ST. LOUIS — St. Louis Mayor Lyda Krewson claims that gun violence has dramatically increased since the new permitless carry law passed in Missouri. One of our viewers asked wanted to know if that was true?
One, we can verify that Krewson sees that as a major problem. She's told us that multiple times in sit down interviews.
"You don’t need anything to be able to carry a gun almost anywhere, any time. And that has really escalated the crime we believe. Gun violence leads to more gun violence," Krewson told our Mike Bush last month.
Our sources for this story were crime statistics from the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department's website and the Missouri Revised Statutes.
Missouri's permitless carry law went into effect January 1, 2017. To qualify, you must be 19 years old, legally allowed to own a gun and it can't be on a property that has a legal sign that bans firearms.
If you meet all of those criteria, you don't need a permit to carry a concealed weapon.
Now let's get to the numbers.
In 2016, the year before the law went into effect, the city recorded 188 homicides.
In 2017, the year after it became law, we saw a spike up to 205 homicides.
2018 saw it level back off to 187.
This year, of course, is still in progress, but through August, we're on pace to see a 15% increase in homicides compared to last year.
Let's also look at aggravated assaults using a firearm.
In 2016, we saw 2,132 assaults involving a gun.
In 2017, after the new law was enacted, there were 2,616. That's an average of seven assaults using a gun per day.
In 2018, it dropped but was still high at 2,332.
So far this year, we're on track to see an 8% increase in assaults using a gun compared to last year.
So, we can verify that violence has increased since the permit-less carry law passed, but of course, there are a number of nuances.
We've seen a variety of different crime-fighting methods over the last six years, we've seen different police chiefs and prosecutors.
The numbers never tell the whole story, but it's certainly something to consider.
