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104 J. Crim. L. & Criminology 717 (2014)
Some Sources of Crime Guns in Chicago: Dirty Dealers, Straw Purchasers, and Traffickers

handle is hein.journals/jclc104 and id is 751 raw text is: 0091-4169/15/10404-0717 THE JOURNAL OF CRIMINAL LAW & CRIMINOLOGY Vol. 104, No. 4 Copyright 0 2015 by Northwestern University School of Law Printed in U.S.A. SOME SOURCES OF CRIME GUNS IN CHICAGO: DIRTY DEALERS, STRAW PURCHASERS, AND TRAFFICKERS PHILIP J. COOK* RICHARD J. HARRIS** JENS LUDWIG*** & HAROLD A. POLLACK**** In this Article, we seek to help guide law enforcement activities targeting gun acquisition by high-risk people by examining two potentially important sources of crime guns: licensed retail dealers and traffickers. Limited data availability is a key reason more is not currently known about how criminals obtain guns. This Article assembles a unique dataset that combines five years (2009-2013) of crime gun trace requests submitted to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) National Tracing Center (NTC) by the Chicago Police Department (CPD), linked to other CPD data sources about the person who was caught with the gun. From these data, we are able to identify which of the violators are or have been gang members and to compare their guns with those of violators who are not gang members. We focus in particular on how gang members obtain guns, since this population is at the highest risk for shooting someone and for being shot. We hypothesize that gang members may differ from others in how they access guns. This hypothesis could help explain why our earlier work found that the underground gun market as a whole in * ITT/Terry Sanford Professor of Public Policy; Professor of Economics and Sociology, Duke University. Research Associate, National Bureau of Economic Research. ** Research Specialist, University of Chicago Crime Lab. *** McCormick Foundation Professor of Social Service Administration, Law, and, Public Policy in the School of Social Service Administration and Chicago Harris School of Public Policy, University of Chicago. Director of the University of Chicago Crime Lab. Research Associate, National Bureau of Economic Research. **** Helen Ross Professor in the School of Social Service Administration, University of Chicago. Co-director of the University of Chicago Crime Lab.