Regarding stray bullets …

Thanks to Hollywood and a largely hostile/ignorant press, there are many misconceptions about the ballistic power of handguns and the risks to bystanders. Let’s take step-by-step approach to this issue of harming bystanders.

If you read the following, please keeping in mind that most handguns are underpowered, and in most cases over penetration through a human body – while certainly possible – is not a huge risk factor. Missing the bad guy is by far the bigger factor.

1. All our innate rights are equally important but …
2. The right to defend yourself, and others, is first among equals. Without that right, all the other rights become pointless – a dead person enjoys no rights.
3. Implicit in the right to self-defense is the means to exercise that right. This is one of the reasons we have the 2nd Amendment.
4.It is therefore wrong – and unconstitutional – to put restrictions on that right.
5. It is also true that this right must be exercised responsibly (as must all rights). The danger to innocent bystanders during a self-defense gunfight is a real concern.
6. What does it mean to exercise this right responsibly, especially in a metropolitan area?
7. There are two ways an innocent bystander can be injured. The shooter misses or the bullet over penetrates (it goes through the bad guy, a wall, or something else.)
8. First, you should use a handgun with the greatest ballistic power that you can control under stress – remember that an adrenaline surge means loss of fine motor control. For a large person this might be a .44 magnum, for a petit person this might be a .32 or even a .22 rimfire. You need power so you can disable the bad buy quickly and reliably. But you also need control so you can place your subsequent shot(s) on target if the first one doesn’t work. These two needs pull in opposite directions. Each individual needs to find the best balance.
9. So to be responsible in your self-defense, you do at least the following things (yes, some people will not be responsible; the answer is to hold them accountable, it is not to ban a fundamental right):
· Practice the color code of awareness (a system of recognizing and avoiding deadly situations). If possible, don’t put yourself in a situation where you need to use deadly force to defend yourself.
· Train often and train well with the gun(s) you plan to use. Training improves your odds of hitting the target when under stress. Fewer shots = less risk to others.
· For heavier calibers, use a load that minimizes the danger of over penetration. For example Federal makes a load called EFMJ (Expanding Full Metal Jacket). It looks sort of like ball ammo but has a blunt tip. This bullet is designed to expand on penetration – causing maximum damage so you don’t have to shoot repeatedly – and helping ensure it won’t go through a person or a wall. (Hollow points are supposed to do the same thing, but tend to get clogged with bits of garment, and therefore don’t always expand properly. The EFMJ is more reliable in this regard).

If you are forced to defend yourself with a firearm, and an innocent bystander gets hurt, let’s keep a clear eye on where the blame lies. You are not morally required to let yourself be killed because some bystander might be hurt (if you were than we would not be talking about a right). Your moral obligation is to take every reasonable step to minimize the risk to others, short of dying yourself.

The bad guy put you in the position of having to shoot. He, and he alone, created the situation that put everybody else at risk. I will say it again, the moral responsibility for the situation and its consequences rests squarely and solely on the shoulders of the thug that attacked you.

Furthermore, how can you know that after he has killed you he doesn’t spray the street/apartment with bullets anyway – and kill several bystanders? Perhaps shooting the bad-guy ends up making everybody in the vicinity safer.

Nothing is certain in life – outcomes cannot be guaranteed and risks must be balanced, but the responsible exercise of your right to defend yourself is a moral course of behavior and a fundamental right no matter where you live.

In balancing the risk, we should note that the risk of bystanders being harmed when firearms are justifiably used for self-defense is vastly exaggerated. If you run some CDC WISQUARS reports you will find that during the 6 year period from 1999 to 2004, there were 4,543 accidental firearms deaths nationwide for all ages. For the state of New York the number is 127.

WISQARS doesn’t go down to the city level, so for the sake of argument, let’s assume most of these were in NYC – say 100. That amounts to 100/6 = 16.6 per year in NYC. Call it 17. (In reality the number in NYC is probably far less than this due to the gun restrictions, but I want to stack the numbers against me in a reasonable way.)

This number is for all accidental firearm deaths, not just those of an innocent bystander falling victim to a self-defense gunfight. So this value represents an upper bound, but we can use it anyway.

During the same period, the murder rate nation-wide (all violent causes) was 106,689 (to get this number, you need to run both a firearm and a non-firearm report).

For New York this value is 7530. As the population seat of the state, let’s guesstimate that NYC accounts for 6000 of these. So on an average annual basis there were 1000 people killed by bad guys vs. about 17 killed by all firearm accidents. So, for every 1 person accidentally killed by gunfire, about 59 were murdered in NYC.

If these odds are not acceptable to you, then by all means don’t arm yourself. But that doesn’t mean everybody else should be deprived of that right. For those who are tempted to rely on the police to protect you or your family, this is some interesting reading.

Herikutsu on August 11, 2007 at 1:41 AM