The pandemic and the social unrest it caused has also played a role. Eight million Americans became first-time gun owners between 2019 and 2021, said Jeffrey Butts, director of the research and evaluation center for the John Jay College of Criminal Justice at City University of New York.
Cincinnati Enquirer — Bystanders in a Crowd: Main Street Shooting Among Many Similar Incidents
[Jeffrey] Butts is a research professor at the John John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City. He said prevention efforts have focused on youth intervention and economic disparity. "That was all designed for a pre-pandemic world," Butts said. "An erosion of civilization happened with the pandemic. It seemed like society was coming apart. People were scared."
Growing Risk of Gun Violence — Interviewed on the “Newsy” streaming site
"I think the Supreme Court made this decision the way they usually do things, not thinking about the country or the safety of people, but some Constitutional provision that appeals to 'the base' ..."
Republicans Insist Most Gun Violence Happens in Democratic Cities – The Figures Tell a Different Story
Between 2008 and 2014, 21 of 33 states with sufficient gun violence data showed equal or greater gun violence in rural areas compared with large metro areas, according to an analysis from the John Jay College of Criminal Justice — even in favoured GOP punching bags like Californa and Illinois.
AP News — Gun Violence Leads Community Groups to Take Bolder Action
Jeffrey A. Butts, director of research at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York and one of the authors of a recent review of community intervention programs, cautioned against drawing easy conclusions about the effectiveness of such intervention.
Podcast — Are violence interrupters more effective than police?
Gun violence is a massive problem in American communities. And after decades of failed policies, some community members are taking matters in their own hands and working as violence interrupters. In this episode of Beyond Black History Month, we meet members of Save Our Streets, or SOS. We find out how some of the same people who once caused neighborhood violence are dedicating their lives to stopping it.
Boston Globe — Massachusetts’ Restrictive Gun Laws are Working. The Supreme Court May Have Just Upended That.
When predicting urban gun violence trends, academics also underscore the strong connection between gun violence and racial and economic segregation.
NewsNation Prime — Is America Seeing a Surge in Violent Crime?
"We can't get to the point where we think this level of violence is normal and just grow to accept it. We have to continue to try to push down the numbers."
Rochester City Newspaper — We’re Missing the Real Gun Violence Epidemic
[T]he science of preventing mass shootings isn't as developed as it is for everyday violence prevention, said Jeffrey Butts, director of the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in Manhattan.
Gothamist — No New Funding for Violence Interrupter Program, Despite Adams’ Promised Expansion
Jeffrey Butts, a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice who has researched the crisis management system, said the city faces the difficult job of scaling up the program without losing its grass-roots bonafides.
MSN — La Masacre de la Escuela de Texas fue el Tiroteo Número 203 de EEUU en Todo 2022
"Es una mezcla de racismo, resentimiento de clase, miedo al cambio, inexistente control de armas y políticos que quieren inflamar y explotar todo esto para mantenerse en el poder", explicó Jeffrey Butts, profesor del centro John Jay de Justicia Criminal de la Universidad de Nueva York.
Newsweek Magazine — ‘Defund the Police’ Is Dead But Other Reform Efforts Thrive In U.S. Cities
"My main concern is that [politicians] don't care about the details, they just want to have a good sound bite and a good promotional campaign," says Jeffrey Butts, director of the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City.
NY Daily News — NYC Will Spend $9 Million on ‘Violence Interrupters’ to Curb Violence in City Schools
“If we don’t do this type of a program… the only thing we have is police and formal policies and protocols, and that’s no way to run a society,” said Jeffrey Butts, a professor at John Jay College who has studied the Cure Violence programs.
Governing Magazine — What We’ve Learned — and Failed to Learn — from a Million COVID Deaths
Many criminologists blame the pandemic and its societal and economic disruptions for the spike in homicides over the past couple of years. “It’s not that the whole society fell apart,” says Jeffrey Butts, director of the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. “It’s just that there are enough people who were already living on the edge, and this pushed them off of it.”
CNY Central — Onondaga County Considering “Violence Interrupter” Program, First of its Kind in Syracuse
Dr. Jeffrey Butts, the director of research at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, has studied violence interruption programs at the national level. He explained that it's difficult to quantify just how effective these programs are, as violence interrupters in other cities primarily deal with trying to change the community culture through relationships to avoid violence.
WBUR Public Radio: Here & Now
Police have announced a suspect in the Brooklyn subway shooting that left many wounded Tuesday. We discuss the implications of the apparently random gun violence with Jeffrey Butts, director of the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
Le Monde — La police de New York lancée aux trousses d’un tireur du métro de Brooklyn
Il est cependant rare d’assister dans les rues de la capitale économique et culturelle des EtatsUnis à une attaque impliquant en une fois autant de blessés par balle. « Je ne me souviens pas d’un précédent de ce type », note Jeffrey Butts, professeur au JohnJay College of Criminal Justice de l’université de New York. Pour lui, le Covid19 « n’est pas une cause directe » de la hausse de la criminalité dans la ville, « mais le virus a perturbé toutes les structures sociales – logement, emploi, scolarité – qui maintiennent habituellement les choses sous contrôle »
Baltimore Sun — After killings of 3 workers, Baltimore’s Safe Streets anti-violence program at a crossroads: ‘We have to continue to evolve’
Understanding what work is being done, anything that lets researchers “pull back the curtain,” is important, said Jeffrey Butts, director of the Research & Evaluation Center at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York.
The Virginian-Pilot — In Portsmouth, Violence Interrupters Defuse Tense Scenes Before the Bullets Fly
Jeffrey Butts, a researcher at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, likens it to the decades-long — and eventually successful — campaign to end smoking. “So can that strategy be used to reduce the incidence of gun violence? And that’s the big question,” Butts said.
NYTimes — Shootings Rise in New York, Coloring Perceptions of City’s Safety
. “It reminds me of the 1990s, in the sense that every incident of violence becomes a major news story,” said Jeffrey Butts, director of the research and evaluation center at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice.
NY1— Shootings Rise in Bronx, Fall in Brooklyn, as Anti-gun Efforts Start
“If all we ever do is call the police in, and we never invest in those other things, we’re just living in a police state,” said Jeffrey Butts, a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. “We sort of did that in the ’80s and ‘90s, and didn't get much back from it.”
CSM — CURBING CHICAGO CRIME, ONE JIGSAW CUT AT A TIME
“There’s a whole garden of approaches, with different styles and modalities and theories of change,” says Jeffrey Butts, director of the Research and Evaluation Center at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City. “What’s new, or seems new, is that we’ve reached the point that relying on law enforcement for all of our public safety problems became too obviously problematic.”
NY1 — Shootings Data Show New Trends in Gun Violence
“The things that cause crime to go up and down are largely societal, structural,” said Jeffrey Butts, a professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice. “It’s about employment, poverty rates, drug abuse, types of drug being abused, neighborhood conditions.”
National Catholic Register — How Restorative Justice Helped Make the Justice System Work Better in Seattle
If done properly, restorative justice can foster “the most natural human response to crime — to try to talk things through and resolve the conflict,” said Jeffrey Butts, director of the Research and Evaluation Center at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York City.
Gothamist — Bridgewater Mall Incident Reignites New Jersey Debate over Police and Racial Profiling
For professor Jeffrey Butts of John Jay College of Criminal Justice, who has spent years studying juvenile justice, the video is clear evidence of the disparate treatment accorded young Black people by police, long a concern of activists and policymakers across New Jersey.
Jeffrey Butts 