Trying to "get tough" on gun crimes, especially through Essay

Trying to "get tough" on gun crimes, especially through mandatory prison sentences, will not reduce gun related crime - Essay Example In 2012 FBI statistics showed that a total of 8855 homicides were caused by firearms and from the total, 6371 were committed using handguns. On the contrary, 40% of the deaths were also attributed to gun related suicides. Last year, gun related violence accumulated to 16,829 (Webster and Jon 76). Usually the gun related violence is common in the poor-urban areas and is mostly linked with gang violence. Majority of the violence is frequently caused by the youths commonly attributed by the males. Several legislations have been instituted at the state, federal and the local level in an effort to prevent gun violence. Gun purchasing restrictions, law enforcement systems, prison sentencing, community-outreach and education programs are some of the many measures to prevent guns possession. Over the past decades the common prison sentencing has not yielded much in the prevention of gun related crimes. The crimes continue to happen even with frequent arrests of the criminals due to their easy acquisition of firearms. The main idea is to stop the gun possession at inception in order to prevent gun related crimes in the nation. Hence, among the strategies to be used will be the use of gun control mechanism to prevent crime (Webster and Jon 34). During the 19th century, firearms violence contributed a big part in the civil disorders for example the Haymarket riots. During this period, the gun related homicide rates in the cities were much lower than in the current times. Between the periods of 1980 and 1990, homicides caused by the use of handguns during this period increased significantly while the usage of other weapons declined proportionately. The firearms homicides were mostly associated with the unemployed male persons who had low incomes. The majority of the offenders include the youths and the African American US citizens where the deaths and injuries numbers tripled in the black