Multiple mass shootings reported in Florida: Gun violence in America at its peak

By: Yash Gupte

Besides the Spectrum News 13 journalist and the nine-year-old girl, a TV crew member and the girl’s mother were wounded during the second shooting. They are in critical condition at a local hospital.

Authorities reported that a little girl and a central Florida television reporter were killed by gunshot on Wednesday afternoon close to the location of a fatal shooting from earlier in the day. The police have detained Keith Melvin Moses, 19, who they suspect is responsible for both shootings that took place in the neighbourhood outside Orlando, according to Orange County Sheriff John Mina, who made the announcement during a news conference on Wednesday evening. Besides the Spectrum News 13 journalist and the nine-year-old girl, a TV crew member and the girl’s mother were wounded during the second shooting. They are in critical condition at a local hospital.

According to Mina, Moses is anticipated to face charges in connection with four further shooting incidents that took place later in the day, including the death of the journalist for Spectrum News 13. Moses, according to the sheriff, has a long criminal record, including convictions for assault with a deadly weapon, aggravated assault, and battery. Authorities were quoted in the newspaper as adding that they did not know the shooting's motive. The subject is not currently cooperating with authorities and was armed when he was taken into custody.

The two journalists, a photographer and a reporter, were shot in or near their vehicle in the morning while covering the homicide, according to Mina. Immediately after that shooting, police responded to a third shooting and discovered a mother on Harrington Street and her 9-year-old daughter had also been shot inside a house resulting in the death of the minor.

The overall number of firearm-related deaths in the US increased to 45,222 in 2020, the highest amount the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has ever recorded since it began keeping track of such deaths in 1968. This corresponds to an average of 124 people each day dying from gun violence. Around 54 percent of all gun-related deaths in the U.S. were suicides (24,292), while 43 percent were murders (19,384). The figure represents a 34 percent increase from 2019, and a 75 percent increase over the course of the previous decade. In 2017, some 39,773 died from gunshot injuries, an average of nearly 109 people each day. That year also saw country's worst mass shooting in a decade when 50 people were killed and over 500 wounded in Las Vegas.

In United States, the right to keep and bear arms is a fundamental right protected by the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution. Open carrying of firearms in public, in some form, is currently allowed in 45 states. The country also lacks measures such as a national firearm registry. According to  reports, more than half of the 50 states in United States of America (USA) have now allowed their citizens to carry guns without any license and permit. Alabama joined the long list of 26 states that authorise residents to carry concealed pistols without permits on January 1, 2023.

More than 600 mass shootings were reported in the United States in 2022 alone, according to data from the Washington based Gun Violence Archive, which is more than twice as many as the 336 mass shootings that were recorded four years earlier. A mass shooting is any incident in which four or more persons are shot or killed, excluding the shooter.

A 2018 report by the Geneva-based Small Arms Survey discovered that US gun owners had 393.3 million firearms, which is more than the nation's current population of 330 million. United States also has the highest firearms per 100 residents’ ratio. And the figure is increasing. According to GVA, 7.5 million US adults - just under 3 percent of the population - became first new gun owners between January 2019 and April 2021. About half of new gun owners in that time period were women while 40 percent where blacks.

After a spurt of mass shootings in recent times, Americans are forced to confront the country’s unique relationship with guns. Earlier in April 2021-- months after taking charge of the country-- US President Joe Biden had called the gun violence an "epidemic and an international embarrassment. However, statistics show that the situation has gone from bad to worse.