October 22: Rise in Gun Crime

New Home Office figures indicate that gun crime has risen by 3 percent. The rise is part of a pattern which includes a 2 percent rise the previous year. 

However, the provisional figures, which cover the year ending in June 2004, show a 15% drop in the number of shooting-related deaths. Firearms-related deaths are comparatively rare. Last year the number fell to 81 from 97 in the previous 12 months. The small rises in gun crimes for the last two years compare with a 34% increase recorded in 2002.

The biggest rises were for offences that resulted in no injury, 28 per cent, and for the use of imitation firearms. There was a 35 percent rise in crimes involving imitation weapons.

According to the Home Office Statistical Bulletin: Crime in England and Wales 2003-04 which was published in July 2004, the number of gun crime offences has risen each year since 1997-98, but the 2003-04 rise is the smallest.

The figures show a decrease of seven percent in the use of handguns from 2002-03. Excluding air weapons, gun crime as a proportion of recorded crime has remained static at 0.17 percent. There has been a 15 percent reduction in the number of homicides involving firearms (from 81 deaths in 2002-03 to 68 in 2003-04). Eight percent of homicides involved firearms in 2003-04, which is unchanged from the previous year.

The number of robberies involving firearms has decreased by 13 percent in 2003-04. Firearms were used in four percent of all robbery offences. Imitation weapons were used in 21 percent of non-air weapon offences. The number of offences involving imitation weapons was up 18 percent in 2003-04 compared to the previous year. This is a smaller increase than the year before, which saw an increase of 46 percent.

Gun crime remains concentrated largely in three areas – around two-thirds of firearm offences occur in just three metropolitan police forces: the Metropolitan Police, Greater Manchester and the West Midlands.