Originally appeared in Newsletter Vol. x, No. y, December 1999

TEN AMERICAN CHILDREN DIE EVERY DAY FROM GUN VIOLENCE AND THREE OF THOSE DEATHS ARE SUICIDE VICTIMS These violent statistics occurring in the U.S. are not related to terrorist attacks.

According to Karen Brock, Violence Policy Center health policy analyst, "Children can't legally buy handguns, children can't legally possess handguns -- yet they are killing each other with handguns. The reason: children still have easy access to handguns because of the lax practices of an unregulated gun industry and the mistaken idea that a handgun in the home offers protection, when in reality it is far more likely to result in horrific consequences."

Kids in the Line of Fire: Children, Handguns, and Homicide is a first-time analysis of handgun murders of children up to age 17 concerning unpublished Federal Bureau of Investigation homicide data. During the period 1995 through 1999 (the most recent data available) nearly one-third of child victims were murdered by another child with a handgun (2 per day). The study contains both national and state statistics. The overall national rate of child handgun homicide victims was 1.20 per 100,000. In California, it was 2.19 per 100,000.

The Children's Defense Fund report on children and gun violence shows that the number of children and teenagers killed in one year dropped below 4000 for the first time since 1988. The number, 3792, equals just over 10 children every day. Where are outrage and calls for leaders to enact a national policy on gun safety? To be effective, these must include: registration and licensing, safe storage laws, trigger locks, and consumer safety regulations for firearms.

Teen suicides are occurring at crisis levels, which prompted a first-ever U.S. Senate hearing on teen suicides, according to the Sept. 19, 2001 Children & Youth Funding Report. Data shows that in 1998, more teens and adults died from suicide than from teenage cancer, heart disease, AIDS, birth defects, stroke, pneumonia, influenza and chronic lung disease combined. There were 1241 youth suicides with guns in 1998, equivalent to more than three every day.

A 19-year old youth went to a shooting center in Delray Beach, Florida and rented a .357-caliber gun. He also purchased an Osama bin Laden target. According to detectives, he shot the target twice, and then killed himself. No federal law specifically addresses the rental of guns on the premises of a shooting range.

Now law-enforcement officials are questioning a policy that allows teens to rent firearms. Officials at the state Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) said federal law is unclear on whether renting a gun to a 19-year old is against the law. Current law prohibits a person from "selling, delivering, or otherwise transferring a handgun to a person under 18." However, another federal law states that a licensed dealer cannot sell or deliver any firearm other than a shotgun or rifle to anyone under 21. The ATF chief counsel's office in Washington, D.C. is examining the issue further.

We can't blame these tragic statistics affecting our nation's children on terrorism, only on the resistance to sensible gun control policies.

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