A new study that finds handgun carriage by adolescents has gone up significantly over the past two decades. The jump 41% was especially pronounced among rural, white, and higher-income adolescents, according to the study, which was published by the American Academy of Pediatrics. The study was based on nationally representative surveys conducted annually from 2002 to 2019 of about 300,000 12-17-year-olds.
“The big finding was that [gun] carriage increased substantially. That translated to hundreds of thousands of adolescents,” said Naoka Carey, a co-author of the study and a doctoral candidate at Boston College.
Nineteen states and Washington, D.C., already have laws that allow the confiscation of firearms in certain situations but some experts believe the laws aren’t being used to their full potential.
The $100,000 gift from Mark Ridley-Thomas, sources said, ended up at an outside nonprofit organization run by his son, former Assemblyman Sebastian Ridley-Thomas.