CHICAGO (AP) – A recent study says many people arrested in Chicago were within just a few degrees of separation from someone illegally possessing a firearm.
The Chicago Tribune reports that the study by Northwestern University researchers was published in the Journal of Urban Health earlier this month. It attempts to understand the city’s gun market through network science.
Researchers used arrest records, gang membership rosters, shooting data and gun recoveries to group together about 188,000 arrestees and pinpoint who possessed illegal weapons. The study says people within these networks were usually two or three connections away from a weapon.
The study says gangs played a big role in facilitating gun access. Sociology professor and study co-author Andrew Papachristos says those in gangs were typically one or two connections away from illegal firearms.
