same way,” Westman wrote in a manifesto linked to him. “Holmes wanted to make sure his victims would be unarmed. That’s why I and many others like schools so much. At least for me, I am focused on them.”

Mr. Lott said the mass shooters share some fairly similar qualities — most feel underappreciated, are suicidal and are seeking attention. He said gun-free zones offer them soft targets to get that attention, and many don’t plan on living through their attacks.

But outside those zones, Mr. Lott said, it’s not as rare for a concealed-carry holder to jump into action.

The best-known such incident was when Elisjsha Dicken shot and killed a gunman Jonathan Douglas Sapirman just seconds after he started his 2022 rampage at a mall in Greenwood, Indiana. Sapirman killed two and wounded three others before Mr. Dicken fatally shot him.

Just this past February in Crozet, Virginia, police said an off-duty federal agent shot and killed gunman Justin Barber after he opened fire in a Harris Teeter parking lot. Barber had killed two people when he was stopped by the law enforcement officer using his personal weapon.

And despite some TV shows stoking fear about armed citizens being irresponsible with their firearms, Mr. Lott said he’s found no instances of a concealed-carry holder in such a scenario unintentionally shooting an innocent person.

Mr. Lott cited other reports in which the FBI acknowledged that its database on active shooting incidents is not meant to be comprehensive, but rather to serve as a “baseline understanding” of how frequently gunmen take aim at the public.

He said the federal agency should seek to be more accurate about those incidents, and how often lawful gun owners intervene, because police officers want more concealed-carry holders to step in when they can’t.

“There are surveys that are done of police generally, and what you find is that police officers are overwhelmingly positive of private ownership of guns to stop crime,” Mr. Lott said.