Reducing Gun Violence in Brooklyn

The findings suggest that Save Our Streets helped to reduce gun violence: over the course of the study period, shooting rates in Crown Heights decreased by six percent.

Save Our Streets, an adaptation of the Cure Violence model (formerly known as Chicago CeaseFire), treats violence like a disease, seeking to halt the spread from person to person. It does this by employing "violence interrupters" to mediate street conflicts before they escalate and by mobilizing community stakeholders in opposition to violence.

At a moment when so much public attention is focused on the question of how to reduce gun violence and the challenges of legislative solutions, Testing a Public Health Approach to Gun Violence offers encouraging news that ground-level prevention efforts can be an effective complement to enforcement strategies.

To download the study, click here.
To read press release, click here.
To listen to a podcast interview with the authors, click here.
To read a Q&A with the authors, click here.