To gain a deeper understanding of Arizona’s past incidents of gun violence within educational institutions, the Arizona Mirror examined information gathered by the Center for Homeland Defense and Security Naval Postgraduate School regarding school shootings throughout the United States.
In Arizona schools, there were no incidents where a weapon was brandished. However, the Mirror made sure to include only incidents where a firearm was discharged, including data that documents any time a gun is fired or if a bullet hits school property.
Out of the 19 occurrences, just one was a “premeditated” incident and the overwhelming majority of them included handguns of different calibers.
In 1987, when Jarod Huskey, a 17-year-old, took place, the incident seemed to be a preplanned attempt to kill the computer science teacher at a New York Times reported school. The angry student headed to the library before the school’s headmaster was killed and he stole a shotgun and a pistol.
Prior to the night during which a security guard was shot by an unidentified person taking pot-shots at a school, an individual who brought a pistol to the school shot another student. This incident had not been witnessed by Arizona Huskey.
Based on the data, incidents or conflicts between students involving firearms have been a significant part of Arizona’s gun violence history in schools since the 1990s.
Seven of the incidents involve a roof worker accidentally causing his own fatal shooting at a Tucson high school, either due to an accident or a dispute.
Four of the incidents concern suicide, including one that gained attention in 2016, when two adolescent girls were discovered at a Glendale high school in the early hours of the morning before classes, in possession of a firearm and a note indicating their intention to take their own lives.
In terms of mass shootings, shootings of a different nature are already surpassing the number of school shootings in Arizona, according to the dataset, with nine additional individuals sustaining various injuries. In Arizona, six individuals have lost their lives in school shootings.
According to data compiled by researchers at the Archive Violence Gun-profit non, there have been four mass shootings in Arizona this year, resulting in the deaths of four individuals and the injury of 21 others.
Tracker Shooting Mass defines a mass shooting incident as an event where more than four people are injured or killed. This definition is widely accepted by law enforcement agencies, politicians, and the media, and is often cited within the gun violence archives.
Even if they are considered a mass shooting by the general public, researchers from the Gun Violence Archive’s team of crime and news reports scourers may find that these shootings fit the definition of everyday gun violence.
Over the Memorial Day weekend in Phoenix, another shooting occurred at a party house, resulting in the death of one person and the injury of five others. Additionally, nine police officers were shot in an ambush in February, which was one of the mass shootings in Phoenix.
Gun fatalities in Arizona have also been gradually increasing.
According to the Center for Disease Control, there was a 22 percent rise in firearm fatalities in Arizona from 2014 to 2017.
In 2017, firearms were responsible for the deaths of 1,134 individuals in Arizona, making it the tenth largest cause of mortality. This number is significantly higher than the approximately 400 people who died from drug overdoses.
In Alaska, the rate of death caused by firearms is 24.5, whereas in Hawaii it is 2.5. Arizona is ranked 18th in the country, with a firearm death rate of 15.8 per 100,000 deaths.
As per the data from the Gun Violence Archive, a total of 256 individuals have lost their lives in incidents of mass shootings across the country, with over 1,000 people sustaining injuries in the year 2022 thus far.