Inequitable Penalties? The Tales of Two Gun Researchers

[GEM]

I have a break, in a sense - this debate of fractions shows how far off the mark the discussion is. To me, the point is whether law abiding citizens can prevent crimes with firearms. The confirmation of such a thesis from Lott or Kleck is a good thing for debate. However, the principal that law abiding citizens can protect themselves is indisputable.

Let's see - where I live, there was a rapist who had served time. He had horribly assaulted a woman many years before. Now being out, he started to harass a women at the health club - one night he crawled through her window and was promptly shot with a Glock 21. Did she care what 12/13 was? Thus, that gun prevented a crime. Perhaps she would have been better off mutilated?

Looking at Tim's blog, it is clear that he is fixated on the evil that guns do. He is particularly fixated on Lott. But I don't see on his web page where he has published in the scholarly journals on the subject. If I missed it, sorry.

I pose the question again, Tim - do you have anything to offer besides being fixated on Lott?

What is your opinion of law abiding citizens owning firearms as a basic right, for self-defense and defense against tyranny?

Otherwise, your fixation is interesting and I propose again that you join the scholarly debate as compared to a web log.

I would also like your response as to what you would have done if the gentleman above came in your window. I will assure you that his physical capacities probably far exceeded your own.

The data are clear that CCW laws don't massively increase crime rate and it is clear that people do defend themselves. So what do you think about this or are you just fixated on no one having guns? Let the next few years deal with Lott specifically. What do you think about the overall issue?

 

[agricola]

tdperk,

Murders arent recorded in the BCS because they are always going to be recorded in the Police Statistics and are not going to be recorded via the BCS.

Rapes are recorded in the BCS, so he could have used them as the link below demonstrates:

http://www.crimestatistics.org.uk/output/page60.asp

For a start, there has not been "a ban on gun ownership" that would allow a comparison - since 1967 there has been successive pieces of legislation that has narrowed what can be held. This is one of the things that Lott falls down on - between 1988 and 1997 the UK already had a very stringent firearms control system in place, and (as has been repeated ad infinitum here and with only very few exceptions) no firearms held for self defence; the contention that Lott, Malcolm and others have held that the 1997 ban caused a rise in crime is therefore spurious, having no basis in fact.

You can see criminal statistics detailing the number of firearms offences between 1989 and 1999/2000 here . That is the last year the HMSO published the details on the web, the more recent data is all .pdf and can be reached from my first link.

I would also point out that Lambert's website details the charges against Lott, provides links to all of the evidence for independent verification and in general he produces a very compelling case - the UK parts especially. However I fear that the reluctance from the pro-gun lobby to give Lott the boot he so clearly deserves (its funny that
this thread isnt mentioned more) just gives the man credibility, up until the time he finally is exposed and causes more damage.

 

[Gunstar1]

Agricola

er... domestic assaults are included in the BCS

Not nearly all of them: From the BCS page 81.

"The issue of willingness to disclose incidents is very important for domestic violence. The 1996 BCS included a self-completion module on domestic violence that is viewed as providing a more complete measure of domestic violence (Mirrlees-Black, 1999). Prevalence rates for domestic assault in 1995 derived from the self-completion module were around three times higher for women and 10 times higher for men. The 2001 BCS contained a special selfcompletion module on inter-personal violence (domestic violence, sexual assault and stalking) and a report on results from this module is in preparation."​

So they know that face to face questions will result in lower results. If you are looking for accuracy, why not just use the self-completion modules?
It does not have a breakdown for men and women in the BCS but the total for Domestic Violence is 550,000 or so. If there were only 20,000 domestic Assaults on men, then the real total could be 180,000 more crimes. The BCS is low-balling the number here.

Murders arent recorded in the BCS because they are always going to be recorded in the Police Statistics and are not going to be recorded via the BCS.

So the BCS yearly total should be another 1,048 higher.

Rapes are recorded in the BCS, so he could have used them as the link below demonstrates:

From the page you linked to:

"While the BCS does not measure sexual offences as a specific category, it does periodically include a self-completion section within the survey, which provides the best available measure of sexual offences in England & Wales.

According to the BCS self-completion survey in 2000:
0.9% of women aged 16 to 59 were subject to some form of sexual victimisation (including rape) during the last year."
​

The last year they did this was 2000. This is not a part of the 2002-2003 data. So rape is NOT included in the Violent Crime total.
In fact the census for england says of the 50,000,000+ people in England and Wales that roughly half are females, so +-25,000,000 females in England and Wales.
Then 63% are aged 16-59 so that is +-15,750,000.
Then .9% were victimized during that period so that is +-141,750 females subjected to violent crime if you use the data from today with the population percent from 2000.
So benefit of the doubt that is another 100,000 violent crimes that are not reported in the BCS.

So that is a low ball 200,000 - 300,000 violent crimes the report admits it does not count.

You can see criminal statistics detailing the number of firearms offences between 1989 and 1999/2000 here . That is the last year the HMSO published the details on the web, the more recent data is all .pdf and can be reached from my first link.

Again from the BCS but quoting police data for 2003/2004:

"In 2003/04 there were a provisional 10,340 firearm offences in England and Wales. This was an increase of less than one per cent since 2002/03 (Figure 5.6). The number of offences has risen each year since 1997/98, but the 2003/04 rise is the smallest. (my emphasis)" page 79​

And on page 80 is "Figure 5.6 Recorded crimes involving firearms other than air weapons, 2003/04"
Which shows a graph at 1997/98 at about 5,000 and for 2003/04 at about 10,340 with a continual rise in between.

Does this prove Lott correct? No. But it does show a casual relationship. Which at least hints that Lott is on the right track.

For a start, there has not been "a ban on gun ownership" that would allow a comparison - since 1967 there has been successive pieces of legislation that has narrowed what can be held. This is one of the things that Lott falls down on - between 1988 and 1997 the UK already had a very stringent firearms control system in place, and (as has been repeated ad infinitum here and with only very few exceptions) no firearms held for self defence; the contention that Lott, Malcolm and others have held that the 1997 ban caused a rise in crime is therefore spurious, having no basis in fact.

Well, from what we here in America, banning all guns will reduce gun violence. The UK has pretty much banned all working firearms, yet the gun crimes continue to rise. Even if nobody registered a gun for self defense before 97, there are still people today using guns in the UK for self defense, illegally. In fact, the ban should work better since it was gradual and there have been many years to comply with the law.

Gun crimes rise in a country surrounded by water (so no fair saying it is a neighbor state or country bringing them across the boarder) and dispite banning more and more guns, the total gun crimes continues to rise.

It could be the new laws are simply making criminals out of previous law abiding citizens and that is causing the rise. If so Lott would be wrong.

Tim just points to the BCS and says Lott is wrong. Dispite the various places the BCS says it does not include data, and yet includes harrasment data that is non-violent.

I wonder if Tim can even admin Lott could be right about anything. So far his response to all my postings is that Lott "should have" used the BCS instead of the actual data.

As I have said previously, as soon as Tim admits the BCS is flawed for compairing to Lott's number or can tell me why all these flaws in the BCS as written are better than calculating with the actual data, I will shut up.

And I would really like to shut up.

 

[agricola]

Gunstar1,

Please read the most recent BCS and Criminal Statistics before making these remarks.

So they know that face to face questions will result in lower results. If you are looking for accuracy, why not just use the self-completion modules?

The self-completion modules are periodic - 1996 and 2000 - and I believe targetted at specific areas of crime.

It does not have a breakdown for men and women in the BCS but the total for Domestic Violence is 550,000 or so. If there were only 20,000 domestic Assaults on men, then the real total could be 180,000 more crimes. The BCS is low-balling the number here.

No, because the most recent BCS does have a breakdown for men and women as this .pdf demonstrates (page 81, remarkably enough). Given that the most recent count of domestic violence is 446,000 incidents split male female at 33-67, where did the figure of "20,000 domestic assaults on men" come from?

So the BCS yearly total should be another 1,048 higher.

No, because the BCS is a survey and throwing criminal statistics, from another source, would distort the results. Secondly the BCS seeks to interview victims, which in cases of homicide clearly cannot be done.

The last year they did this was 2000. This is not a part of the 2002-2003 data. So rape is NOT included in the Violent Crime total.
In fact the census for england says of the 50,000,000+ people in England and Wales that roughly half are females, so +-25,000,000 females in England and Wales.
Then 63% are aged 16-59 so that is +-15,750,000.
Then .9% were victimized during that period so that is +-141,750 females subjected to violent crime if you use the data from today with the population percent from 2000.
So benefit of the doubt that is another 100,000 violent crimes that are not reported in the BCS.

So that is a low ball 200,000 - 300,000 violent crimes the report admits it does not count.

Firstly the percentage of rapes in the self-completion survey was .4, not .9 (which referred to overall instances of "sexual victimization"). Secondly the data is provided via this .pdf, which could be extrapolated out from that.

Again from the BCS but quoting police data for 2003/2004:

"In 2003/04 there were a provisional 10,340 firearm offences in England and Wales. This was an increase of less than one per cent since 2002/03 (Figure 5.6). The number of offences has risen each year since 1997/98, but the 2003/04 rise is the smallest. (my emphasis)" page 79


And on page 80 is "Figure 5.6 Recorded crimes involving firearms other than air weapons, 2003/04"
Which shows a graph at 1997/98 at about 5,000 and for 2003/04 at about 10,340 with a continual rise in between.

Does this prove Lott correct? No. But it does show a casual relationship. Which at least hints that Lott is on the right track.

It shows nothing of the kind. Everton Football Club last faced a relegation battle on the last day of the 1997-98 season. Since they beat the drop, gun crime has risen. Accordingly, Everton's continued presence in the top flight of English football is responsible for gun crime.

Well, from what we here in America, banning all guns will reduce gun violence. The UK has pretty much banned all working firearms, yet the gun crimes continue to rise. Even if nobody registered a gun for self defense before 97, there are still people today using guns in the UK for self defense, illegally. In fact, the ban should work better since it was gradual and there have been many years to comply with the law.

How can that possibly be evidenced?

Also the UK has not "pretty much banned all working firearms".

Gun crimes rise in a country surrounded by water (so no fair saying it is a neighbor state or country bringing them across the boarder) and dispite banning more and more guns, the total gun crimes continues to rise.

You ban cats, and the result would be an increase in cat crime. You hit the nail on the head when you say:

It could be the new laws are simply making criminals out of previous law abiding citizens and that is causing the rise. If so Lott would be wrong.

I would add "increasing the amount of behaviours that have been criminalized" - the more things you can get arrested for, usually the more people will get arrested.

Tim just points to the BCS and says Lott is wrong. Dispite the various places the BCS says it does not include data, and yet includes harrasment data that is non-violent.

And yet harrassment and no-injury assaults are included in the "violent crime" category in Police statistics - facts which dont seem to trouble Lott when he claims "violent crime rises in England".

 

[fallingblock]

While you're here, Agricola....

And since it seems relevant to the discussion.....

What's your take on Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir John Stevens announcement that the laws on self defense need to be clarified in favour of the defender?

I realise that Sir John is retiring, thus his statement is more of a "parting shot" than a declaration of policy.

Any chance that the police bureaucracy supports the idea?

 

[agricola]

Probably more of a parting shot, but he made good points, though I would disagree that the law isnt clear on the issue - the law and caselaw are very clear (genuine self defence always being identified pre-trial or at trial and upheld); where the confusion arises is because elements of the media have seen fit to throw lies, fabrications and bias into the mix.

Incidentally, this can be seen in the way that certain media outlets have reported the Commissioners' comments - check the language used in the headlines, and what two of the most pro-Martin papers (the Evening Standard and Sun) decided what wasnt worth passing on:

http://www.thisislondon.com/news/articles/PA_NEWPOLICEForceSat7Policeatta?source=&ct=5
http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2004561645,00.html

here is the original:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/mai...4.xml&sSheet=/portal/2004/12/04/ixportal.html

and the BBC report:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/4067681.stm

I would add that the problem I have is not with the issue of self-defence, because we already have a system that robustly defends homeowners and anyone else who uses force, including deadly force, to protect themselves. What I take issue with is the way in which the media - in exactly (if less successfully) the same way as they did after Dunblane and Hungerford - have sought to force political opinion down one path.

 

[fallingblock]

Thanks, agricola.....

"Incidentally, this can be seen in the way that certain media outlets have reported the Commissioners' comments - check the language used in the headlines, and what two of the most pro-Martin papers (the Evening Standard and Sun) decided what wasnt worth passing on:"
*********************************************************


Yes. I read the "Telegraph" article initially.

Many of the print media certainly are earning the sobriquet "presstitutes".


*********************************************************
"I would add that the problem I have is not with the issue of self-defence, because we already have a system that robustly defends homeowners and anyone else who uses force, including deadly force, to protect themselves."
*********************************************************

My problem with current British law is the "proportional force" emphasis.

It would be more just, IMHO, if the defender was given more tolerance under the law, even if force used is 'disproportionate'.


*********************************************************
"What I take issue with is the way in which the media - in exactly (if less successfully) the same way as they did after Dunblane and Hungerford - have sought to force political opinion down one path."
*********************************************************


Yes. We in Australia witnessed such a media circus following the shootings at Port Arthur than even those with no interest in firearms were aghast at the feeding frenzy of the anti-gun press.

I suppose there is advantage to media promoting misunderstanding...
controversy sells papers.

 

[agricola]

fallingblock,

My problem with current British law is the "proportional force" emphasis.

It would be more just, IMHO, if the defender was given more tolerance under the law, even if force used is 'disproportionate'.

Thats the thing - they (the defendants) already are, and the "proportional force" element is massively overemphasised by the press, the "scholars" like Lott and (especially, as Tim demonstrated) Malcolm - indeed its doubtful if (when one looks at caselaw) it remains in existance:

All putative self-defence, it seems, falls into the category of “necessary self-defence.†In this part of the judgment, the idea that the defendant’s belief is merely evidence of reasonableness has suddenly vanished; indeed, the very word “reasonable†is dropped. It seems, therefore, that the decision makes a radical change in the law. At least where the defender fears death or serious injury, there is no proportionality rule any longer; and a good thing too—in view of the jury’s verdict in Shannon. German law, it seems, gets on without a proportionality rule, and so could we, where the facts are similar to those in Shannon. The reasoning in the decision is fudged, but that is the price one pays for a beneficial change in the law.

from here

Again, this is yet more evidence of Tim identifying clearly fraudulent behaviour. Can anyone be found to condemn Malcolm on this?

edited to add "defendants" - in the sense of "those that defend themselves", not in the judicial sense of the word.

 

[Gunstar1]

I did read some of the 2003/2004 data, but since Tim was using 2002/2003 data, that is the report I used.

Except for the gun crimes.
So any notes to the BCS are using the link Tim provided, which was the 2002/2003 survey. I know the 2003/2004 survey has a better breakdown, but that is not what Tim used to prove Lott was "wrong"

If the data did not exist in the 2002/2003 survey, that is what I reported. Don't gripe at me for not using 2003/2004 survey, when I am intentionally using 2002/2003 data just as Tim used.

The self-completion modules are periodic - 1996 and 2000 - and I believe targetted at specific areas of crime.

did you ignore what I quoted? The domestic assaults are grossly under represented on the BCS, just as the BCS says. 3 times higher for females and 10 times for males.

No, because the most recent BCS does have a breakdown for men and women as this .pdf demonstrates (page 81, remarkably enough). Given that the most recent count of domestic violence is 446,000 incidents split male female at 33-67, where did the figure of "20,000 domestic assaults on men" come from?

The male - female breakdown is not in the 2002-2003 BCS that Tim used. Since the data was not included, I wanted to show how grossly off it was, but without the actual data I used a low made up number that was far lower than the actual total would be and demonstrated. But now that you have provided the correct info, let me update it, for the 2003/2004 survey.
From BCS 2003/2004:

Prevalence rates for domestic violence derived from the 2001 self-completion module were around five times higher for all adults than those obtained from the face-to-face interviews.

446,000 x 5 = 2,230,000
2004 BCS is roughly 1,784,000 crimes shy of totals they would probably get with modules.
Do you think 1.8 MILLION extra violent crimes might throw that graph showing total violent crimes off a little?
Why not just make the module yearly and not ask the face to face domestic violence questions?

The self-completion modules are periodic - 1996 and 2000 - and I believe targetted at specific areas of crime.

Yes I quoted this in my last post, and my point was make it yearly for the most accuate info. If you know a module shows the most accuate data, why not use it yearly?

Firstly the percentage of rapes in the self-completion survey was .4, not .9 (which referred to overall instances of "sexual victimization"). Secondly the data is provided via this .pdf, which could be extrapolated out from that.

Not in 2002/2003 it is not included. So if you take my +-141,750 minus what the BCS reported sexual victimization in the 2003/04 total of 52,070 is drum roll... 89,680 more unreported crimes.


Again tell me how a few million violent crimes the BCS did not report shows that the BCS' downward violent crime trend is accurate as Tim insists?

 

[agricola]

Gunstar,

So in essence what you are saying is the BCS is inaccurate because it doesnt cover every single crime that might exist? Why then does Lott get a pass for using numbers that include even less? The BCS is only of use if it remains the same over a period of years and rises, and falls, in crimes can be demonstrated.

The reason the face-to-face interviews are used rather than self-completion forms is probably because the interviewer is going to have a better idea of what constitutes a "domestic incident" than the person filling in the form will have.

I also dont know which BCS you are using, but the 2002/3 data has the breakdown of BCS domestic violence by sex, its on page 97 onwards.

 

[Gunstar1]

So in essence what you are saying is the BCS is inaccurate because it doesnt cover every single crime that might exist? Why then does Lott get a pass for using numbers that include even less? The BCS is only of use if it remains the same over a period of years and rises, and falls, in crimes can be demonstrated.

Close, what I am saying is that the BCS should not be used as the end all proof that total violent crimes in the UK have gone down since it does not include all types of violent crimes, or if it does include certain violent crimes the BCS admits that the numbers may be higher than what is printed.

On Tim's website he imply's that Lott is incorrectly using the police recorded crimes. To prove that violent crimes have not risen he posts the BCS violent crime trend. How does Tim know where Lott chose to pull his data from. He apparently guesses that Lott is using police data and claims Lott is using it incorrectly.

Maybe Lott did use the BCS, and did exactly as I did in figuring out what the actual numbers for different violent crimes might really be, as suggested in the BCS.

Do I know Lott did it this way? Nope
Does Tim know Lott got his information soley from the police recorded crimes? Nope

To say the police data is wrong while the BCS is correct, is grossly misleading. Neither are completly wrong or right. They both contain different information from different sources that mean different things.

The BCS is only the crimes people told the interviewers. The police record is only of those crimes reported to the police. Both are flawed in the same way, so neither can be proof that violent crimes have gone up or down.

Lott does not say what data he used, whether police or BCS in the report. Tim says Lott used the police, I have no idea how Tim knows this since Lott did not say.

Why does Lott get away with this stuff? Frankly, this kind of stuff happens in all fields. Such as the VPC's report that said 1 in 5 police officers were killed with an assault weapon. Big news unless you know that guns that were exempted by name (such as the mini-14) in the federal assault weapons ban were counted as assault weapons by the VPC.

I will say this again, I am not for or against Lott.
I do not think the BCS is a junk report. It simply reports what was learned.
However I do think that Tim is using the BCS data improperly to try to prove Lott is wrong.

Tim would have done better trying to find out where the data came from and what crimes Lott considers are violent crimes and what are serious violent crimes. Then recreating Lott's research using those sources.

Police recorded crimes show an increase in violent crimes.
BCS recorded crimes show a decrease in violent crimes.
Both under report the true number of violent crimes. So neither one can represent true violent crime totals for all violent crimes. Tim is misleading readers by saying that the BCS does show this total. When it does not.

 

[agricola]

To say the police data is wrong while the BCS is correct, is grossly misleading. Neither are completly wrong or right. They both contain different information from different sources that mean different things.

That isnt what he has been saying. From his website:

To summarize: the increase in the police recorded violent crime was caused by changes in the crimes counted and increased recording. The underlying violent crime rate, as measured by the BCS in fact declined significantly.

http://cgi.cse.unsw.edu.au/~lambert/cgi-bin/blog/guns/UK/malcolm.html

The Police stats have been affected by at least two major changes since 1997. The BCS has been unaffected by such changes, so long-term trends in it are more likely to be correct in terms of that survey.

Of course, if Lott and Malcolm and the rest had pointed out that these changes had taken place and that may be one of the reasons why violent crime has apparently risen, there would not be an issue - but they continue to insist that the reason for the post-1997 rise is because of a handgun ban. Such fraudulent behaviour is not unique - I have spent the past two years pointing it out - and it really is time that some of you started to question exactly who is speaking on your behalf.

 

[Gunstar1]

So how come Malcolm reported that the violent crime rate more than doubled from 1997 to 2001? The answer lies in the difference between two different ways crime can be measured. The BCS is a victimization survey. It is conducted by asking a sample of the population questions about any crimes they might have experienced. The other way crime is measured is being collating crimes reported to the police. Because most crime is not reported to the police, surveys like BCS give a much more accurate estimate of the total number of crimes than police reports.

1 million violent crime reports to the police, inaccurate because of the changes in recording requirments (what Tim says Lott used)
2.8 million violent cime reports to the BCS, which makes it a better indicator than police reports. (what Tim says Lott should have used)
4.6 million estimated real world violent crimes, that is the BCS total plus the 1.8 million under reported or not reported violent crimes, which would make this the best indicator of them all (what I think Lott probably used and keep saying Tim should have considered instead of assuming Lott incorrectly used the police records)

As I keep saying, since the BCS does not report some crimes and under reports others, adding the missing violent crime information(murder total) and correcting the under reporting (as I did in several posts) into the BCS total you will have a better indicator of true violent crimes in England and Wales.

If Lott did use this method, he would be using a better indicator than the BCS.
And I keep suggesting that Tim should figure the real world data out instead of assuming Lott used the police data(which I have not seen Lott say anywhere that the info came from the police data)

 

[agricola]

Gunstar,

As I keep saying, since the BCS does not report some crimes and under reports others, adding the missing violent crime information(murder total) and correcting the under reporting (as I did in several posts) into the BCS total you will have a better indicator of true violent crimes in England and Wales.

Not really, because there is no scientific method there, and you have ignored the great problems in that theory of yours.

The BCS is useful because it can identify more crimes than are reported to the Police and provide a better idea of what might be going on. The reasons why rapes and murders are not in it is because firstly, rapes formed a very small element in the BCS return, and secondly the BCS interviews victims - so murder victims by definition cannot be part of the survey.

You also havent addressed Lamberts main problem with the original Lott article - is it ethical to claim that "violent crime has risen in England" as a result of the 1997 gun ban, when the change is so clearly down to a change in recording practices, and a separate, unchanged survey shows that it has in fact fallen?

Dont you think he should have at least pointed that out to his readers?

You also said:

4.6 million estimated real world violent crimes, that is the BCS total plus the 1.8 million under reported or not reported violent crimes, which would make this the best indicator of them all (what I think Lott probably used and keep saying Tim should have considered instead of assuming Lott incorrectly used the police records)

i) where did "1.8 million under-reported or not reported violent crimes" come from;

ii) where is the evidence that Lott used that.

 

[Gunstar1]

i. 3 posts ago, summary of what was said

Agricola: "Given that the most recent count of domestic violence is 446,000 incidents split male female at 33-67, where did the figure of "20,000 domestic assaults on men" come from?

Gunstar1: I used a low made up number that was far lower than the actual total would be and demonstrated. But now that you have provided the correct info, let me update it, for the 2003/2004 survey.

From BCS 2003/2004:

Prevalence rates for domestic violence derived from the 2001 self-completion module were around five times higher for all adults than those obtained from the face-to-face interviews.

446,000 x 5 = 2,230,000
2004 BCS is roughly 1,784,000 crimes shy of totals they would probably get with modules.
(2,230,000 - 446,000 included in BCS already = 1,784,000 or 1.8 million)


ii. Lott is talking about real world total of ALL violent crimes, the BCS does not include all violent crimes, it has reported violent crimes(some of which are under reported). To come closer to the total of all violent crimes you need to add that information to the info in the BCS. Add the data that the BCS does not include, plus the ajustments to the under-reported BCS crimes, with the the general BCS data equals a closer number to a total of all violent crimes than the BCS or police data does.

The police data and the BCS only show what crimes people are willing to report. Neither are truly representative of what is really going on with real world actual violent crimes.

 

[agricola]

gunstar,

In that case (and this is not to say I agree with you - Lott clearly used the Police statistics) Lott's use of such statistics is doubly fraudulent, since he cited rises in statistics that it is an impossibility to collect and which he had no way of collecting.

The only published statistics are the BCS and the Police recorded crime, both represent a means to identify rises and falls in different types of crime, but only one of which has not been changed in the recent past. Accordingly, the BCS should be a more reliable indicator over this period, at least until the Police statistics calm down in terms of changes, which they should now NCRS is in.

To sum up, Lott and others should therefore have (at the very least):

i) pointed out that the Police statistics have been subject to changes in the way they are collated, and that these changes are very likely to be responsible for a good part, if not the whole of, rises in crime;

ii) pointed out that the other means of identifying crime levels - the BCS - did not match that in the Police statistics, indeed it showed the exact opposite.

Also, as was noted above, the reason self-completion modules are not used is probably because the person filling it in is unlikely to define "an incident" in the same way as the next person. I would imagine 100% of people have "domestic incidents" with their partners or family members of one sort or another. Isnt that why most statistical surveys are done by means of interviews?

Not to mention the fact that, if you expand the England and Wales statistics like that, you must also expand the comparative statistics - in this case the US - by a like amount.

 

[TimLambert]

Gunstar, Lott could have got an 118% increase in violent crime by using the police recorded numbers. If you want to argue that he used some other numbers, you need to show that those numbers show a 118% increase. If you still have doubts, why not email him and ask him how he got the 118% number?

 

[TimLambert]

Double standards

The responses by the pro-gun posters here have proven the point of the article that started this thread. Bellesiles published numbers for gun ownership that were too low. In fact, they could not even be derived from the data that he did published. He gets condemned for fraud. Lott publishes number for brandishing in defensive gun use that are too high. In fact, they cannot even be derived from the data he has published. The reaction? "In the ballpark", "within the margin of error", "who cares anyway".

GEM praises Clayton Cramer for contributing "mightly to pointing out problems with Bellesiles" and Lindgren for using his expertise to nail Bellesiles. OTOH, GEM claims that i am "crazy" and "fixated" for daring to criticizing Lott, and studiously ignores Lindgren's nailing of Lott for the missing survey and all the contradictory stories Lott told about it.

I pretty sure I know what the reaction here would be if some anonymous poster came and claimed to have attended the most recent OAH meeting and talked to historians who were doing research into guns in early America that could well vindicate Bellesiles and it was just too early to condemn him. And he couldn't tell you who these historians were because he has been sworn to secrecy.

 

[Gunstar1]

Way off topic yes, but

Gunstar, Lott could have got an 118% increase in violent crime by using the police recorded numbers. If you want to argue that he used some other numbers, you need to show that those numbers show a 118% increase. If you still have doubts, why not email him and ask him how he got the 118% number?

No Tim, if you are trying to prove Lott is wrong, you have to investigate all the possible ways he could have come to that number.

YOU need to show that Lott did not use those numbers. YOU need to ask Lott if he really did use the police data.

I am a fence sitter on what Lott has done. Some of the things he says makes sense, other things make him sound crazy. However I am not trying to prove him right or wrong, I am critizing you for failing to properly prove Lott wrong.

I count at least 4 different places Lott might have got the total from:

1. Police Data
2. BCS data
3. Error corrected BCS data for each year
4. Out of thin air

So of those 4:
Looking at the police data, well that is pretty close, so Lott might have used 1.
Looking at the BCS only, it does not show 118%, so Lott did not use 2.
Did not bother to check 3.
If nothing can be found, it must be 4.

I am not trying to prove Lott is right, I am trying to show you that you are falling short of proving Lott wrong. If you don't ask him what he used then you need to prove that the numbers came from no other source but 1 or 4.

Just because #1 looks like the number does not mean you can ignore #3. I am a vistor to your website, it is your job to convince me Lott could have only used the data from #1 and why it is wrong for Lott to use that data. Unfortunatly you did not. Your argument is built on an assumption that you have failed to prove.

YOU should prove Lott did not use #3, YOU should make sure that 118% could come from no other place but #1 or #4.

You are the one that is trying to prove him wrong so you email him and ask him where the data came from. Post the email you sent to Lott, and anyone else that might know where that data came from.

Your website is trying to convince ME that Lott is incorrect. However you fail to eleminate all the possible ways Lott could have arrived at 118%, nor did you even bother to ask if that is where he got the data.

In that case (and this is not to say I agree with you - Lott clearly used the Police statistics) Lott's use of such statistics is doubly fraudulent, since he cited rises in statistics that it is an impossibility to collect and which he had no way of collecting.

Clearly to you maybe. However, without eliminating all the possibilities Tim has not clearly proved it to me.

The BCS gives what the possible data might be. The latest BCS calculates more info for you than the older ones. But the data can still be calculated.

And if their is some data that cannot be calculated then show why it cannot, and thus Lott could not have used it. If you have not tried to collect the data then you do not know if a data set is not collectable. You cannot tell me what that data is and why it cannot be collected. Only then could you say Lott could not have used #3.

Assumption is not proof.


Back to the topic of the thread:

Bellesiles published numbers for gun ownership that were too low. In fact, they could not even be derived from the data that he did published. He gets condemned for fraud. Lott publishes number for brandishing in defensive gun use that are too high. In fact, they cannot even be derived from the data he has published. The reaction? "In the ballpark", "within the margin of error", "who cares anyway".

No, Bellesiles published numbers for gun ownership that was the opposite of what historians have been saying for years. He said that guns were expensive, only the more wealthy had them, and the poor common people could not afford them. Which is not true.

Lott is publishing numbers for brandishing that is higher than previous studies, but not drastically so.

People are more willing to forgive slight overstatements than out and out lies.

The real problem lies with people trying to prove Lott is wrong but not doing it correctly. By you saying Lott is wrong but not backing it up, leaves people like me to discredit your claim.

Think of it like a criminal court case. You want to prove Lott is guilty of using false and misleading information beyond a resonable doubt. If someone in Lott's defense pokes holes in your case, the jury could have resonable doubt.

To the jury Lott would not be guilty. He could have done exactly as you said, however failure to eliminate all the possible ways Lott could have got the data leads to doubt. If you fail to prove him wrong, some people believe by default that Lott was right. Even if Lott really was wrong and it was simply your failure to successfully prove it.

Some people reading this tread might think "Gunstar proved Tim wrong, therfore Lott is correct". Which is incorrect.
What I am saying is that Tim did not finish proving Lott wrong beyond reasonable doubt.

You have to try harder to prove Lott is wrong than people had to do with Bellesiles. Simply because Bellesiles was posting the opposite of what was known and it was not very hard to prove otherwise. It is much harder to prove exaggerations in which people are more willing to give the author the benefit of the doubt, than someone saying the opposite of what you have been taught is true.

 

[agricola]

Gunstar,

Its very clear Lott is using the Police statistics, because he is at pains to point this out in his articles on the subject, of which below is one example:

The 2000 International Crime Victimization Survey, the last survey done, shows the violent-crime rate in England and Wales was twice the rate in the U.S. When the new survey for 2004 comes out, that gap will undoubtedly have widened even further as crimes reported to British police have since soared by 35%, while declining 6% in the U.S.

http://www.tsra.com/Lott112.htm

As an aside, that article further demonstrates his reckless use of statistics without giving any explanation of their significance.

He contends in one part that the response time has slowed in London so that 29% of the time Police do not arrive within 12 minutes of the call being made, and that this is due to increased workload. What he neglects to mention is that, thanks to increased recruitment, 1/3 of London's Police are "probationary" officers - which means that they cannot drive Police cars "in response mode" - that is with the blue lights and two-tones going, thus slowing the time it takes for them to get to calls.

Since that is contained within the very
source
he would have got the statistics from, this is a serious omission.

Later he contends that imitation weapons form "only 6% of firearm crime" - except that (as he well knows) the only way that the Police can determine if an imitation weapon has been used for the purposes of the statistics is if they have arrested the person concerned. Therefore those crimes where persons arent caught (and the status of the "firearm" cannot be identified) will include an amount (probably a very large amount) of imitation weapons. That would of course mean that Lott's theory that the UK is now awash with illegally handguns is damaged (since he relies on the statistics), so it doesnt go in.

To me, this forms a pattern of behaviour that is clear; Lott habitually uses only those statistics that support his "case" (that the 1997 ban caused crime to rise), and that these statistics are almost always taken out of context in order to prove a case that is so patently, demonstrably false that it is apparent to anyone that has even a slightest idea of what firearms controls were like in the UK between Hungerford and Dunblane.

 

[GEM]

Still wearing your tin foil hat, Tim?

Also, are you really so dense as to miss my point? I'll make it simple for you. The resolution of the issue and not your fixation on Lott will be in the future with new studies. It's the same with Bellesiles, if someone explores his conjecture with better methodology, that's interesting.

I also told you and gave you the rationale for not discussing other folks' works in progress. What part of that can't you understand?

I didn't say they are going to prove or disprove Lott. That's your added nuance - never said that. It's quite possible that when it shakes out, Lott will be shown to be a crappy researcher. I said there are new studies afoot. Sorry that you aren't in the scholarly circle. Like I said, show up at the ASC meeting.

How about answering my question about your views on the overall issue of gun usage? What's your view on folks having guns? If you give a reasoned opinion, I'll tell you my name - even though you could find it in 5 minutes, if you tried. It's not Rumplestiltskin, though.

 

[Gunstar1]

good find

So in 2003 Lott says:
"the violent-crime rate in England and Wales was twice the rate in the U.S. When the new survey for 2004 comes out, that gap will undoubtedly have widened even further as crimes reported to British police "

Lott is waiting for the 2004 survey to come out.

In 2004 Tim ASSUMES Lott is using the police data when what you just posted said he was waiting for survey data!!!

Thank you for proving my point. There IS another place the data could come from.

(however I will agree the compairson of the reported crimes to the police in the US and England should not have been made)

 

[agricola]

Gunstar,

Are you being deliberately obtuse? You edited that quote to entirely alter its meaning:

The 2000 International Crime Victimization Survey, the last survey done, shows the violent-crime rate in England and Wales was twice the rate in the U.S. When the new survey for 2004 comes out, that gap will undoubtedly have widened even further as crimes reported to British police have since soared by 35%, while declining 6% in the U.S.

He clearly used the Police data, because there is nowhere in the ICVS where he could have got the rest.

 

[fallingblock]

Yes, Tim, it would be appreciated if you would answer GEM's question....

"How about answering my question about your views on the overall issue of gun usage? What's your view on folks having guns? Please do tell us your personal views on defensive use of firearms by citizens."
*********************************************************

And Tim, haven't you any link pointing to evidence of your opposition to Howard's anti-gun legislation?


Agricola:
*********************************************************
"Thats the thing - they (the defendants) already are, and the "proportional force" element is massively overemphasised by the press, the "scholars" like Lott and (especially, as Tim demonstrated) Malcolm - indeed its doubtful if (when one looks at caselaw) it remains in existance..."
*********************************************************

Tim hasn't convinced me that he has demonstrated much beyond his own anti-Lott bias yet.

As GEM writes:
"Sorry that you aren't in the scholarly circle. Like I said, show up at the ASC meeting. "

It is a pity that Tim resorts to a blog rather than properly engaging in the discussion at an academic level.

Caselaw or not, it seems the Tories are going to run with this idea...and good on em'.

I have my doubts that the 'proportional force' issue is overstated in Britain.

It would seem that too many questions remain on the definition of such force and upon which magistrate is doing the defining.

 

[TimLambert]

GEM, if you really were interested in my views on guns in general, you could have found out what they were in a few minutes. I don't keep them a secret -- they are posted on my blog and Usenet under my real name. Lott has already been shown to be a crappy researcher -- that's one of the reasons why he can't get a job in academia. Conceivably, future research could show that he was accidently right about concealed carry, but he would still be a crappy researcher.

Fallingblock, I don't need to provide a link to show what my views are. They are my views, I know what they are. I'm not particularly concerned that I can't sway you about Lott. Lott said that 12/13 was 95% and you don't think that is wrong. Obviously your belief in Lott is stronger than your belief in arithmetic.