Gun Law May Be Averting Mass Shootings In California, Study Finds

LOS ANGELES, CA — In the wake of mass shootings in Gilroy, El Paso and Dayton, lawmakers in California are considering a string of bills aimed at expanding the state’s red flag laws, which allow courts to temporarily ban people deemed a threat from possessing firearms.

The first state to enact a red flag law, California is now poised to adopt, by far, the most stringent of such laws. But do red flag laws work?

A study released this month is one of the few to examine just how effective California’s law has been. The UC Davis School of Medicine red flag law study looked at 21 out of 414 cases where people had firearms removed or gun purchases blocked under the state's red flag law. In all 21 cases, the individual did not go on to commit any gun-related violence.

Supporters of measures to expand red flag laws see the study as proof that they work. Critics, however, contend that there is no way to know if the individuals would have committed violence had their guns not been removed.

“We can’t prove that the orders are responsible for the outcome,” Garen Wintemute, a professor of emergency medicine and the director of the Violence Prevention Research Program told the Los Angeles Times. “But there is an obvious logic to this — that if somebody is posing an imminent threat, whether it’s to others or to themselves, and firearms are a part of that threat, recovering the firearms can help reduce the threat.”

Opponents of restrictive gun laws scoff at the idea that researchers can draw any conclusions about what would have happened without intervention.

“There is no way for them to quantify what would have happened had they not issued” the orders, Sam Paredes, the executive director of Gun Owners of California told the Times.

According to the study’s authors, “Nearly 80% of perpetrators of mass violence in public places make explicit threats or behave in a manner indicative of their intent to carry out an attack. For example, public mass shootings in Parkland, Florida; Aurora, Colorado; and Tucson, Arizona, among others, were committed by assailants known to family members, acquaintances, law enforcement agencies, and in some cases health professionals to be at high risk for violence.”

Since California’s law went into effect in 2016, it’s been used 414 times, and the vast majority of the gun owners targeted are white men. A full 91 percent were men, and 61 percent were white, according to the study. They ranged in age from 14 to 65. In those 21 cases, 52 guns were confiscated and kept for at least a year.

Those who saw their guns taken away included:

• A 21-year-old man, who threatened to shoot up his former high school on social media,
• A 31-year-old Islamic State supporter on a terror watch list, who told an acquaintance he wanted to commit a mass shooting,
• A 48-year-old Iraq War vet with PTSD, who threatened to shoot veterans service center employees,
• A 31-year-old car dealership employee who threatened a workplace shooting.

The UC Davis researchers plan to dive deep into some of the hundreds of other cases. In the meantime, state lawmakers aren’t waiting for new results.

Assemblyman Phil Ting (D-San Francisco) proposed a law that would expand the state's red flag laws to allow co-workers, employers and school employees to petition the courts in addition to the current law, which allows immediate family members and roommates to petition.

Another proposal would would keep allow the courts to confiscate guns for up to five years instead of the current one year time-limit.

Lawmakers have reason to hope they will succeed in passing stricter gun laws in California.

Gov. Gavin Newsom issued a challenge to lawmakers following the most recent mass shootings: "Failure to act on gun violence is a damn disgrace," he said.