Gun Free Zones in Alcohol-Serving Establishments and Risk for Firearm Violence: A Cross-Sectional, Geospatial Study in Texas.

To date, there have been no peer-reviewed studies in the United States estimating the impact of gun-free zone policies in alcohol-serving establishments on rates of firearm violence in and around such establishments. In this study, we utilized a cross-sectional design to estimate the impact of Texas's 51% alcohol law, which prohibits the carrying of firearms in establishments that generate over half of their revenue from alcohol sales. The analysis focused on the difference in shooting incidents in and around establishments with and without firearm carrying prohibitions in 2021 and 2022.

Predicting Short Time-to-Crime Guns: a Machine Learning Analysis of California Transaction Records (2010-2021).

Gun-related crime continues to be an urgent public health and safety problem in cities across the US. A key question is: how are firearms diverted from the legal retail market into the hands of gun offenders? With close to 8 million legal firearm transaction records in California (2010-2020) linked to over 380,000 records of recovered crime guns (2010-2021), we employ supervised machine learning to predict which firearms are used in crimes shortly after purchase. Specifically, using random forest (RF) with stratified under-sampling, we predict any crime gun recovery within a year (0.

Individual, firearm, and purchasing characteristics associated with risk of firearm-related violent crime arrest: a nested case-control study.

Background: Firearm purchasing records offer a potentially important administrative data source to identify individuals at elevated risk of perpetrating firearm violence. In this study, we describe individual, firearm, and transaction characteristics of purchasers in California who were arrested for a firearm-related violent crime (FRV) as compared to the general population of registered purchasers in the state.

Methods: Relying on a dataset of all individuals with transaction records in California (1996-2021), linked to criminal records (1980-2021), we enrolled a cohort of individuals for whom we could capture the legal firearm purchase history.

Purchaser, firearm, and retailer characteristics associated with crime gun recovery: a longitudinal analysis of firearms sold in California from 1996 to 2021.

Background: Firearm violence is a major cause of death and injury in the United States. Tracking the movement of firearms from legal purchase to use in crimes can help inform prevention of firearm injuries and deaths. The last state-wide studies analyzing crime gun recoveries used data from over 20 years ago; thus, an update is needed.

The Association between the Percentage of Female Law Enforcement Officers and Rape Report, Clearance, and Arrest Rates: A Spatiotemporal Analysis of California.

Rape is an underreported violent crime that frequently remains uncleared (open) in the legal system. Rape disproportionately affects women, with 91% of rape victim-survivors estimated to be female. However, law enforcement agencies, the entry point into the criminal justice system, are predominantly comprised of male officers.

Does recreational cannabis legalization change cannabis use patterns? Evidence from secondary school students in Uruguay.

Background And Aims: In 2013, Uruguay became the first country to legalize and regulate the production and distribution of cannabis for recreational use. We measured whether Uruguay's non-commercial model of recreational cannabis legalization was associated with changes in the prevalence of risky and frequent cannabis use among secondary school students.

Design: We used data from repeated cross-sectional surveys of secondary students in Uruguay and Chile (2007-2018).

Unemployment and Crime in US Cities During the Coronavirus Pandemic.

Unemployment and violence both increased during the coronavirus pandemic in the United States (US), but no studies to our knowledge have examined their association. Using data for 16 US cities from January 2018 to July 2020, we estimated the association between acute changes in unemployment during the coronavirus pandemic and violent and acquisitive crime. We used negative binomial regression models and parametric g-computation to estimate average differences in crime incidents if the highest and lowest levels of unemployment observed in each city had been sustained across the exposure period (March-July 2020), compared with observed unemployment in each city-month.

Neighborhood Racial and Economic Segregation and Disparities in Violence During the COVID-19 Pandemic.

To describe associations between neighborhood racial and economic segregation and violence during the COVID-19 pandemic. For 13 US cities, we obtained zip code-level data on 5 violence outcomes from March through July 2018 through 2020. Using negative binomial regressions and marginal contrasts, we estimated differences between quintiles of racial, economic, and racialized economic segregation using the Index of Concentration at the Extremes as a measure of neighborhood privilege (1) in 2020 and (2) relative to 2018 through 2019 (difference-in-differences).

Physical Distancing, Violence, and Crime in US Cities during the Coronavirus Pandemic.

Violent crime increased and most property crime decreased in many United States (US) cities during the coronavirus pandemic. Using negative binomial regressions, we examined the association between physical distancing (a central coronavirus containment strategy) and crime within 16 large cities (in 12 US states and the District of Columbia) through July 2020. Physical distancing was measured with aggregated smartphone data and defined as the average change in the percentage of the population staying completely at home.

SuperMICE: An Ensemble Machine Learning Approach to Multiple Imputation by Chained Equations.

Researchers often face the problem of how to address missing data. Multiple imputation is a popular approach, with multiple imputation by chained equations (MICE) being among the most common and flexible methods for execution. MICE iteratively fits a predictive model for each variable with missing values, conditional on other variables in the data.

Firearm purchasing and firearm violence during the coronavirus pandemic in the United States: a cross-sectional study.

Background: Firearm violence is a significant public health problem in the United States. A surge in firearm purchasing following the onset of the coronavirus pandemic may have contributed to an increase in firearm violence. We sought to estimate the state-level association between firearm purchasing and interpersonal firearm violence during the pandemic.

The impact of cannabis legalization in Uruguay on adolescent cannabis use.

Background: In 2013, Uruguay became the first country in the world to legalize recreational cannabis, instituting a non-commercial state regulatory model of production and supply. This study provides the first empirical evidence on its impacts on adolescent use of cannabis and related risks.

Methods: We use a generalization of the synthetic control method (SCM) to estimate the impact of legalization in Uruguay on adolescent past year and month cannabis use, perceived availability of cannabis and perceived risk of cannabis use.

Armed and prohibited: characteristics of unlawful owners of legally purchased firearms.

Background: A substantial proportion of individuals who lawfully purchase firearms later become unlawful owners ('prohibited firearm owners'), usually following events associated with an increased risk for future violence. This high-risk population has not previously been described. We aimed to characterise all individuals in California's Armed and Prohibited Persons System (APPS), a statewide programme for recovering firearms from individuals who legally purchased them and later became prohibited from ownership.

Alcohol-Related Crimes And Risk Of Arrest For Intimate Partner Violence Among California Handgun Purchasers.

Intimate partner violence is a major public health problem in the US. Both firearms and alcohol have been documented to contribute to the risk and severity of this violence. Yet there has been little research examining the nexus of the two risk factors.

The impact of spikes in handgun acquisitions on firearm-related harms.

Background: Research has documented sharp and short-lived increases in firearm acquisitions immediately following high-profile mass shootings and specific elections, increasing exposure to firearms at the community level. We exploit cross-city variation in the estimated number of excess handgun acquisitions in California following the 2012 presidential election and the Sandy Hook school shooting 5 weeks later to assess whether the additional handguns were associated with increases in the rate of firearm-related harms at the city level.

Methods: We use a two-stage modeling approach.

Investigating how perceived risk and availability of marijuana relate to marijuana use among adolescents in Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay over time.

Aims: Amid changing marijuana policies in the Southern Cone, we examined relationships between marijuana-related risk factors and marijuana use among adolescents in Argentina, Chile, and Uruguay from 2001 to 2016.

Methods: Using cross-sectional surveys from 8, 10, and 12 graders and weighted time-varying effect models, we estimated associations between perceived risk (no/low risk versus moderate/great risk) and perceived availability (easy/very easy versus difficult/very difficult/not able to obtain) of marijuana, and any past-month marijuana use.

Results: In all countries, marijuana use increased over time and adolescents who perceived no/low risk and easy availability had higher odds of use.