Time for the TLA decoder ring:
CDC: Center for Disease Control and Prevention
DGUs: Defensive Gun Uses
FOIA: Freedom of Information Act
With that out of the way….
I was working on my book in 2020 when COVID hit. During the year, I became extremely frustrated with the CDC. Their advice sucked, to put it bluntly. My mom was 88 then, and I was highly concerned that my ignorance of COVID would kill her. I had to put down the research and work I was doing on my book and spend 2020 researching infectious diseases. What a freaking pain!
Fast forward to now, mom is set to turn 91 soon. After a lot of tough family times in 2022, I’m hopeful 2023 will be better. However, the fact is that I never forgave the CDC for their bumbling COVID response (one that continues to this day). I almost want to yell, “You had ONE job….”
From 2021 to October 2022, my research into violent crimes and self-defense was completed, and my text was finalized. During this period, I noticed that the CDC was changing the DGU section of their Firearms Fast Facts page. They finally removed all the DGU statistics and said more research would be needed. I put that in my book as I thought it was odd.
There was a reason for it – pressure from groups with known anti-gun ties. I recommend that you read this article in its entirety.
In my book, I also criticize the Gun Violence Archive for how it counts DGUs and quote from the same passage the article does. Additionally, I discuss why DGUs are so hard to track. However, Kleck and English have produced some outstanding research on DGUs, and there is no reason why the CDC should not post that info.
Here are a couple of points to help understand DGUs and injurious violent crime
- The vast majority of injurious violent crimes are not committed with firearms.
- In the vast majority of DGUs, the firearm is not discharged.
When you understand these two things, you will understand why you do not bring fists to a gunfight. To clarify, when your attacker feels they can overwhelm you with their physicality (or with a non-firearm weapon), and you defend yourself by pulling a gun, your fleeing attacker just showed an instinctive understanding of the principle not to bring fists to a gunfight.
Furthermore, you can understand why DGUs are so hard to track. If there is no injury, video footage, audio recordings, or other physical evidence, it becomes harder to charge someone with a crime. It is one person’s word against another (I’m sure law enforcement gets tired of hearing adults act like children with “He started it!”). However, there is a wrinkle. If you say you pulled your gun in self-defense as part of a DGU, you are admitting to committing an aggravated assault with a firearm, but it was justified because of the circumstances. These are the exact circumstances that cannot be verified by physical evidence. So the question becomes: Do you want to take the chance that the court will find it unjustified?
This reason is the primary one why I feel the law should be changed. In the absence of physical evidence for a non-injurious DGU, I should be given the benefit of the doubt if there is disagreement about what happened. Why me? Well, I have a concealed carry permit. The state of Arizona has all ten of my fingerprints and my picture and conducted an extensive background check on me (and does so every time I renew, if not more). Also, the Federal government has my picture and all ten fingerprints. Why? Because I own restricted National Firearms Act (NFA) items. If it is my word against someone else’s who has not gone through such checks, my word should count more.
I don’t expect any changes to the law in my lifetime, so you may want to add devices to help gather physical evidence. Since most DGUs happen at home or on the home’s property, you’ll want to read my detailed discussion of home defense in my book. Implementing a basic set of my recommendations will get you all the physical evidence you need, but also, it will probably keep the situation where a DGU unfolded from ever happening.
If you carry a weapon, you should seriously consider body cameras and audio recording capability when you go between your vehicle/hotel to a destination (and back again), assuming your state allows one-party consent for audio recording. This equipment could be the difference between a DGU being ruled as self-defense versus an aggravated assault.