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FBI Gun Data

The data comes from the FBI's National Instant Criminal Background Check System(NICS). The NICS is used by to determine whether a prospective buyer is eligible to buy firearms or explosives. Gun shops call into this system to ensure that each customer does not have a criminal record or isn’t otherwise ineligible to make a purchase.

Based on documentation gotten from an FBI publication, each column represents the type of transaction submitted to the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). In addition, each type of transaction is broken down by the type of firearm—handgun, long gun, and other. The types of firearms are defined by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives as follows:

  • Month - This is the month the check was made

  • State - This column indicates the State the check was initiated.

  • permit - Number of permits issued.

  • permit_recheck - Number of rechecks made on permits.

  • Handgun - Number of firearms categorized as handguns

  • Long Gun - Number of firearms categorized as Long guns(Rifles)

  • Other - Number of other types of firearms

  • Multiple - denotes a background check where more than one type of firearm is associated to a single background check

  • Admin - denotes the administrative checks that are for other authorized uses of the NICS.

  • Pre-Pawn—background - indicates checks requested by an officially-licensed FFL on prospective firearm transferees seeking to pledge or pawn a firearm as security for the payment or repayment of money, prior to actually pledging or pawning the firearm.

  • Redemption—background checks requested by an officially-licensed FFL on prospective firearm transferees attempting to regain possession of a firearm after pledging or pawning a firearm as security at a pawn shop.

  • Returned/Disposition—background checks requested by criminal justice/law enforcement agencies prior to returning a firearm in its possession to the respective transferee, to ensure the individual is not prohibited.

  • Rentals—background checks requested by an officially-licensed FFL on prospective firearm transferees attempting to possess a firearm when the firearm is loaned or rented for use off the premises of the business.

  • Private Sale—background checks requested by an officially-licensed FFL on prospective firearm transferees attempting to possess a firearm from a private party seller who is not an officially-licensed FFL.

  • Return to Seller-Private Sale—background checks requested by an officially-licensed FFL on prospective firearm transferees attempting to possess a firearm from a private party seller who is not an officially-licensed FFL.

  • Totals - Total number of firearms for each month per state.

Note: In general there are 3 classes of firearms recognized in this dataset namely; handguns, longuns, and others, hence, columns like "private_sale_long_gun" simply refer to a combination of the description for "private_sale" and "long_gun".

Conclusions

The dataset contained details about background checks carried out in the United States of America(USA) by the Federal Bureau of Intelligence(FBI) within a specified time period. It showed among other things the distribution of different categories of firearms by states and also the different timelines associated with them. Thus, insigghts were drawn from the dataset, which though fallible, were fascinating. It is my view that a more in depth approach achieved via supporting datasets will help in understanding and making inferences from this dataset.