Mass shootings closer than you think
By Philip Bump
August 6 at 1:49 PM
A hallmark of the gun debate in the United States is how quickly it can devolve into pedantry. Discussions over incidents in which dozens of people are gunned down spiral off into ancillary debates over the proper terminology in describing the weapon used or the correct way to report on new developments in the incident.
One of the more enduring debates along these lines is over the descriptors used to refer to incidents in which multiple people are shot. The FBI refers to “mass killings” as incidents in which four or more people are killed by a shooter, but the government doesn’t define “mass shootings.” The Gun Violence Archive, which tracks shooting incidents, uses a definition for mass shootings that echoes the “mass killings” definition: Any incident in which four or more people are shot ...
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/08/06/mass-shooting-incidents-probably-happened-closer-you-than-you-think/