"A five-month-old girl, sitting in her grandmother’s lap, was shot in the thigh by a stray bullet from a drive-by shooting between two cars near Powderhorn Park in Minneapolis around 8:00 PM. 'This was a family enjoying the balmy evening in the park, and obviously their night was ruined,' " police said, according to the Violence Policy Center, citing an article in the Minneapolis Star Tribune.
Center workers conducted the first ever U.S.overview for drive-by shootings in 2007. A 2010 follow-up emerged this month, posing the question why - after three years - there remains no national data on the "the prevalence of drive-by shootings, those who commit them, those who are killed and injured as a result of them, the firearms used, where they take place, or at what times they most often occur."
The case above is typical in that it's gang-related, with the victim an innocent bystander.
Yet according to the 2010 study, called "Drive-By America," only 17 percent of the national total of 733 drive-by shootings were gang-related. VPC even suggests the number is significantly low, taking into account how underreported many of these incidents are.
Data, however, did not come from a national government tally, but rather a Google News search for the words "drive-by" during a six-month period from December to July 2008.
In total, of the 733 drive-by shootings logged nationally,154 lives were claimed while 631 people were injured.
And out of this 733 - 148 were from California - making it the leading state for drive-by shootings.
This part is the part I want to explore more. Despite limited information at the national level, how is LA doing with collecting data, analyzing numbers, and moreover, how do residents react to the statistics and what are they doing to improve the rates of reporting to authorities? In turn, what innovative awareness plans have officials launched to boost their connection to the community?
Photo by Mceacherntim via Flickr
I'm heading into my junior year at USC, majoring in comparative literature and public relations. I am a reporter for the USC newspaper, The Daily Trojan, and have been interning with a popular Los Angeles-based blog LAist.com. I also am interning with Spot.Us and feel strongly about highlighting a topic that is overlooked - going beyond the rankings.
I hope to provide an analysis on drive-by shootings unique to Los Angeles, based on information from the LA Police Department on stats and community stakeholders, along with discussing possibilties for furture national involvement.
