# Empire State Bldg shooting - ALL bystanders wounded by police - Why are police such terrible shots?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/empire-state-bldg-shooting-all-bystanders-wounded-by-police-why-are-police-such-terrible-shots/632717>\
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion\
**Created:** [August 26, 2012, 3:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/empire-state-bldg-shooting-all-bystanders-wounded-by-police-why-are-police-such-terrible-shots/632717 "2012-08-26T15:18:33Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 5

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**Author:** ![Turble](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Turble](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Turble)\
**Post date:** [August 31, 2012, 12:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/empire-state-bldg-shooting-all-bystanders-wounded-by-police-why-are-police-such-terrible-shots/632717/81 "2012-08-31T00:56:31Z")

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Regarding the documentation of the statement that there are about 2.5 million defensive gun uses per year in the US:

> [@RickJay](#):
>
> No, he doesn’t; he just claims it’s true.T

Here is a more in-depth look at that number from:  
[http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record\_id=10881&page=103](http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=10881&page=103)

> [@](#):
>
> COUNTING DEFENSIVE GUN USES
> 
> How many times each year do civilians use firearms defensively? The answers provided to this seemingly simple question have been confusing. Consider the findings from two of the most widely cited studies in the field: McDowall et al. (1998), using the data from 1992 and 1994 waves of the National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS), found roughly 116,000 defensive gun uses per year, and Kleck and Gertz (1995), using data from the 1993 National Self-Defense Survey (NSDS), found around 2.5 million defensive gun uses each year.
> 
> Many other surveys provide information on the prevalence of defensive gun use. Using the original National Crime Survey, McDowall and Wiersema (1994) estimate 64,615 annual incidents from 1987 to 1990. **At least 19 other surveys have resulted in estimated numbers of defensive gun uses that are similar (i.e., statistically indistinguishable) to the results founds by Kleck and Gertz.** No other surveys have found numbers consistent with the NCVS (other gun use surveys are reviewed in Kleck and Gertz, 1995, and Kleck, 2001a).

Emphasis mine.

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