July 23, 1993 MEMORANDUM FROM: PHB SUBJECT: BJS SURVEY OF STATE PRISON INMATES, 1991 In March 1993, the Bureau of Justice Statistics (U.S. Dept. of Justice) released its findings of a massive survey of state prison inmates, regarding a variety of topics, including where they obtain their firearms and what sort of guns they use to commit crimes. Better crosstabulations would make the data more useful, but some of the data are interesting and useful for us, and at least one datum is already being used by the other side. The survey was larger and more inclusive than the Wright-Rossi survey, involving nearly 14,000 inmates in over 200 facilities in 45 states. The results are somewhat different from the Wright-Rossi in part for that reason: the BJS survey included many less serious offenders, and probably more first-time convicts, and included a few women. The datum being used by the other side is that 27% of the prisoners purchased the handgun from a retail outlet (an additional 9% stole it from some source, including retail outlets). This is higher than the Wright-Rossi finding of 16%. But both surveys included ownership of handguns not used in crime. In the case of Wright-Rossi, the percentage using a regulated source for direct or indirect purchase dropped to 7% for those part of whose reason for obtaining the firearm was to commit a crime, and similarly to 7% among handgun predators -- those felons who frequently misused guns. In the case of the BJS survey, we do not have precise question wording (so we don't know if "straw" purchases were included), but it dealt with those who "ever owned or possessed a handgun" -- even though, overall, less than 40% of the persons who had ever owned or possessed a handgun been armed when committing their current offense. (Although 34% who had owned a handgun at some time, 13% were armed when committing their current offense, or about 38% of the owners.) The 27% exaggerates the potentiality for Brady (or the instant check) from affecting those purchases, since sizeable minorities of the BJS survey had either never been convicted of a serious offense or hadn't been punished for any but juvenile offenses -- enough so that most of the 27% could have been purchased by persons eligible to purchase at least until they were convicted of the crime for which they were being punished. With regard to military-type firearms, less than 1% of the prisoners indicated they had been armed with a military-type firearm while committing their current offense. And, while 8% indicated they had sometime owned such a gun, less than one-eighth of those who had ever owned it had used it in the current offense -- suggesting that even criminals realize that military-type firearms are inappropriate for criminal misuse. Whereas two-thirds of those criminals who owned a gun during the month prior were armed when committing their current offense, only one-third of whose with recent military-type gun ownership were so armed for their current offense.