Every year, about 500 identifiable people in D.C. drive as much as 70% of the city’s gun violence, according to a new report commissioned by the city.
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“In Washington, D.C., most gun violence is very tightly concentrated on a small number of very high risk young Black male adults that have a shared set of common risk factors,” says David Muhammad, the executive director of the National Institute for Criminal Justice Reform. “This very small number of high risk individuals are identifiable. Their violence is predictable and therefore it is preventable.”
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According to the study, there is significant overlap between victims of homicides and the suspects who commit them, in terms of life circumstances and risk factors. Many are involved in groups, which the study defined as a neighborhood crew, clique, or gang with varying levels of organization. Many have history with the criminal justice system, and a significant number have previously been the victim of a shooting or connected in some way to a recent shooting.
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While many point to programs for youth as a solution to violence, Muhammad says the city also needs to be extremely focused on reaching older young adults.
“It’s extremely difficult engaging a 25-year-old who has seven previous adult arrests, who is an avowed member of his neighborhood clique, who’s not currently interested in services, but that is the individual we have to serve. That’s the individual we have to pour resources into,” he says.
And pouring resources into the highest-risk people will take more coordination among the District’s various violence prevention agencies and programs, says Muhammad, who was part of a team that at one point reduced homicides in Oakland by half. He says successful violence prevention involves regular meetings where leaders of various agencies and programs get specific about certain individuals they’re worried about — and then assign that person a life coach who can check in with them every single day and connect them with the resources and interventions they need.
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