Guns and Assault Rifles are not the Problem, mentally ill people with Guns and assault rifles are the problem.

[Grumblenuts]

The numbers, unlike liberal anti-gun troglodytes, don't lie.

The Unz Review​

Unz's writings on Ivy League admissions were praised by David Duke who said it confirmed Harvard was "now under powerful Jewish influence". Antisemitic conspiracy theorist Kevin B. MacDonald said it was similar to his own view that Jews are "at odds with the values of the great majority of non-Jewish White Americans."

 

[2aguy]

So there is a direct correlation to our guns and our homicide rate.

Homicide rate in Australia: 0.90 per 100,000

Homicide rate in US: 4.88

541% higher than Australia



Homicide rate in UK: 0.92
Homicide rate in US: 4.88.

530% higher than the UK



Homicide rate in France: 1.3

375% higher than France



Homicide rate in Germany: 0.8

610% higher than Germany



Homicide rate in Canada: 2.0

244% higher than Canada

Nope......

Do the those countries...

1) destroy their local police to the point they can't and won't stop violent criminals

2) do their democrat party judges, prosecutors and politicians keep releasing violent gun criminals no matter how many gun crimes they commit...

3) Did they end their borders so that drug cartels and other criminals could flood their countries....

No....to all 3.......that is our problem.....

 

[2aguy]

So there is a direct correlation to our guns and our homicide rate.

Homicide rate in Australia: 0.90 per 100,000

Homicide rate in US: 4.88

541% higher than Australia



Homicide rate in UK: 0.92
Homicide rate in US: 4.88.

530% higher than the UK



Homicide rate in France: 1.3

375% higher than France



Homicide rate in Germany: 0.8

610% higher than Germany



Homicide rate in Canada: 2.0

244% higher than Canada

Australian gun control has failed....

Ms Mallet said she believed the types of offences associated with gang-related crime in Australia had shifted in recent years.
'We're seeing people being shot in the street, total disregard for the public, for families,' she said.
'I think the police are concerned about the different types of violence because the rule book seems to have been thrown out with some of these organised gangs.'
Ms Mallet said the alleged kidnapping of Mr Vuong was 'very frightening'.
'I'm sure that everybody in Sydney and especially that neighbourhood is going to be thrown by this,' she said.
A number of high-profile gang-related crimes have dominated the news in the past 12 months, including the brutal execution-style shooting of celebrity chauffer Taha Sabbagh less than two weeks ago.

Crime expert compares bloodshed on Australia's streets to Brazil


9/3/22

It's a portrait of the average Australian who operates in the country's illegal firearms market, built from the findings of a 2022 Deakin University study.
In the study, criminology professor David Bright and his colleagues conducted 75 interviews with prisoners across 16 correctional facilities comprising drug traffickers, members of organised crime gangs and armed robbers.
The researchers were attempting to build a picture of the illegal gun trade in the Australian underworld.
They found buying an illegal gun in Australia could be as easy as a trip to the supermarket for those in the know.
Figures show a deep reservoir of illegal firearms exists for criminals to tap into, with police measures only able to recover tiny fractions each year.
----
Professor Bright said most of the interviewees came from backgrounds where criminal behaviour and access to guns were the norm.
----
"Some of the stories were shocking, I suppose, in the sense of the violence that some of these men had either experienced or had engaged in using guns," Professor Bright said.
"The other surprising thing was just how easily some of these men were able to access firearms."
---

The source of illegal firearms​

The Deakin University study identified the main ways illegal firearms were procured in Australia.
Very few criminals interviewed spoke of obtaining weapons through the internet or "dark web", with them instead preferring to rely on personal connections.
Guns are commonly obtained from friends and family, as well as from deals where a trusted party has vouched for the potential buyer.
One prisoner was given guns on the condition that he attacked certain people to earn them.
"I had to do two things to get the guns, but that was simple so I didn't really have to do much," they said.
"I just had to shoot at people … I didn't care … I was getting free guns out of it."
---
Police use firearms prohibition orders (FPOs) to ban people they believe are linked to organised crime from coming into contact with guns.
---
In 2019 — the year after FPOs were introduced — Victoria recorded a nine-year high in firearm assault deaths.
---
The latest figures from the Australian Criminal Intelligence Commission (ACIC) estimate there are at least 260,000 illegal firearms circulating in Australia.
In its report, it states the number of illegal firearms could be as high as 600,000 if estimation methods from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime were used.
---
It means the seizures represent just a fraction of a percentage of Australia's illegal firearms market. And for those convicted of serious gun-related crimes in SA and NSW, not much has changed.
The insular nature of the illegal firearms market has led to increased caution among criminals when trafficking and carrying firearms, but the ease of access remains the same.
"Honestly, the access is pretty easy. I could get access to a gun within an hour of walking out of jail … no problem at all," one prisoner said in the Deakin report.

Paper linked to in above article....

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01639625.2022.2086838
As Melbourne and Sydney reel from inner-city shootings, researchers look to trace where the guns are coming from



==============
More on the 9/3/22 topic.....from above...

He said some of the interviewees spoke of illegal firearm suppliers having "huge caches" of guns, including pistols, shotguns and semi-automatic rifles.

Buying illegal guns 'surprisingly easy' for underworld figures, research finds
=======

1/6/22

The modus operandi of the hitmen contracted to take out Hamzy associates is to sneak up on the target - often in a public place - and pepper them with bullets.
---
OCTOBER 18, 2020 - Rafat Alameddine's former home is shot up in a drive-by shooting

OCTOBER 19, 2020 - Mejid Hamzy is shot dead in Condell Park

JANUARY 30, 2021 - Mustafa Naaman is shot dead in Hurstville in a suspected mistaken identity attack on Ibrahem Hamze

JANUARY 30, 2021 - Mejed Derbas is shot dead in Smithfield

FEBRUARY 15, 2021 - Bilal Hamze's mother Maha Hamze comes under gunfire again in another drive-by shooting at her home in Auburn

MARCH 12, 2021 - A home linked to the Alameddine family in Guildford is shot up

AUGUST 6, 2021 - Alameddine low-level associate Shady Kanj is shot in Chester Hill and found dead by police in Guildford

AUGUST 14, 2021 - Police foil alleged gangland hit on Ibrahim Hamze when they spot stolen Mercedes in North Sydney

OCTOBER 20, 2021 - Salim and Toufik Hamze are gunned down outside their home in Guildford

NOVEMBER 10, 2021 - Drive-by shooting at Guildford home of Alameddine associate. No-one is hurt

JANUARY 6, 2022 - Brother of Bassam Hamzy, Ghassan Amoun, is shot dead at 35 years of age in a brazen daylight execution as he sat in a BMW outside an apartment building in Western Sydney.

How cops made a chilling prediction before crime boss brother killed


New article 9/1/20

Gun violence grips Victoria as deadly shootings double

More than 14 hardened criminals are being found in possession of firearms each week as the state grapples with a rising gun culture that has led to twice as many Victorians shot dead in 2019.
------
Anti-gangs division Detective Superintendent Peter Brigham said illegal firearms were routinely unearthed at the homes of drug traffickers and in the possession of “gangster types” chasing image and status.
----
In September, a 35-year-old Docklands man was sentenced to at least eight years' jail for heroin trafficking. As part of his plea deal, the former Iraqi national led police to a cache of weapons wrapped in plastic and hidden in a Melbourne drain. They included an SKS assault rifle and grenades.
---
And while handguns were proving to be the gun of choice among young men, high powered military-grade firearms were in demand from the city’s outlaw motorcycle gangs
======

Gun city: Young, dumb and armed

The notion that a military-grade weapon could be in the hands of local criminals is shocking, but police have already seized at least five machine guns and assault rifles in the past 18 months. The AK-47 was not among them.

Only a fortnight ago, law enforcement authorities announced they were hunting another seven assault rifles recently smuggled into the country. Weapons from the shipment have been used in armed robberies and drive-by shootings.

These are just a handful of the thousands of illicit guns fuelling a wave of violent crime in the world’s most liveable city.

----

Despite Australia’s strict gun control regime, criminals are now better armed than at any time since then-Prime Minister John Howard introduced a nationwide firearm buyback scheme in response to the 1996 Port Arthur massacre.

Shootings have become almost a weekly occurrence, with more than 125 people, mostly young men, wounded in the past five year

-----------

While the body count was higher during Melbourne’s ‘Underbelly War’ (1999-2005), more people have been seriously maimed in the recent spate of shootings and reprisals.

Crimes associated with firearm possession have also more than doubled, driven by the easy availability of handguns, semi-automatic rifles, shotguns and, increasingly, machine guns, that are smuggled into the country or stolen from licensed owners.

-------------

These weapons have been used in dozens of recent drive-by shootings of homes and businesses, as well as targeted and random attacks in parks, shopping centres and roads.

“They’re young, dumb and armed,” said one former underworld associate, who survived a shooting attempt in the western suburbs several years ago.

“It used to be that if you were involved in something bad you might have to worry about [being shot]. Now people get shot over nothing - unprovoked.”

------------

Gun crime soars
In this series, Fairfax Media looks at Melbourne’s gun problem and the new breed of criminals behind the escalating violence.

The investigation has found:

• There have been at least 99 shootings in the past 20 months - more than one incident a week since January 2015
• Known criminals were caught with firearms 755 times last year, compared to 143 times in 2011
• The epicentre of the problem is a triangle between Coolaroo, Campbellfield and Glenroy in the north-west, with Cranbourne, Narre Warren and Dandenong in the south-east close behind
• Criminals are using gunshot wounds to the arms and legs as warnings to pay debts
• Assault rifles and handguns are being smuggled into Australia via shipments of electronics and metal parts

In response to the violence, it can be revealed the state government is planning to introduce new criminal offences for drive-by shootings, manufacturing of firearms with new technologies such as 3D printers, and more police powers to keep weapons out of the hands of known criminals.

============

The second part of the series....

Gun city: Gunslingers of the North West


========================
'Thousands' of illegal guns tipped to be handed over in firearms amnesty

Asked roughly how many he expected to be handed in, Mr Keenan said: "Look I certainly think the number will be in the thousands."

The Australian Crime Commission estimated in 2012 there were at least 250,000 illegal guns in Australia. But a Senate report noted last year it was impossible to estimate how many illicit weapons are out there.

And despite Australia's strict border controls, the smuggling of high-powered military-style firearms is also a growing problem.

 

[2aguy]

So there is a direct correlation to our guns and our homicide rate.

Homicide rate in Australia: 0.90 per 100,000

Homicide rate in US: 4.88

541% higher than Australia



Homicide rate in UK: 0.92
Homicide rate in US: 4.88.

530% higher than the UK



Homicide rate in France: 1.3

375% higher than France



Homicide rate in Germany: 0.8

610% higher than Germany



Homicide rate in Canada: 2.0

244% higher than Canada

Canada....gun control failed....

Sometimes they go to prison and come out even more hardened, more likely to settle a score at the end of a gun barrel.



Gun activity has become so prevalent in the city that it scarcely bears mentioning anymore unless someone has been killed. Or, say, when a Toronto Maple Leaf is carjacked at gunpoint.



“The severity of gun violence, the arbitrariness of many of these events, along with the retaliatory nature of gang rivalries, leaves the broader communities feeling unsafe and vulnerable,” says a report prepared by Toronto Police and presented to the police board at its most recent meeting.



Toronto is awash with guns, mostly illegal firearms, thus a scourge that wouldn’t be affected by a national gun ban, which many are calling upon the federal government to mandate.

----

As it stands, the report argues, with supporting evidence, there are too many accused and convicted offenders released on bond with conditions they simply ignore, only to reoffend.

Despite pandemic lockdowns and restrictions imposed under the Emergency Measures and Civil Protects Act, there were 297 reported shootings in Toronto public areas in 2021 and 60 through the first three months of 2022. (Public or “congregate” areas refer to bars and restaurants, parking lots, streets, bicycle paths, commercial buildings (malls, for example) and other open spaces.)

Shootings and firearms discharges jumped 41 per cent between 2015 and 2021; killings rocketed by 77 per cent.

Of the 85 murders last year, 46 were shooting homicides. As of April 22 this year, 15 of 20 murders in the city were shooting homicides — 75 per cent.

----

As of March 31, 190 individuals were charged with firearm-related offences; 81 were granted bail and three have been rearrested.

http://[URL='https://www.thestar.co...onto-it-scarcely-gets-mentioned-any-more.html

[/URL]



2021, August

Firearms too easy to get​

Marc Alain, a professor at the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières and a researcher with the Centre of International Comparative Criminology, says one of the biggest drivers of gun violence is how readily available handguns have become in Quebec and throughout Canada.

------

Maria Mourani, a criminologist who has studied Montreal street gangs and written about organized crime in Quebec and around the world, says she's not surprised by the recent rise in gun violence.

Mourani says she started to notice an uptick in shootings last fall, but things have escalated in the last couple months.

"When we have shootings it means there are conflicts between different criminal groups," she said. "Fights over territory, over drugs, unpaid debts…sometimes it's just two people who disagree."

She says an ongoing war between rival gangs, the Profit Boys in Rivière-des-Prairies and Zone 43 from Montréal-Nord, is causing a lot of the bloodshed.



https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/montreal/gun-violence-explained-by-criminologists-1.6132114





CityNews



Part of the problem is the proliferation of guns. Although Canada has some of the strictest gun laws in the Western world, with Bill C-21 poised to make them even stricter, getting a gun has never been easier for some segments of the population, namely criminals.

“It’s not hard. They’re everywhere,” says Dwayne Beckford from behind a glass partition.

Beckford is currently remanded on gun charges at Toronto East Detention Centre. In his late 30s, he has spent most of his adult life behind bars
-------
“Everybody has them, like I said. It is scary how much there are, how easily accessible they are. Kids have them.”

Convicted of gun-related charges in the past, he recalls getting a gun was as easy as walking a dog. “They’d be cheaply bought, or just handed to you by guys in the neighbourhood.”

“Everybody has a gun these days. You talk to some guys that can easily give you what you want – to borrow, or hold, or buy.”
-----
“It’s like, ‘Yeah, here’s $80. You go do what you’ve got to do with it and come back.’ So they’re not even worried about getting caught with the weapon with X amount of bodies on it. That doesn’t even matter anymore,” he explains.

“I could find a gun in a couple of hours,” Wilson says, despite years outside of the game.

“We are seeing more firearms in the street, deadlier than we have seen before,” says Inspector Joe Matthews, the head of Toronto Police’s Guns and Gangs Unit.

In 2009, there were 259 shootings in Toronto resulting in 70 injuries and deaths. Last year, that number jumped to 462 shootings and 217 injuries and deaths. For the past five years, Toronto has witnessed more than 400 shootings a year.
--------
“The fact that innocent people are getting hit, children are getting hit. These are things we used to care about. There was a moral compass, even though we were extremely violent. There was a method to the madness. I can’t wrap my head around why they would allow it to get to the way that it’s getting, where now, the violence can spill over into their safe communities and zones.”

The end result is broken communities, broken families and lives lived in fear.

“You have people who have been terrified by people in their community, terrorized by people. So they’re afraid,” explains Fox outside the bar where her son was killed. “They’re afraid to say anything … But I mean, it has to stop somewhere. Right?”

==============



Growing gun violence in Toronot..



By the end of 2019, more than 760 people had been shot in the city, 44 of whom were killed, according to Toronto Police. That's triple the number of shooting victims in the city in 2014.

Canada has tighter gun laws than in the U.S. and suffers much less gun crime, so for many citizens, the sharp rise in gun violence in Toronto is shocking. City officials and gun control advocates are trying to figure out why the surge is happening — and what they can do to stop it.





Toronto...

EDITORIAL: Politicians silent on street check ban increasing gun crime

The fact gang and gun violence in Toronto has skyrocketed since police were banned from doing street cheeks makes them uncomfortable, lest they be accused of racism by anti-police activists if they acknowledge it.

And so at City Hall and Queen’s Park they ignore reality, saying they’re hiring more police officers, implementing new shift schedules to more effectively deploy the force and investing more money in policing and programs to address the root causes of violence.

Despite that, since street checks were banned in 2014, the number of shootings compared to 2019 is up by 178%, victims by 218% and shooting homicides by 63%.

------

Last week, recently retired police officer Sue Fisher, on the force for almost 32 years, told the Sun’s Sue-Ann Levy that the end of street checks allowed the “bad guys to take over … there’s no longer that fear (among the criminal element.)”

Today, Fisher said, officers are often running from shooting to shooting after the fact, as opposed to doing proactive policing, like street checks, to gather intelligence to prevent shootings before they occur.





According to Canada's government statistics agency, gun violence overall rose by more than 40% in Canada between 2013 and 2017, with much of that increase driven by incidents in Toronto.

Toronto Police Chief Mark Saunders says that the city's recent gun violence has been connected to gang activity.

In a press conference in August, he said the Raptors incident and the August shootings "by and large have street gang connotations to them," pointing to the gang membership of the victims and those arrested. There is a thriving gang culture in Toronto centered on the illegal drug trade, largely in the city's poorer outer suburbs.


LILLEY: Gun in cop cruiser shows why bans don’t work with criminals

Ali Showbeg is now the poster child for why Justin Trudeau’s proposed gun bans simply won’t work.

If you haven’t heard of Showbeg, maybe you’ve heard of what he did. After being arrested for impaired driving on Oct. 27 in Toronto, Showbeg was caught on camera maneuvering himself to the point where he popped a handgun out of his clothing and dropped it right in his crotch.

Thank goodness the man was clearly intoxicated and not in a mood for fighting or things could have been much worse for the officers transporting him. As in, they could have been dead.
-----
As Joe Warmington reported when the event became public, Showbeg was not exactly a stranger to police. He was arrested and charged with attempted murder in 2005 for an incident that saw a car shot up in Toronto’s north end.

In 2006, he faced firearms charges that resulted in a lifetime gun ban.

So how, given that he is subject to a lifetime gun ban, did Ali Showbeg get a gun and then get that gun into the back of a squad car?

I mean, surely he would have known he was banned from owning a gun. Surely he would have known he has never taken the required safety course and passed the test to get a gun licence. So how could he have gotten a gun?

The same way the 38 year-old did when he was a much younger 23 year-old. He bought it illegally.

Toronto left reeling after long weekend gun violence



Officials in Toronto say more will be done to reduce gun violence after 11 people were shot, two fatally, over a holiday weekend.

The weekend of violence included a deadly shooting on Queen Street, a commercial artery, that killed two men and left one woman wounded.

The shooting happened on Saturday just before 8pm local time (12am GMT).

Gun violence in Canada's largest city appears to be taking place at a higher rate than normal.

 

[2aguy]

So there is a direct correlation to our guns and our homicide rate.

Homicide rate in Australia: 0.90 per 100,000

Homicide rate in US: 4.88

541% higher than Australia



Homicide rate in UK: 0.92
Homicide rate in US: 4.88.

530% higher than the UK



Homicide rate in France: 1.3

375% higher than France



Homicide rate in Germany: 0.8

610% higher than Germany



Homicide rate in Canada: 2.0

244% higher than Canada

France...gun control failed....

"In Marseille, you can buy a Kalachnikov as easy as buying a pain au chocolat," he said.

A police investigation is underway after two people were shot dead, and a third burnt alive on Saturday evening in the southern French city of Marseille. It's the fourth death linked to gun violence this week, a phenomenon which the Mayor Benoît Payan says is out of control.

"In Marseille, you can buy a Kalachnikov as easy as buying a pain au chocolat," he said.

"This has to stop, and the Interior Minister, who is aware of the problem, must make it a key objective."
----
"If people are being killed by Kalachnikov rifles, it's because they are too easily sold throughout the city."



Three dead in Marseille shootout: 'guns are too easy to buy' says mayor

2/13/20


Reports of 'heavy gunfire' on the streets of French city of Nimes | Daily Mail Online

Machine-gun shots have been heard on the streets of a French city this evening as it was claimed a 'shootout' took place between rival gangs.

Repeated 'heavy gunfire' bursts were let off in the city of Nimes in southern France after armed men were seen in the area.

Social media videos showed several people running through the street as shots rang out at around 8.30pm.

Initial reports suggested the shooting could have been linked to gangs operating in the area.

Residents in a suburb of Pissevin district in the city claimed gang members shot at a building occupied by a rival group.


Reports of gunfire in the district have been on the rise in recent months, according to local media

========
Tourist killed in AK47 gang shooting in France as parents warned to ‘watch kids’

The woman was on a hired scooter when she and her husband were sprayed with bullets as they passed a gangland Kalashnikov shooting in which three people died.
---
The 57-year-old woman, whose nationality is not known, was among those killed in the bloodbath at a petrol station in Ollioules, near the Mediterranean – four miles from Toulon – on Sunday.

The vacationer's husband was injured in the shooting.

----

he men who died in the 8pm shooting were aged 29 and 30, and both had criminal records.

Other men were seen running away from the filling station, and police believe they were involved in the gunfight.
---

Detectives had today cordoned off the crime scene, where bullet holes could be seen everywhere.

From last year...

Marseille policeman who faced Kalashnikov gang: 'They do not fear us'




-----



But the main problem for police in Marseille when it comes to drug gangs is not their cars or the guns so much.

"These criminals do not fear the police or the justice system," he said.

Which means that among the police force in Marseille, a city where certain neighbourhoods have been blighted by gun violence in recent years, there is an increasing climate of fear.

"Of course I am scared," said the officer. "I am a police officer but I am also a human, a father with a family. Each day I ask myself if I am going to see my children tonight."
A policeman who was among the squad who responded to emergency calls from residents in the Busserine neighbourhood has spoken of how he and his colleagues live in fear of being killed and how they stood no chance against the Kalashnikovs.

The officer, whose colleague had a gun pointed at him, said the gunmen were impossible to stop because there were so many members of the public around.

"If we had rammed their car or blocked them there would have been a lot of damage. You need to think we had civilians around us and above all there were children. Innocent people would have died.

The officer was shocked by the gunmens' brazen act, which he said was not their usual type of manoevre.



ris attacks highlight France's gun control problems

The arsenal of weapons deployed by the eight attackers who terrorised Paris on Friday night underlined France’s gun control problems and raised the spectre of further attacks.

The country has extremely strict weapons laws, but Europe’s open borders and growing trade in illegal weapons means assault rifles are relatively easy to come by on the black market.

===============
France’s real gun problem

Despite these strict laws, France seems to be awash with guns. The guns used in high-profile terror attacks are really just the tip of the iceberg. In 2012, French authorities estimated that there were around 30,000 guns illegally in the country, many likely used by gangs for criminal activities.

Of those guns, around 4,000 were likely to be "war weapons," Le Figaro reported, referring to items such as the Kalashnikov AK-variant rifles and Uzis. Statistics from the National Observatory for Delinquency, a government body created in 2003, suggest that the number of guns in France has grown by double digits every year.


-----------------
This is How AK-47s Get to Paris

France outlaws most gun ownership and it’s almost impossible to legally acquire a high-powered rifle such as an AK-47, so where did the weapons in the Nov. 13 terror attack—not to mention the bloody January assault by Islamic terrorists on the Paris office ofCharlie Hebdo magazine and the 2012 shootings by a militant in Toulouse—come from?



Guns soon became a major export commodity in the Balkans. Western Europe is the target market. “Many firearms trafficked in Europe come from the western Balkans after being held illegally after recent conflicts in the area,” Europol reported. In just one case from 2014, Slovakian cops intercepted a truck trying to enter the country with “a large number of grenades and firearms,”according to Europol. “The vehicle was travelling from Bosnia and Herzegovina to Sweden.”

And it’s not like the stream of weapons will end when dealers in the Balkans run out of war-vintage leftovers. “One of the reasons we see a lot of Kalashnikovs and AK-47s on the black market is because Russia has just upgraded the Kalashnikov,” Kathie Lynn Austin, an expert on arms trafficking with the Conflict Awareness Project, told Al Jazeera, “and that has created massive stockpiles of the older models.”

On March 6, 2012, French lawmakers passed a law tightening up gun regulation and increasing penalties for illegal ownership. Just five days later, Mohamed Merah—a French jihadist of Algerian descent—went on shooting rampage, killing seven people in three separate attacks in around Toulouse before a police sniper shot him dead.

Merah’s arsenal included an AK-47, an Uzi, a Sten submachine gun, a shotgun, and several pistols—all illegal. “He could only supply himself on the black market or from crime organizations, that’s clear,” Thierry Coste, a pro-gun lobbyist, told The Christian Science Monitor.

In October 2014, French police raided several homes across the country, breaking up an Internet-based smuggling ring, arresting 48 suspected traffickers, and seizing hundreds of illegal guns. Three months later on Jan. 7 this year, jihadist gunmen wielding AK-47s shot up Charlie Hebdo in Paris, killing 12 people.

 

[2aguy]

So there is a direct correlation to our guns and our homicide rate.

Homicide rate in Australia: 0.90 per 100,000

Homicide rate in US: 4.88

541% higher than Australia



Homicide rate in UK: 0.92
Homicide rate in US: 4.88.

530% higher than the UK



Homicide rate in France: 1.3

375% higher than France



Homicide rate in Germany: 0.8

610% higher than Germany



Homicide rate in Canada: 2.0

244% higher than Canada

Britain....gun control failed.....

Two in three police force areas in England and Wales are experiencing rising gun crime, with one force facing levels six times higher than a decade ago, Guardian analysis of Home Office data has found.
-------

Concerns are now being raised about the growing availability of firearms in parts of the north of England and the Midlands as some police forces are struggling to tackle rising gun crime with fewer officers than they had a decade ago.

The sharpest rise is in the north-east, where gun crime has more than tripled from an average of 91 firearms offences a year between 2009 and 2012, to 294 a year between 2019 and 2022.

In the Cleveland police area, firearms offences have risen almost sixfold, from a yearly average of 22 to 127. Durham, Sussex, Lincolnshire, Northumbria, South Yorkshire, Norfolk and Kent police have all seen numbers more than double in 10 years


Gun crime rising in two-thirds of police force areas in England and Wales
---------

County lines​

Peter Squires, professor of criminology at the University of Brighton, told The Guardian that so-called “county lines” – a form of criminal exploitation where urban gangs persuade young people to take drugs to rural areas of the country – are probably behind the rise in gun crime in places such as Sussex, Kent and Cheshire.
-----

Gun smuggling​

The prevalence of firearm offences is also partially to do with gun smuggling, experts say. Firearms can now be hired for as little as £100 around the UK and can be acquired in “less than a day”, reported the i news site’s investigations correspondent Dean Kirby.

According to Dr Robert Hesketh, a criminology expert at Liverpool John Moores University, it is “relatively easy” to get hold of a firearm in many cities.
“A MAC-10 will cost about £3,000, an MP5 £3,000,” Hesketh said. “These are automatic weapons. Another gun doing the rounds a few years ago and possibly now was a Desert Eagle, for about £500. It isn’t hard, put it that way.”
There is also an option to rent a weapon – with criminals borrowing firearms for short periods. “You can get one possibly for £100 to £150 if you know the right people,” Hesketh said.

While it is working to cut off supplies to the UK, the National Crime Agency has seen a “gradual increase” in the use of fully automatic weapons.
Some of the weapons used are deactivated or blank-firing devices, which are being bought in eastern Europe, where they are legal and unrestricted. They are then illegally reactivated by criminals before being transported to the UK, Kirby said.
Guns can also be bought on the dark web, and stolen, lawfully bought guns have also ended up being used in shootings. On the messaging app Telegram The Sunday Times found firearms advertised for sale from £400.
In 2019/20, the National Crime Agency seized 552 illegal firearms in the UK and abroad. The UK Border Force, meanwhile, picked up 2,600 lethal and non-lethal firearms in the year to September 2020.

Why is gun crime on the rise? | The Week UK

=================


Gun offences had been increasing since roughly 2015 across England and Wales, according to figures from the Office of National Statistics. But then came the pandemic.

Are gun crimes on the rise again?​

Dr Robert Hesketh, from the School of Justice Studies at Liverpool John Moores University, thinks the incidents will increase because of the cost of living crisis.
"People are getting desperate and desperate times call for desperate measures," he said.

Dr Hesketh disagreed with senior police officers, who say it is hard for a criminal to buy a gun in Britain.

The academic instead suggested in Liverpool a cheap firearm can be obtained for as little as £150 with a bit of asking around.

Gun crime is closely linked with drug dealing. At the top of the criminal tree drug gangs arrange imports to sell in the UK.
The retail arm of the market has become dominated by a relatively new business model.
County lines gangs, using dedicated mobile phones for customers to make orders, shift drugs around the country and have been blamed for increasing the risk of violence involving guns and knives.
Liverpool is an important part of the UK's drug gang infrastructure.

http://[URL='https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-62667546[/URL]']https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-62667546

[/URL]


Police struggle to stop flood of firearms into UK


Police and border officials are struggling to stop a rising supply of illegal firearms being smuggled into Britain, a senior police chief has warned.

Chief constable Andy Cooke, the national police lead for serious and organised crime, said law enforcement had seen an increased supply of guns over the past year, and feared that it would continue in 2019

The Guardian has learned that the situation is so serious that the National Crime Agency has taken the rare step of using its legal powers to direct every single police force to step up the fight against illegal guns.

The NCA has used tasking powers to direct greater intelligence about firearms to be gathered by all 43 forces in England and Wales.

Another senior law enforcement official said that “new and clean” weapons were now being used in the majority of shootings, as opposed to guns once being so difficult to obtain that they would be “rented out” to be used in multiple crimes.

Cooke, the Merseyside chief constable, told the Guardian: “We in law enforcement expect the rise in new firearms to continue. We are doing all we can. We are not in a position to stop it anytime soon.

“Law enforcement is more joined up now than before, but the scale of the problem is such that despite a number of excellent firearms seizures, I expect the rise in supply to be a continuing issue.”

The increasing supply of guns belies problems with UK border security and innovations by organised crime gangs. Smugglers have increasingly found new ways and innovative routes to get guns past border defences.


Cooke said that the dynamics of the streets of British cities had changed and that criminals were more willing to use guns: “If they bring them in people will buy them. It’s a kudos thing for organised criminals.”

Simon Brough, head of firearms at the NCA, said: “The majority of guns being used are new, clean firearms ... which indicates a relatively fluid supply.”

He said shotguns were 40% of the total, with an increase in burglaries to try and steal them.

Handguns are the next biggest category, most often smuggled in from overseas, with ferry ports such as Dover being a popular entry point into the UK for organised crime groups:




==========

9/1/22

Concerns are now being raised about the growing availability of firearms in parts of the north of England and the Midlands as some police forces are struggling to tackle rising gun crime with fewer officers than they had a decade ago.
The sharpest rise is in the north-east, where gun crime has more than tripled from an average of 91 firearms offences a year between 2009 and 2012, to 294 a year between 2019 and 2022.
In the Cleveland police area, firearms offences have risen almost sixfold, from a yearly average of 22 to 127. Durham, Sussex, Lincolnshire, Northumbria, South Yorkshire, Norfolk and Kent police have all seen numbers more than double in 10 years.
While big cities dominate the headlines, the rise in gun crime in places such as Sussex, Kent and Cheshire is probably down to what has become known as “county lines” – urban organised crime groups pushing out into rural areas – said Peter Squires, a gun crime expert and professor of criminology at the University of Brighton.

Gun crime rising in two-thirds of police force areas in England and Wales
=========

Gun crime rising in two-thirds of police force areas in England and Wales

10/13/21

Powerful automatic guns are being smuggled into Britain for use by organised crime gangs.
The National Crime Agency and police seized weapons in raids on the homes of previously untouchable “Mr Big”s after receiving intelligence from European detectives who broke an encrypted phone network used by drug dealers and gun traffickers.
Gangs bring rapid‑fire guns to Britain’s streets


2/29/21
Matt Perfect, the crime agency’s firearms threat lead, said that new Skorpion and G9A automatic pistols, which fire at a speed comparable to an AK47 assault rifle, were found.

=====

cotland Yard today said police are seizing more deadly automatic weapons from criminals in London as detectives revealed that an innocent bystander was gunned down with a suspected Skorpion sub-machine gun last month .
Rise in sub-machine guns on London streets
Revealed - The deadly cache of guns taken off West Midlands streets
A former undercover cop who snared members of the Burger Bar Boys has warned violent gangs are in an “arms race” to control the West Midlands’ illegal drugs trade.
Neil Woods, now a campaigner to legalise recreational drugs for rehabilitation benefits, said criminals are willing to use “extreme violence” to gain an upper hand on their competitors.
That includes “importing” illegal firearms from places like the “Balkans” region of south eastern Europe onto the streets of the West Midlands, ready for combat.
UK Gangs In "Arms Race" Despite Gun Control Laws

Illegal weapons in the city have been increasing over the last few years, figures show.
Diana Fawcett, the charity's chief executive, told Sky News: "At a time when the number of homicides has been falling, deaths related to gun crime are showing significant increases which is incredibly concerning.More than 600 children in the UK were arrested for suspected firearm offences last year amid the coronavirus pandemic, new figures reveal.
A Sky News investigation has found children as young as 11 were among more than 2,000 youths detained for alleged crimes involving guns, imitation firearms and air weapons between 2018 and January 2021.
-----
Simeon Moore, who carried a gun aged 15 when he was a member of a notorious Birmingham gang, said young people arming themselves often believe they are doing "the right thing".
---
"From knives, we started to carry guns. For me, at the time it was a means of protection.
"I was walking around and at any point I could get beat up, stabbed or have my head blown off.
Hundreds of children arrested for suspected gun crimes during COVID pandemic
==============

The number of shootings in London is on the rise, despite the capital being in lockdown for significant parts of last year.

Scotland Yard figures reveal 288 incidents in 2020 where a lethal firearm was discharged, compared with 266 shooting incidents the year before.
-----
The second call of the day brought into sharp focus the concerns police have around the number of criminals apparently now willing to carry firearms.
----
The officer said criminal gangs were increasingly targeting vehicles for the small amounts of precious metals in the catalytic converters.

"It is only worth a few hundred pounds to them, but for that, the criminal gangs are willing to threaten lethal force."

Shootings in London on the rise despite lockdown, police reveal

Sharp rise in knife and gun attacks outside London as austerity bites

Across the West Midlands, violent crime has become unnervingly common. Despite knife crime in the capital making the headlines, it has risen by 103% since 2014 in this region compared with 48% in London, with 14 knife crimes a day so far this year often targeting children of school age. Meanwhile, gun crime is up by a third in the West Midlands,

and murder, GBH and other violent crimes increased by 17% in the last year alone. In London, the rises were about 10% and 6% year-on-year, respectively.
The gangs and violence commission report found “crucial links” between the black market for illicit substances and serious violence, and much of the rising violence is blamed locally on disputes between gangs, many of whom deal drugs, increasingly being settled with guns and knives.





Britain, 10/17/19 gun crime up 4%

Knife crime rises to new record of 44,000 offences in England and Wales


drugs need them to hold their territory...


Liverpool gangs 'dominate' gun and drugs trade outside London

Organised criminal gangs from Liverpool have risen to the summit of the UK underworld and “dominate” the firearms and drugs-trade outside London, the latest intelligence from senior officers at the National Crime Agency (NCA) reveals.
---
Analysis of encrypted messages from a communications system used by criminals has shown that the city has become the preeminent location for top-tier gangs sourcing high-volume importations of drugs and automatic weapons.
------

Analysis by the NFTC found that Merseyside and the broader north-west corridor was home to a network of gun factories converting low-calibre weapons such as the Czech-made Škorpion and Slovakian Grand Power into deadly automatic firearms.

Perfect said that converting weapons was seen by some in the region as a viable business.

A low-calibre Glock handgun bought for £135 in eastern Europe could be converted in just 90 seconds to a 9mm weapon that could be sold for up to £5,000.
-----
nalysis of the intelligence from EncroChat has revealed other surprises to firearms officers. Perfect said:

“If you’d asked me before Venetic what was the firearm of choice for an organised crime group, I’d have absolutely said the Glock handgun. Venetic showed that the Škorpion SMG and the Grand Power are now becoming that weapon of choice.”
Police struggle to stop flood of firearms into UK


Police and border officials are struggling to stop a rising supply of illegal firearms being smuggled into Britain, a senior police chief has warned.

Chief constable Andy Cooke, the national police lead for serious and organised crime, said law enforcement had seen an increased supply of guns over the past year, and feared that it would continue in 2019

The Guardian has learned that the situation is so serious that the National Crime Agency has taken the rare step of using its legal powers to direct every single police force to step up the fight against illegal guns.

The NCA has used tasking powers to direct greater intelligence about firearms to be gathered by all 43 forces in England and Wales.

Another senior law enforcement official said that “new and clean” weapons were now being used in the majority of shootings, as opposed to guns once being so difficult to obtain that they would be “rented out” to be used in multiple crimes.

Cooke, the Merseyside chief constable, told the Guardian: “We in law enforcement expect the rise in new firearms to continue. We are doing all we can. We are not in a position to stop it anytime soon.

“Law enforcement is more joined up now than before, but the scale of the problem is such that despite a number of excellent firearms seizures, I expect the rise in supply to be a continuing issue.”

The increasing supply of guns belies problems with UK border security and innovations by organised crime gangs. Smugglers have increasingly found new ways and innovative routes to get guns past border defences.


Cooke said that the dynamics of the streets of British cities had changed and that criminals were more willing to use guns: “If they bring them in people will buy them. It’s a kudos thing for organised criminals.”

Simon Brough, head of firearms at the NCA, said: “The majority of guns being used are new, clean firearms ... which indicates a relatively fluid supply.”

He said shotguns were 40% of the total, with an increase in burglaries to try and steal them.

Handguns are the next biggest category, most often smuggled in from overseas, with ferry ports such as Dover being a popular entry point into the UK for organised crime groups:

“We’re doing a lot to fight back against it,” Brough said, adding that compared to other European countries, the availability in the UK was relatively lower.
==========


Two shot dead on London's streets amid warnings 'fluid supply' of guns is increasingly difficult to control

The violence came as police warned that the “fluid supply” of gunswas becoming increasingly difficult to control, with gangs using new and innovative ways of smuggling them past border defences.
---

Simon Brough, head of firearms at the National Crime Agency (NCA), also warned that the “sheer volume” of firearms coming into the UK represented a “pernicious threat” that urgently needed to be addressed.

“The scale is really challenging, he told the Telegraph. “We are doing everything we can but criminals are operating in a lucrative business where they can be increasingly innovative and operate in a highly effective way.”


Last week, an Irish man found with 60 firearms in his car in Dover, en route from Calais, admitted gun smuggling.

Robert Keogh, 37, was stopped on August 2 by Border Force officers who found the weapons concealed deep inside the vehicle’s bumper and both rear quarter panels.

The number of shootings has been on the rise since 2013 and has in part being linked to the 2,000 drug supply chains identified as part of the country lines network.

Mr Brough said hand guns were being smuggled through eastern Europe, across nexus points in Belgium and the Netherlands and then onwards into the UK.

“Some of the methods criminal groups are using are incredibly sophisticated, for example, they are built into the interior of vehicles,” he said.

“The challenge at the border is the sheer volume of the operation.

“When a gun is coming in as a fast parcel, how can we find that? It’s a needle in a haystack.”

Shotguns lawfully held are being diverted into the criminal market via burglaries while other weapons are purchased blank and then converted.

Mr Brough said there was a trend towards “new and clean” guns being used for the first time that did not link to previous crimes.


“The source of them and availability leads to incidents such as we’ve seen this weekend,” he added.
========


Crime will continue to rise until us bobbies are released from the shackles of the PC police

The national crime figures released this week confirmed what my colleagues and I have known for some time. Violent crime is out of control and criminals now see certain cities and towns across the country as places where they can act with impunity.

This is not just about gangland battles in the likes of Brixton or Tottenham. What we are facing is a national crisis, fast spreading across the provinces.

In the West Midlands, for example, we had a murder rate last year on a par with that of London. Gun crime in our region is running at similarly high levels and violent thugs in my area have developed a

British crime going up...9/23/22

Anarchy in the U.K.

 

[2aguy]

So there is a direct correlation to our guns and our homicide rate.

Homicide rate in Australia: 0.90 per 100,000

Homicide rate in US: 4.88

541% higher than Australia



Homicide rate in UK: 0.92
Homicide rate in US: 4.88.

530% higher than the UK



Homicide rate in France: 1.3

375% higher than France



Homicide rate in Germany: 0.8

610% higher than Germany



Homicide rate in Canada: 2.0

244% higher than Canada

Sweden.....gun control failed....

Teenager machineguns the home of a terrified mother and young child in Stockholm suburb in latest example of spiralling gun crime as migrant drug gangs battle for control of the streets​

---
'It is terrible that attacks like this are normalised.'

The flat is the home of the ex-girlfriend of a well-known rapper, but she is no longer with him. The attack appears to have been a scare tactic.
------

Sweden has seen at least 15 incidents of homes being sprayed with bullets and a similar number of bombings in the last six weeks as drug gangs, mainly from immigrant communities, battle for control of the streets.

An hour after the apartment shooting, police managed to prevent a potential murder in nearby Hammarbyhöjden.

Officers carrying out surveillance on an address linked to a man in the Dalen network are said to have begun chasing a suspicious car.

The pursuit ended with the car crashing and two boys aged 13 and 14 being arrested after automatic weapons and masks were found inside.

Teenager machineguns family home near Stockholm as gun crime spirals
=======
3/

Barely a day goes by in this wealthy Scandinavian country without a shooting or an explosion. In the early 2000s the number of annual gun homicides in the country was in single digits and one of the lowest in Europe. Now Sweden, with a population of just over 10 million, is a country that alongside Croatia has Europe’s highest gun homicide rate. Last year there were a record 391 shootings and 63 people shot to death, alongside 90 explosions involving hand grenades and home-made explosives. Already this year there have been 71 shootings, injuring 19 people and killing 7, as well as 38 explosions.
With rising gang warfare involving guns and explosives on the streets of other seemingly peaceful northern European nations, and innocent bystanders being caught in the crossfire, it’s a part of Europe now facing an existential threat from the kind of gangland executions and creeping corruption many associate with Mexican cartels or the Italian mafia. But unlike Belgium and the Netherlands, whose massive cocaine smuggling ports have turned them into a magnet for violent international crime gangs, Sweden’s bullet-strewn crime wave has seemingly come out of nowhere.
----
And this proliferation of inter gang battles has been supplied by an abundant stream of guns and explosives in Sweden. Police estimate there are 3,000 illegal firearms in Stockholm alone, around three times the number thought to be in London, a city with around ten times the population.
----
According to police data, the most common firearm used in gang attacks is the Serbian-made Zastava handgun. Sven Granath, an intelligence analyst at the Swedish Police Authority, said more and more shootings are being carried out with black market Glocks, seen by Sweden’s new breed of hitmen as the BMW of the gun world. Guns are mainly imported from eastern Europe and the Balkans through Germany and Denmark. There is also a good supply of Kalashnikov (AK-47) assault rifles, hand grenades, powerful firecrackers and make-shift bombs made from thermos flasks packed with explosives.

‘Killing Is Simple’: Fear and Bloodshed in One of Europe’s Wealthiest Nations

=======
2/18/23

This is the terrifying moment a teenager armed with an AK-47 fired 15 bullets into the home of a terrified mother and her young child in a Stockholm suburb.
In exclusive footage obtained by MailOnline, bullets are sprayed into the front door with empty cartridge cases bouncing down the stairwell, before the camera focuses on the front door riddled with holes.
A frightened mother, who lives in the block, told MailOnline: 'It was crazy. It wasn't a small gun. It was a Kalashnikov.
---

Sweden has seen at least 15 incidents of homes being sprayed with bullets and a similar number of bombings in the last six weeks as drug gangs, mainly from immigrant communities, battle for control of the streets.
An hour after the apartment shooting, police managed to prevent a potential murder in nearby Hammarbyhöjden.
Officers carrying out surveillance on an address linked to a man in the Dalen network are said to have begun chasing a suspicious car.
The pursuit ended with the car crashing and two boys aged 13 and 14 being arrested after automatic weapons and masks were found inside.
-----
Local media reports that many recent attacks are linked by police to a desperate turf war between two gang leaders, nicknamed 'The Kurdish Fox' and 'The Greek'.
Gangs increasingly hire young teenagers to carry out acts of violence as they cannot be prosecuted due to the criminal age of responsibility being 15 in Sweden, compared to ten in the UK.

Teenager machineguns family home near Stockholm as gun crime spirals

=======

2/18/23
​

As once-peaceful Sweden is grappling with a major crime wave that includes murder, gun violence and bombings, at a level unwitnessed by its peers and neighbors, the country's police chief Anders Thornberg admitted that "this is a society we don't want".​

In 2022, fatal shootings in Sweden hit a record high of 61 - six times more than Denmark, Finland and Norway combined. As the country struggles to contain the soaring crime rate, in neighboring countries, a recently coined term "Swedish conditions" has become an insult in political debate.
-----
Nevertheless, he cautiously admitted that "there are those who claim" that immigration could have a hand in the game.

"There are those who say that it may have been because of poor integration and [the fact] that we have to deal with these vulnerable areas," Thornberg told Swedish media, alluding to a massive list of blighted and crime-stricken urban zones scattered across the country.

Outside Sweden, such areas where violence runs riot are known as "no-go zones" and even "ghettos", but the country's authorities stick to the more euphemistic "exclusion zones" or "parallel societies". The list currently features 61 entries, clouded with crime, unemployment and lawlessness.

Sweden's Top Cop Has 'No Explanation' Why Country Is Overrun with Crime - Other Media news - Tasnim News Agency | Tasnim News Agency
=========

6/8/22

"Our kids are actually dying - and it's weekly. Mother after mother, after mother is burying their kids," the heartbreaking words I heard from Maritha, a mother whose son Marley was shot dead on the streets of Stockholm.

Maritha spends her time campaigning to end gun crime, whilst her son's killer is yet to face justice.

When I travelled to Stockholm for my On Assignment report, Maritha would be the first person to tell me the primary factor driving Sweden's rising gun crime murders was segregation, but she would not be last.

The headlines about serious youth violence and gang crime bring to mind cities such as London, New York and Sao Paulo.

But, few would think of or know that Stockholm, Sweden, has become one of the worst places in Europe for Gun violence.

http://[URL='https://www.itv.com/ne...otings-are-on-the-increase-in-swedens-suburbs

[/URL]

======

A suspected bomb blast which tore through an apartment block, injuring 20 people in the Swedish city of Gothenburg in the early hours of Tuesday has reignited the country's debate over rampant gang violence.

Police say that an explosive device was 'probably' placed at the scene, with sources revealing that an officer who recently testified at a major gang trial lived in the building.

Prime Minister Stefan Lofven refused to 'speculate' but it's hard to blame Swedes for rushing to conclusions: more than 200 explosions and 360 shootings reverberated through their cities in 2020.
------

Police chiefs blame the violence on 'criminal clans that have a completely different culture' and a 'generous welfare system and trusting society can be exploited by the criminal networks.'

The country last year suffered its highest level of murder and manslaughter for at least 18 years, with 124 people killed in violent attacks. Eighty per cent were linked to gangs and 39 per cent involved guns.
----

Gun crime is also rampant, which BRA attributes to increased gangs, drug trafficking, and low confidence in the police.
---
In 2020, Sweden recorded more than 360 gun-involved incident, with 47 deaths and 117 people wounded.
After a long period of decline, gun violence steadily increased from the mid-2000s and continues to do so.
Shooting deaths more than doubled between 2011 and 2019 and now account for 40 per cent of violent deaths.
'The increase in gun homicide in Sweden is closely linked to criminal milieux in socially disadvantaged areas,' the report said.
Eighty per cent of shootings were linked to gangs, a significantly higher proportion than in other European countries.

As 'bomb blast' injures 20, how Sweden is being plagued by explosions​

=======​

Sweden has gone from having one of the lowest rates of gun violence in Europe to having one of the highest, a report said on Wednesday, describing what one researcher called a "social contagion" of killings.​

-----
The report said eight out of 10 shootings took place in a "criminal environment", with gang conflicts mentioned as one of the potential reasons for the trend. The drugs trade and low confidence towards the police in some parts of society were also cited as potential factors.

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/social-contagion-sweden-sees-surge-deadly-shootings-2021-05-26/​

​

The increase in gun homicide in Sweden is closely linked to criminal milieux in socially disadvantaged areas,” the report said, noting that shooting deaths had more than doubled between 2011 and 2019 and now accounted for 40% of violent deaths.
The report said more than eight out of 10 shootings were linked to organised crime, a significantly higher proportion than in other countries, and cited gang wars, the drugs trade and low confidence towards the police as potential factors.
The report said a decline in other forms of deadly violence, including knife crime, had masked the rise in fatal shootings.
Of 22 European countries analysed in the report, data from 2014-2017 put the country in second place, behind Croatia and ahead of Latvia. In 2018 it topped the ranking, although data from some countries was not complete that year.
-------
Last year the country of 10.3 million people recorded more than 360 incidents involving guns, including 47 deaths and 117 people injured.
Sweden is the only European country where fatal shootings have risen significantly since 2000, leaping from one of the lowest rates of gun violence on the continent to one of the highest in less than a decade, a report has found.
The report, by the Swedish national council for crime prevention (BRA), said the Scandinavian country had overtaken Italy and eastern European countries primarily because of the violent activities of organised criminal gangs.
Swedenâs gun violence rate has soared due to gangs, report says

=======
Swedish capital sees 79% spike in shootings as govt laments ‘high levels’ of violence in the Scandinavian country
Sweden recorded a surge in gun-related violence last year, according to new figures released by the government amid accusations that authorities have turned a blind eye to rising crime in the country.
Interior Minister Mikael Damberg disclosed on Monday that 47 people were killed and 117 injured in 366 shooting incidents in 2020, marking a 10 percent increase in gun violence when compared to statistics from 2019.

Damberg noted that in nearly half of the shootings registered last year, someone was injured or killed. “We will neither accept nor get used to such high levels of violence,” he said.


The situation in Malmo, a city with a large migrant population that has struggled with gang violence, has improved, while crime is surging in Stockholm, the interior minister pointed out.

According to Damberg, the Swedish capital saw a staggering 79 percent increase in shootings in 2020.
-----
Most of the violent incidents occurred in 60 suburbs across the country identified by police as “vulnerable” areas. Damberg said that while 5.4 percent of Sweden’s population live in such neighborhoods, they account for more than half of the nation’s fatal shootings.


===========
In the report on Tuesday, the Swedish Television, citing statistics from the Swedish Police Authority, revealed that by November, there had been as many shootings in 2020 as during the whole of 2019.
Between January 1 and December 15, there were 349 confirmed shootings in Sweden, with 111 people wounded and 44 dead as a result, Xinhua news agency quoted the report as saying.
The death toll is close to the highest number on record so far -- 45 gun-related fatalities in 2018.
Most of the shootings, or 146, occurred in the capital Stockholm, where 23 deaths and 48 injuries were reported.
According to the police, most incidents were related to organised crime and conflicts between gang members.
Criminologist Joakim Sturup told Swedish Television that a major reason behind the worrying statistics is that automatic weapons are becoming more commonly used by gang members.

Sweden witnesses spike in shooting incidents​

​

https://sputniknews.com/europe/2020...crackdown-on-gang-violence-covid-19-epidemic/​

The number of shootings is increasing in Sweden, despite a national effort to curtail gang violence amid the ongoing coronavirus epidemic, SVT reported.​

-------
The police also noted that the raging coronavirus epidemic, contrary to some people's expectations, has not had a major impact on crime. This is likely due to the fact that Sweden, unlike most European nations, has consistently avoided lockdowns. Even the flow of drugs has not been disturbed to any great extent, the police said. However, there is still a risk that reduced access to drugs may increase violence.

Crime gangs in Sweden: What's behind the rise in the use of explosives?

The frequent use of explosives is a relatively recent phenomenon, and criminologists told The Local that the blasts can be seen as part of an overall rise in violence and growing recklessness in these criminal networks.

Amir Rostami, a police superintendent turned sociologist with a focus on criminal gangs, told The Local that so-called 'street gangs' are showing an increased tendency towards violence, and that this violence was becoming more severe when it took place.

"If previously they maybe fired one shot or shot someone in the legs, today it's more about AK47s, using more bullets, hand grenades and explosions that we didn't see before. I'd say that's the biggest shift we see – they're more reckless, they don't seem to care about the consequences," Rostami said.

Fatal shootings linked to criminal gangs have increased from around four per year in the early 1990s to over 40 in 2018. And while the blasts that have taken place in Sweden have caused no fatalities so far this year, they could be seen as a sign that the gangs are unafraid of causing damage and potentially harming people.
No, Sweden, hand grenade attacks aren’t an ‘image’ problem

In 2018 there were 162 bombings reported to police, and 93 reported in the first five months of this year, 30 more than during the same period in 2018. The level of attacks is “extreme in a country that is not at war,” Crime Commissioner Gunnar Appelgren told SVT last year.
-------
The use of hand grenades is a purely Swedish phenomenon too, with no other country in Europe reporting their use on such a level, a police manager told Swedish Radio in 2016, a year after attacks first spiked.

The grenades used almost exclusively originate in the former Yugoslavia, and are sold in Sweden for around $100 per piece. But while only three hand grenades were thrown in Kosovo between 2013 and 2014, more than 20 have been used in Sweden every year since 2015.

More broadly, homicide has risen in Sweden, with more than 300 shootings reported last year, causing 45 deaths. Though homicide rates had been in decline since 2002, they again began trending upwards in 2015, as did rapes and sexual assaults, which more than tripled in the last four years.

Of course, 2015 was also the year in which Sweden flung open its doors to more than 160,000 asylum seekers, more per capita than any other European country.
-------

Dagens Nyheter pointed out that 90 percent of shooting perpetrators in Sweden are either first or second generation immigrants.​

https://www.spectator.co.uk/2019/10/bomb-attacks-are-now-a-normal-part-of-swedish-life/​

Only days after the murder of Karolin Hakim, another young woman fell victim to the gang wars. Eighteen-year-old Ndella Jack was killed as someone fired an automatic weapon into her flat in western Stockholm, probably aiming for her husband, a well-known figure in Stockholm’s gang scene. Less than a week after the murder, associates of Ms Jack’s husband were lured to a middle-class suburb of Stockholm, where they had been promised information about her killer. Shots were fired, missing the targets and hitting instead a taxi driver and a resident in a nearby building. One victim, also a university student, lost his sight in an eye after it was hit by a bullet


Holding Sweden hostage: firearm-related violence

Statistics from the NBHW shows that the number of individuals in Sweden injured by a firearm has greatly increased since 2009. Between 2012 and 2017, the number of individuals that were injured by a firearm increased by 50% [13]. Figure 3 outlines the number of individuals being treated at Swedish hospitals for firearm-related injuries.
----------
International reports [1, 2], the Swedish police [12,19], and Swedish scholars [3–6,20,21] agree that the main cause for the increase in the rate of firearm-related violence is the presence of many gangs and criminal networks in Sweden.

Although gangs and criminal networks have always existed in Sweden, street gangs flourished in the late 1990s and are today considered to be one of the main security problems in the country [22–24]. Swedish gangs and foremost criminal networks have not only continued to increase, butthey have also become bolder and more violent as can be seen in their use of firearms and explosive devices as their modus operandi [3,6].

Another very important source of the increase of firearm-related violence in Sweden is the easy access to illegal firearms. Although Sweden was, for decades, shielded from firearm-related violence, mostly because of its restrictive gun laws, the easy access to illegal firearms, in addition to the many gangs and criminal networks in the country, is the main reason for the disturbing increase in the country’s rate of firearm-related violence. According to police reports, there has been a high inflow of illegal weapons into Sweden from the western Balkans [12].
==========

https://www.thelocal.se/20190704/in-depth-whats-behind-the-rise-in-gang-violence-across-sweden

Honour, debts, and prestige are serving as the pretext for an increasing number of deadly shootings that challenge the ideals of equality and social harmony on which modern Sweden was built.
https://wjla.com/news/inside-your-world/stats-in-sweden-show-rise-in-violence-after-refugee-surge

Murder rose 11 percent in 2016 when compared to 2015's numbers.

Men specifically are killed by gunfire at an increased rate too - up 28 percent in that same time period.

Leading up to 2016, more than a quarter million refugees applied for asylum in Sweden, most fleeing war zones in Muslim-majority countries.​

​

Abstract​

Recent reports state that firearm-related violence is increasing in Sweden. In order to understand the trend of firearm-related violence in Sweden with regard to rate, modus operandi (MO) and homicide typology, and for which injuries and causes of death firearm-related violence is responsible, a systematic literature review was conducted. After a thorough search in different databases, a total of 25 studies published in Swedish and English peer-review journals were identified and thus analyzed. The results show that even though knives/sharp weapons continue to be the most common MO in a violent crime in Sweden, firearm-related violence is significantly increasing in the country and foremost when discussing gang-related crimes. Moreover, firearm-related homicides and attempted homicides are increasing in the country. The studies also show that a firearm is much more lethal than a knife/sharp weapon, and that the head, thorax and the abdomen are the most lethal and serious anatomical locations in which to be hit. It is principally the three largest cities of Sweden which are affected by the many shootings in recent years. The police have severe difficulties in solving firearm-related crimes such as homicide and attempted homicide, which is why the confidence and trust for the Swedish judicial system may be decreasing among the citizens. Several reforms have taken place in Sweden in the last few years, but their effect on firearm-related violence remains to be studied.
========
4/19/18

Sweden’s violent reality is undoing a peaceful self-image

Gang-related gun murders, now mainly a phenomenon among men with immigrant backgrounds in the country’s parallel societies, increased from 4 per year in the early 1990s to around 40 last year. Because of this, Sweden has gone from being a low-crime country to having homicide rates significantly above the Western European average. Social unrest, with car torchings, attacks on first responders and even riots, is a recurring phenomenon.

Shootings in the country have become so common that they don’t make top headlines anymore, unless they are spectacular or lead to fatalities.

News of attacks are quickly replaced with headlines about sports events and celebrities, as readers have become desensitized to the violence.


A generation ago, bombings against the police and riots were extremely rare events. Today, reading about such incidents is considered part of daily life.

3/9/18

https://www.economist.com/news/euro...edish-sense-security-why-are-young-men-sweden
IT WAS supposed to be a sneaky afternoon cigarette break.

Then a gunman in black appeared and shot 15-year-old Robin Sinisalo in the head.

His older brother Alejandro was shot four times. Robin died immediately on the doorstep of his home in north-west Stockholm. Alejandro was left in a wheelchair for life. Two years later, the boys’ mother, Carolina, says the police still have no leads.

Robin’s fate is increasingly common in Sweden. In 2011 only 17 people were killed by firearms. In 2017 the country had over 300 shootings, leaving 41 people dead and over 100 injured.

The violence mostly stems from street gangs running small-time drug operations in big cities such as Stockholm, the capital, Malmö and Gothenburg.

Gang members have even used hand grenades to attack police stations.

Between 2010 and 2015, people were killed by illegal firearms at the same rate as in southern Italy. Though Sweden is still a relatively peaceful place, this is worrying.

Acquiring a legal gun requires strict screening, but Kalashnikovs from the Yugoslav wars are readily available on the black market. To sweeten the deal, smugglers often throw in hand grenades (there were 43 grenade incidents in Sweden last year). The victims and perpetrators of gang violence are nearly always young men.

But shootings with illegal guns have been rising since the mid-2000s. Most gang members are indeed first- or second-generation immigrants—72% of them, according to one report, but they tend not to be new arrivals.



3/3/18

Sweden grenades increasing...


Hand Grenades and Gang Violence Rattle Sweden’s Middle Class

Weapons from a faraway, long-ago war are flowing into immigrant neighborhoods here, puncturing Swedes’ sense of confidence and security.

The country’s murder rate remains low, by American standards, and violent crime is stable or dropping in many places. But gang-related assaults and shootings are becoming more frequent, and the number of neighborhoods categorized by the police as “marred by crime, social unrest and insecurity” is rising. Crime and immigration are certain to be key issues in September’s general election, alongside the traditional debates over education and health care.

Continue reading the main story


Part of the reason is that Sweden’s gang violence, long contained within low-income suburbs, has begun to spill out. In large cities, hospitals report armed confrontations in emergency rooms, and school administrators say threats and weapons have become commonplace. Last week two men from Uppsala, both in their 20s, were arrested on charges of throwing grenades at the home of a bank employee who investigates fraud cases.

An earlier jolt came with the death of Mr. Zuniga, who on Jan. 7 picked up the grenade, which the police believe had been thrown by members of a local gang targeting a rival gang or police officers.

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Affixed to the wall in Mr. Appelgren’s office in Stockholm’s Police Headquarters is a chart showing the increase in the use of hand grenades. Until 2014 there were about a handful every year. In 2015, that number leapt: 45 grenades were seized by the police, and 10 others were detonated. The next year, 55 were seized and 35 detonated. A modest decrease occurred in 2017, when 39 were seized and 21 were detonated.

Mr. Appelgren has watched the trend apprehensively, calling it an arms race among gangs.

“I think we’re going to see, if we don’t stop it, more drive-by shootings with Kalashnikovs and hand grenades,” he said. “They throw rocks and bottles at our cars, and they trick us in an ambush. When will it happen that they ambush us with Kalashnikovs? It’s coming.”



https://www.thelocal.se/20170905/wh...ings-per-capita-than-norway-and-germany-malmo

Sweden has in recent years seen a sharp increase in the number of shootings per capita, with research suggesting that the Scandinavian country is statistically on par with southern Italy and parts of Ireland.
In 2016, some 250 shootings (random, fatal and non-fatal) were registered by police in Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö. In 2014, that number came to 200, indicating that Sweden is experiencing a drastic rise in such incidents.
“We don’t really know why yet, but what we can see is that the increase comes as we also see a rise in gang-related crimes and a growing number of criminal networks,” Manne Gerell, a criminologist at Malmö University, told The Local, after Swedish public radio first wrote about new research he is involved in.
One study which is yet to be published suggests that Sweden experienced four to five times as many fatal shootings per capita as Norway and Germany in 2008-2014, two otherwise similar countries. Previous figures have shown that deadly violence in general is going down in Sweden, but gun violence has gone up.
Gerell also singled out Malmö, Sweden’s third-largest city, as the one place where shootings are becoming particularly common.
“Malmö stands out,” he said, noting that the southern city is somewhat more exposed to social problems and poverty in comparison to both the capital and Gothenburg.
“Malmö is also what we describe an ‘early adopter’ when it comes to crime. It was the first of the three cities where hand grenade crimes became more commonplace and it was also the place for the establishment of Sweden’s first biker-gangs. We don’t know whether this is to do with its proximity to the European continent or not, but it could explain why the trends seem to start there.”
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http://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=2054&artikel=6770170

New research says Sweden sees more deadly shootings per capita than its closest European neighbors, and the low number of gun crimes solved by police here may be part of the reason why.
Sweden experiences four to five times more fatal shootings per capita than Norway and Germany, according to the ongoing research from Malmö University, Karolinska Hospital and Stockholm University.
The areas with the most shootings are Sweden's major cities: Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö. The victims as well as the perpetrators also tend to be younger than those in other the countries.

 

[M14 Shooter]

So there is a direct correlation to our guns and our homicide rate.

Which proves... what?

 

[airplanemechanic]

100% of mass shootings have one thing in common.
Guns.

100% of mass shootings have one thing in common.

Mental instability.

 

[Tommy Tainant]

Sweden.....gun control failed....

Teenager machineguns the home of a terrified mother and young child in Stockholm suburb in latest example of spiralling gun crime as migrant drug gangs battle for control of the streets​

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'It is terrible that attacks like this are normalised.'​

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The flat is the home of the ex-girlfriend of a well-known rapper, but she is no longer with him. The attack appears to have been a scare tactic.​

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Sweden has seen at least 15 incidents of homes being sprayed with bullets and a similar number of bombings in the last six weeks as drug gangs, mainly from immigrant communities, battle for control of the streets.​

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An hour after the apartment shooting, police managed to prevent a potential murder in nearby Hammarbyhöjden.​

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Officers carrying out surveillance on an address linked to a man in the Dalen network are said to have begun chasing a suspicious car.​

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The pursuit ended with the car crashing and two boys aged 13 and 14 being arrested after automatic weapons and masks were found inside.​

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Teenager machineguns family home near Stockholm as gun crime spirals​

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Barely a day goes by in this wealthy Scandinavian country without a shooting or an explosion. In the early 2000s the number of annual gun homicides in the country was in single digits and one of the lowest in Europe. Now Sweden, with a population of just over 10 million, is a country that alongside Croatia has Europe’s highest gun homicide rate. Last year there were a record 391 shootings and 63 people shot to death, alongside 90 explosions involving hand grenades and home-made explosives. Already this year there have been 71 shootings, injuring 19 people and killing 7, as well as 38 explosions. ​

With rising gang warfare involving guns and explosives on the streets of other seemingly peaceful northern European nations, and innocent bystanders being caught in the crossfire, it’s a part of Europe now facing an existential threat from the kind of gangland executions and creeping corruption many associate with Mexican cartels or the Italian mafia. But unlike Belgium and the Netherlands, whose massive cocaine smuggling ports have turned them into a magnet for violent international crime gangs, Sweden’s bullet-strewn crime wave has seemingly come out of nowhere. ​

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And this proliferation of inter gang battles has been supplied by an abundant stream of guns and explosives in Sweden. Police estimate there are 3,000 illegal firearms in Stockholm alone, around three times the number thought to be in London, a city with around ten times the population. ​

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According to police data, the most common firearm used in gang attacks is the Serbian-made Zastava handgun. Sven Granath, an intelligence analyst at the Swedish Police Authority, said more and more shootings are being carried out with black market Glocks, seen by Sweden’s new breed of hitmen as the BMW of the gun world. Guns are mainly imported from eastern Europe and the Balkans through Germany and Denmark. There is also a good supply of Kalashnikov (AK-47) assault rifles, hand grenades, powerful firecrackers and make-shift bombs made from thermos flasks packed with explosives. ​

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‘Killing Is Simple’: Fear and Bloodshed in One of Europe’s Wealthiest Nations​

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2/18/23​

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This is the terrifying moment a teenager armed with an AK-47 fired 15 bullets into the home of a terrified mother and her young child in a Stockholm suburb.​

In exclusive footage obtained by MailOnline, bullets are sprayed into the front door with empty cartridge cases bouncing down the stairwell, before the camera focuses on the front door riddled with holes.​

A frightened mother, who lives in the block, told MailOnline: 'It was crazy. It wasn't a small gun. It was a Kalashnikov.​

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Sweden has seen at least 15 incidents of homes being sprayed with bullets and a similar number of bombings in the last six weeks as drug gangs, mainly from immigrant communities, battle for control of the streets.​

An hour after the apartment shooting, police managed to prevent a potential murder in nearby Hammarbyhöjden.​

Officers carrying out surveillance on an address linked to a man in the Dalen network are said to have begun chasing a suspicious car.​

The pursuit ended with the car crashing and two boys aged 13 and 14 being arrested after automatic weapons and masks were found inside.​

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Local media reports that many recent attacks are linked by police to a desperate turf war between two gang leaders, nicknamed 'The Kurdish Fox' and 'The Greek'.​

Gangs increasingly hire young teenagers to carry out acts of violence as they cannot be prosecuted due to the criminal age of responsibility being 15 in Sweden, compared to ten in the UK.​

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Teenager machineguns family home near Stockholm as gun crime spirals​

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2/18/23​

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As once-peaceful Sweden is grappling with a major crime wave that includes murder, gun violence and bombings, at a level unwitnessed by its peers and neighbors, the country's police chief Anders Thornberg admitted that "this is a society we don't want".​

In 2022, fatal shootings in Sweden hit a record high of 61 - six times more than Denmark, Finland and Norway combined. As the country struggles to contain the soaring crime rate, in neighboring countries, a recently coined term "Swedish conditions" has become an insult in political debate.​

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Nevertheless, he cautiously admitted that "there are those who claim" that immigration could have a hand in the game.​

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"There are those who say that it may have been because of poor integration and [the fact] that we have to deal with these vulnerable areas," Thornberg told Swedish media, alluding to a massive list of blighted and crime-stricken urban zones scattered across the country.​

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Outside Sweden, such areas where violence runs riot are known as "no-go zones" and even "ghettos", but the country's authorities stick to the more euphemistic "exclusion zones" or "parallel societies". The list currently features 61 entries, clouded with crime, unemployment and lawlessness.​

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Sweden's Top Cop Has 'No Explanation' Why Country Is Overrun with Crime - Other Media news - Tasnim News Agency | Tasnim News Agency​

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6/8/22​

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"Our kids are actually dying - and it's weekly. Mother after mother, after mother is burying their kids," the heartbreaking words I heard from Maritha, a mother whose son Marley was shot dead on the streets of Stockholm. ​

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Maritha spends her time campaigning to end gun crime, whilst her son's killer is yet to face justice. ​

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When I travelled to Stockholm for my On Assignment report, Maritha would be the first person to tell me the primary factor driving Sweden's rising gun crime murders was segregation, but she would not be last. ​

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The headlines about serious youth violence and gang crime bring to mind cities such as London, New York and Sao Paulo. ​

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But, few would think of or know that Stockholm, Sweden, has become one of the worst places in Europe for Gun violence. ​

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http://[URL='https://www.itv.com/ne...otings-are-on-the-increase-in-swedens-suburbs

[/URL]​

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A suspected bomb blast which tore through an apartment block, injuring 20 people in the Swedish city of Gothenburg in the early hours of Tuesday has reignited the country's debate over rampant gang violence.​

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Police say that an explosive device was 'probably' placed at the scene, with sources revealing that an officer who recently testified at a major gang trial lived in the building.​

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Prime Minister Stefan Lofven refused to 'speculate' but it's hard to blame Swedes for rushing to conclusions: more than 200 explosions and 360 shootings reverberated through their cities in 2020.​

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Police chiefs blame the violence on 'criminal clans that have a completely different culture' and a 'generous welfare system and trusting society can be exploited by the criminal networks.'​

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The country last year suffered its highest level of murder and manslaughter for at least 18 years, with 124 people killed in violent attacks. Eighty per cent were linked to gangs and 39 per cent involved guns.​

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Gun crime is also rampant, which BRA attributes to increased gangs, drug trafficking, and low confidence in the police.​

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In 2020, Sweden recorded more than 360 gun-involved incident, with 47 deaths and 117 people wounded.​

After a long period of decline, gun violence steadily increased from the mid-2000s and continues to do so.​

Shooting deaths more than doubled between 2011 and 2019 and now account for 40 per cent of violent deaths.​

'The increase in gun homicide in Sweden is closely linked to criminal milieux in socially disadvantaged areas,' the report said.​

Eighty per cent of shootings were linked to gangs, a significantly higher proportion than in other European countries.​

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As 'bomb blast' injures 20, how Sweden is being plagued by explosions​

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Sweden has gone from having one of the lowest rates of gun violence in Europe to having one of the highest, a report said on Wednesday, describing what one researcher called a "social contagion" of killings.​

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The report said eight out of 10 shootings took place in a "criminal environment", with gang conflicts mentioned as one of the potential reasons for the trend. The drugs trade and low confidence towards the police in some parts of society were also cited as potential factors.

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/social-contagion-sweden-sees-surge-deadly-shootings-2021-05-26/​

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The increase in gun homicide in Sweden is closely linked to criminal milieux in socially disadvantaged areas,” the report said, noting that shooting deaths had more than doubled between 2011 and 2019 and now accounted for 40% of violent deaths.​

The report said more than eight out of 10 shootings were linked to organised crime, a significantly higher proportion than in other countries, and cited gang wars, the drugs trade and low confidence towards the police as potential factors.​

The report said a decline in other forms of deadly violence, including knife crime, had masked the rise in fatal shootings.​

Of 22 European countries analysed in the report, data from 2014-2017 put the country in second place, behind Croatia and ahead of Latvia. In 2018 it topped the ranking, although data from some countries was not complete that year.​

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Last year the country of 10.3 million people recorded more than 360 incidents involving guns, including 47 deaths and 117 people injured.​

Sweden is the only European country where fatal shootings have risen significantly since 2000, leaping from one of the lowest rates of gun violence on the continent to one of the highest in less than a decade, a report has found.​

The report, by the Swedish national council for crime prevention (BRA), said the Scandinavian country had overtaken Italy and eastern European countries primarily because of the violent activities of organised criminal gangs.​

Swedenâs gun violence rate has soared due to gangs, report says​

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Swedish capital sees 79% spike in shootings as govt laments ‘high levels’ of violence in the Scandinavian country​

Sweden recorded a surge in gun-related violence last year, according to new figures released by the government amid accusations that authorities have turned a blind eye to rising crime in the country.​

Interior Minister Mikael Damberg disclosed on Monday that 47 people were killed and 117 injured in 366 shooting incidents in 2020, marking a 10 percent increase in gun violence when compared to statistics from 2019.​

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Damberg noted that in nearly half of the shootings registered last year, someone was injured or killed. “We will neither accept nor get used to such high levels of violence,” he said.​

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The situation in Malmo, a city with a large migrant population that has struggled with gang violence, has improved, while crime is surging in Stockholm, the interior minister pointed out.​

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According to Damberg, the Swedish capital saw a staggering 79 percent increase in shootings in 2020.​

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Most of the violent incidents occurred in 60 suburbs across the country identified by police as “vulnerable” areas. Damberg said that while 5.4 percent of Sweden’s population live in such neighborhoods, they account for more than half of the nation’s fatal shootings.​

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In the report on Tuesday, the Swedish Television, citing statistics from the Swedish Police Authority, revealed that by November, there had been as many shootings in 2020 as during the whole of 2019.​

Between January 1 and December 15, there were 349 confirmed shootings in Sweden, with 111 people wounded and 44 dead as a result, Xinhua news agency quoted the report as saying.​

The death toll is close to the highest number on record so far -- 45 gun-related fatalities in 2018.​

Most of the shootings, or 146, occurred in the capital Stockholm, where 23 deaths and 48 injuries were reported.​

According to the police, most incidents were related to organised crime and conflicts between gang members.​

Criminologist Joakim Sturup told Swedish Television that a major reason behind the worrying statistics is that automatic weapons are becoming more commonly used by gang members.​

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Sweden witnesses spike in shooting incidents​

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Shootings on the Rise in Sweden Despite Crackdown on Gang Violence, COVID-19 Epidemic​

The number of shootings is increasing in Sweden, despite a national effort to curtail gang violence amid the ongoing coronavirus epidemic, SVT reported.​

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The police also noted that the raging coronavirus epidemic, contrary to some people's expectations, has not had a major impact on crime. This is likely due to the fact that Sweden, unlike most European nations, has consistently avoided lockdowns. Even the flow of drugs has not been disturbed to any great extent, the police said. However, there is still a risk that reduced access to drugs may increase violence.

Crime gangs in Sweden: What's behind the rise in the use of explosives?​

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The frequent use of explosives is a relatively recent phenomenon, and criminologists told The Local that the blasts can be seen as part of an overall rise in violence and growing recklessness in these criminal networks.​

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Amir Rostami, a police superintendent turned sociologist with a focus on criminal gangs, told The Local that so-called 'street gangs' are showing an increased tendency towards violence, and that this violence was becoming more severe when it took place.​

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"If previously they maybe fired one shot or shot someone in the legs, today it's more about AK47s, using more bullets, hand grenades and explosions that we didn't see before. I'd say that's the biggest shift we see – they're more reckless, they don't seem to care about the consequences," Rostami said.​

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Fatal shootings linked to criminal gangs have increased from around four per year in the early 1990s to over 40 in 2018. And while the blasts that have taken place in Sweden have caused no fatalities so far this year, they could be seen as a sign that the gangs are unafraid of causing damage and potentially harming people.​

No, Sweden, hand grenade attacks aren’t an ‘image’ problem​

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In 2018 there were 162 bombings reported to police, and 93 reported in the first five months of this year, 30 more than during the same period in 2018. The level of attacks is “extreme in a country that is not at war,” Crime Commissioner Gunnar Appelgren told SVT last year.​

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The use of hand grenades is a purely Swedish phenomenon too, with no other country in Europe reporting their use on such a level, a police manager told Swedish Radio in 2016, a year after attacks first spiked.​

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The grenades used almost exclusively originate in the former Yugoslavia, and are sold in Sweden for around $100 per piece. But while only three hand grenades were thrown in Kosovo between 2013 and 2014, more than 20 have been used in Sweden every year since 2015.​

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More broadly, homicide has risen in Sweden, with more than 300 shootings reported last year, causing 45 deaths. Though homicide rates had been in decline since 2002, they again began trending upwards in 2015, as did rapes and sexual assaults, which more than tripled in the last four years.​

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Of course, 2015 was also the year in which Sweden flung open its doors to more than 160,000 asylum seekers, more per capita than any other European country.​

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Dagens Nyheter pointed out that 90 percent of shooting perpetrators in Sweden are either first or second generation immigrants.​

https://www.spectator.co.uk/2019/10/bomb-attacks-are-now-a-normal-part-of-swedish-life/​

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Only days after the murder of Karolin Hakim, another young woman fell victim to the gang wars. Eighteen-year-old Ndella Jack was killed as someone fired an automatic weapon into her flat in western Stockholm, probably aiming for her husband, a well-known figure in Stockholm’s gang scene. Less than a week after the murder, associates of Ms Jack’s husband were lured to a middle-class suburb of Stockholm, where they had been promised information about her killer. Shots were fired, missing the targets and hitting instead a taxi driver and a resident in a nearby building. One victim, also a university student, lost his sight in an eye after it was hit by a bullet​

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Holding Sweden hostage: firearm-related violence​

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Statistics from the NBHW shows that the number of individuals in Sweden injured by a firearm has greatly increased since 2009. Between 2012 and 2017, the number of individuals that were injured by a firearm increased by 50% [13]. Figure 3 outlines the number of individuals being treated at Swedish hospitals for firearm-related injuries.​

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International reports [1, 2], the Swedish police [12,19], and Swedish scholars [3–6,20,21] agree that the main cause for the increase in the rate of firearm-related violence is the presence of many gangs and criminal networks in Sweden.​

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Although gangs and criminal networks have always existed in Sweden, street gangs flourished in the late 1990s and are today considered to be one of the main security problems in the country [22–24]. Swedish gangs and foremost criminal networks have not only continued to increase, butthey have also become bolder and more violent as can be seen in their use of firearms and explosive devices as their modus operandi [3,6].​

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Another very important source of the increase of firearm-related violence in Sweden is the easy access to illegal firearms. Although Sweden was, for decades, shielded from firearm-related violence, mostly because of its restrictive gun laws, the easy access to illegal firearms, in addition to the many gangs and criminal networks in the country, is the main reason for the disturbing increase in the country’s rate of firearm-related violence. According to police reports, there has been a high inflow of illegal weapons into Sweden from the western Balkans [12].​

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IN DEPTH: What's behind the rise in gang violence across Sweden?​

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Honour, debts, and prestige are serving as the pretext for an increasing number of deadly shootings that challenge the ideals of equality and social harmony on which modern Sweden was built.​

Stats in Sweden show rise in violence after refugee surge​

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Murder rose 11 percent in 2016 when compared to 2015's numbers.​

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Men specifically are killed by gunfire at an increased rate too - up 28 percent in that same time period.​

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Leading up to 2016, more than a quarter million refugees applied for asylum in Sweden, most fleeing war zones in Muslim-majority countries.​

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Abstract​

Recent reports state that firearm-related violence is increasing in Sweden. In order to understand the trend of firearm-related violence in Sweden with regard to rate, modus operandi (MO) and homicide typology, and for which injuries and causes of death firearm-related violence is responsible, a systematic literature review was conducted. After a thorough search in different databases, a total of 25 studies published in Swedish and English peer-review journals were identified and thus analyzed. The results show that even though knives/sharp weapons continue to be the most common MO in a violent crime in Sweden, firearm-related violence is significantly increasing in the country and foremost when discussing gang-related crimes. Moreover, firearm-related homicides and attempted homicides are increasing in the country. The studies also show that a firearm is much more lethal than a knife/sharp weapon, and that the head, thorax and the abdomen are the most lethal and serious anatomical locations in which to be hit. It is principally the three largest cities of Sweden which are affected by the many shootings in recent years. The police have severe difficulties in solving firearm-related crimes such as homicide and attempted homicide, which is why the confidence and trust for the Swedish judicial system may be decreasing among the citizens. Several reforms have taken place in Sweden in the last few years, but their effect on firearm-related violence remains to be studied.
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4/19/18

Sweden’s violent reality is undoing a peaceful self-image

Gang-related gun murders, now mainly a phenomenon among men with immigrant backgrounds in the country’s parallel societies, increased from 4 per year in the early 1990s to around 40 last year. Because of this, Sweden has gone from being a low-crime country to having homicide rates significantly above the Western European average. Social unrest, with car torchings, attacks on first responders and even riots, is a recurring phenomenon.

Shootings in the country have become so common that they don’t make top headlines anymore, unless they are spectacular or lead to fatalities.

News of attacks are quickly replaced with headlines about sports events and celebrities, as readers have become desensitized to the violence.


A generation ago, bombings against the police and riots were extremely rare events. Today, reading about such incidents is considered part of daily life.

3/9/18

Why are young men in Sweden shooting each other?
IT WAS supposed to be a sneaky afternoon cigarette break.

Then a gunman in black appeared and shot 15-year-old Robin Sinisalo in the head.

His older brother Alejandro was shot four times. Robin died immediately on the doorstep of his home in north-west Stockholm. Alejandro was left in a wheelchair for life. Two years later, the boys’ mother, Carolina, says the police still have no leads.

Robin’s fate is increasingly common in Sweden. In 2011 only 17 people were killed by firearms. In 2017 the country had over 300 shootings, leaving 41 people dead and over 100 injured.

The violence mostly stems from street gangs running small-time drug operations in big cities such as Stockholm, the capital, Malmö and Gothenburg.

Gang members have even used hand grenades to attack police stations.

Between 2010 and 2015, people were killed by illegal firearms at the same rate as in southern Italy. Though Sweden is still a relatively peaceful place, this is worrying.

Acquiring a legal gun requires strict screening, but Kalashnikovs from the Yugoslav wars are readily available on the black market. To sweeten the deal, smugglers often throw in hand grenades (there were 43 grenade incidents in Sweden last year). The victims and perpetrators of gang violence are nearly always young men.

But shootings with illegal guns have been rising since the mid-2000s. Most gang members are indeed first- or second-generation immigrants—72% of them, according to one report, but they tend not to be new arrivals.



3/3/18

Sweden grenades increasing...


Hand Grenades and Gang Violence Rattle Sweden’s Middle Class

Weapons from a faraway, long-ago war are flowing into immigrant neighborhoods here, puncturing Swedes’ sense of confidence and security.

The country’s murder rate remains low, by American standards, and violent crime is stable or dropping in many places. But gang-related assaults and shootings are becoming more frequent, and the number of neighborhoods categorized by the police as “marred by crime, social unrest and insecurity” is rising. Crime and immigration are certain to be key issues in September’s general election, alongside the traditional debates over education and health care.

Continue reading the main story


Part of the reason is that Sweden’s gang violence, long contained within low-income suburbs, has begun to spill out. In large cities, hospitals report armed confrontations in emergency rooms, and school administrators say threats and weapons have become commonplace. Last week two men from Uppsala, both in their 20s, were arrested on charges of throwing grenades at the home of a bank employee who investigates fraud cases.

An earlier jolt came with the death of Mr. Zuniga, who on Jan. 7 picked up the grenade, which the police believe had been thrown by members of a local gang targeting a rival gang or police officers.

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Affixed to the wall in Mr. Appelgren’s office in Stockholm’s Police Headquarters is a chart showing the increase in the use of hand grenades. Until 2014 there were about a handful every year. In 2015, that number leapt: 45 grenades were seized by the police, and 10 others were detonated. The next year, 55 were seized and 35 detonated. A modest decrease occurred in 2017, when 39 were seized and 21 were detonated.

Mr. Appelgren has watched the trend apprehensively, calling it an arms race among gangs.

“I think we’re going to see, if we don’t stop it, more drive-by shootings with Kalashnikovs and hand grenades,” he said. “They throw rocks and bottles at our cars, and they trick us in an ambush. When will it happen that they ambush us with Kalashnikovs? It’s coming.”



Why Sweden has more fatal shootings per capita than Norway and Germany

Sweden has in recent years seen a sharp increase in the number of shootings per capita, with research suggesting that the Scandinavian country is statistically on par with southern Italy and parts of Ireland.
In 2016, some 250 shootings (random, fatal and non-fatal) were registered by police in Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö. In 2014, that number came to 200, indicating that Sweden is experiencing a drastic rise in such incidents.
“We don’t really know why yet, but what we can see is that the increase comes as we also see a rise in gang-related crimes and a growing number of criminal networks,” Manne Gerell, a criminologist at Malmö University, told The Local, after Swedish public radio first wrote about new research he is involved in.
One study which is yet to be published suggests that Sweden experienced four to five times as many fatal shootings per capita as Norway and Germany in 2008-2014, two otherwise similar countries. Previous figures have shown that deadly violence in general is going down in Sweden, but gun violence has gone up.
Gerell also singled out Malmö, Sweden’s third-largest city, as the one place where shootings are becoming particularly common.
“Malmö stands out,” he said, noting that the southern city is somewhat more exposed to social problems and poverty in comparison to both the capital and Gothenburg.
“Malmö is also what we describe an ‘early adopter’ when it comes to crime. It was the first of the three cities where hand grenade crimes became more commonplace and it was also the place for the establishment of Sweden’s first biker-gangs. We don’t know whether this is to do with its proximity to the European continent or not, but it could explain why the trends seem to start there.”
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Gun violence in Sweden surpasses neighboring countries, researchers say - Radio Sweden

New research says Sweden sees more deadly shootings per capita than its closest European neighbors, and the low number of gun crimes solved by police here may be part of the reason why.
Sweden experiences four to five times more fatal shootings per capita than Norway and Germany, according to the ongoing research from Malmö University, Karolinska Hospital and Stockholm University.
The areas with the most shootings are Sweden's major cities: Stockholm, Gothenburg and Malmö. The victims as well as the perpetrators also tend to be younger than those in other the countries.

Obviously you are stressed at the moment.

 

[2aguy]

Obviously you are stressed at the moment.

Obviously you were shown to not know what you are talking about...hence your last post...