From TheConversation.com, an exploration of the devastating gun violence in the United States—and possible ways to stop it. In The Conversation on Guns, editor James Densley brings together a group of expert scholars to explore the role of guns in US society and the tragic impacts of gun violence. From the many forms of gun violence, to effective and innovative public health and community-led initiatives to curb it, the authors discuss how and why guns are deeply rooted in American history and culture by examining both the politics and policies around gun safety. Grounded in the latest research, these short and accessible articles written by experts in criminal justice, law, sociology, public health, history, and education explain how the United States became so saturated with guns and what the prevalence of guns is doing to our society. The Critical Conversations series collects essays from top scholars on timely topics, including water, biotechnology, gender diversity, and more, originally published on the independent news site The Conversation. Contributors: Pierre M. Atlas, Deborah Azrael, Michelle Barnhart, Paul Boxer, Brad J. Bushman, Marika Cabral, Patrick Carter, Philip J. Cook, Saul Cornell, Rebecca Cunningham, James Densley, Greg Dickinson, John J. Donohue III, Frank Edwards, Sandro Galea, Richard Gunderman, Connie Hassett-Walker, Paul Hirschfield, Aimee Dinnín Huff, Arash Javanbakht, Bokyung Kim, Michael J. Klein, Anita Knopov, Susanna Lee, Morgan Marietta, Frank McAndrew, Jonathan M. Metzl, Matthew Miller, Brian L. Ott, Molly Pahn, Jillian Peterson, Dan Romer, Maya Rossin-Slater, Allen Rostron, Molly Schnell, Hannes Schwandt, Donald H. Sebastian, Michael Siegel, Rebeccah Sokol, Robert Spitzer, Peter Squires, Jeremy Straub, Tom Stucky, Ashwini Tambe, Jennifer Tucker, John A. Tures, Lacey Wallace, Andrew P. Wheeler, Garen Wintemute, Cary Wu, April M. Zeoli, Marc A. Zimmerman

This book delves into a multitude of practices that, although deemed “lawful” by courts, are undeniably “awful” and unethical. From police officers employing deceit to extract confessions or consent to search, to prosecutors manipulating innocent individuals to relinquish their rights and plead guilty, to excessive force by law enforcement, these practices erode public trust in the criminal legal system and deny justice to those affected. With a critical examination of these deeply flawed tactics, this volume goes beneath the surface to explore their profound impact on the ethical standards and emotional health of justice system practitioners. It forcefully argues for a reclaiming of The Social Contract and for peace officers and prosecutors to unequivocally reject these unethical methods and recognize the urgent need for a criminal justice system that truly embodies ethics and fairness. This work equips police officers, prosecutors, judges, and legislators with invaluable research, enabling them to actively advocate for a transformed system that ethically serves justice for all in the post-George Floyd era.

Combining a compulsive read with rigorous academic analysis, this book tells the real-life stories of drug dealers involved in county lines networks, including their methods, motives and misfortunes. Conventional wisdom surrounding county lines often portrays drugs runners as exploited victims and gang proliferation as a market-driven exercise, and suggests a business model facilitated exclusively by smart phone technology and routinely regulated by violence. Aimed at students, scholars, practitioners and policymakers, this myth-busting, accessible book offers a novel way of thinking about county lines in relation to gangs and serious organised crime and presents new ideas for drug crime prevention, intervention and enforcement.

Robbery can be planned or spontaneous and is a typically short, chaotic crime that is comparatively under-researched. This book transports the reader to the streets and focuses on the real-life narratives and motivations of the youth gang members and adult organised criminals immersed in this form of violence. Uniquely focusing on robberies involving drug dealers and users, this book considers the material and emotional gains and losses to offenders and victims and offers policy recommendations to reduce occurrences of this common crime.

An examination of the phenomenon of mass shootings in America and an urgent call to implement evidence-based strategies to stop these tragedies-now in paperback Using data from the writers' groundbreaking research on mass shooters, including first-person accounts from the perpetrators themselves, The Violence Project charts new pathways to prevention and innovative ways to stop the social contagion of violence. Frustrated by reactionary policy conversations that never seemed to convert into meaningful action, special investigator and psychologist Jill Peterson and sociologist James Densley built The Violence Project, the first comprehensive database of mass shooters. Their goal was to establish the root causes of mass shootings and figure out how to stop them by examining hundreds of data points in the life histories of more than 170 mass shooters-from their childhood and adolescence to their mental health and motives. They've also interviewed the living perpetrators of mass shootings and people who knew them, shooting survivors, victims' families, first responders, and leading experts to gain a comprehensive firsthand understanding of the real stories behind them, rather than the sensationalized media narratives that too often prevail. For the first time, instead of offering thoughts and prayers for the victims of these crimes, Peterson and Densley share their data-driven solutions for exactly what we must do, at the individual level, in our communities, and as a country, to put an end to these tragedies that have defined our modern era.