SC is one of the worst states for mass shootings this year, data shows

Sarah Ellis
·3 min read
4

South Carolina has had the fifth-most mass shootings of any state this year, despite being only the 23rd largest state by population.

Thirteen times in just over five months — including five times just since May 1 — the Palmetto State has experienced a shooting that injured or killed more than four people, not including the shooter, according to nationwide data compiled by the nonprofit research group Gun Violence Archive. That’s an average of more than two mass shootings each month this year.

Seven people have been killed and at least 70 injured in mass shootings in the state this year.

The state has had more mass shootings than any surrounding state, all of which dwarf South Carolina’s population of about 5.1 million people.

Only Texas, California, Louisiana and Illinois outpaced South Carolina in the number of mass shootings recorded as of the first week of June, according to Gun Violence Archive data.

There have been 247 mass shooting incidents across the nation this year as of June 7, according to Gun Violence Archive, which compiles data based on law enforcement, media, government and other sources reporting shootings in each state.

Less than halfway through the year, 2022 is on pace to match last year’s record-setting mass shooting tally, CNN reported this week. There were 692 mass shootings in the U.S. in 2021, according to the Gun Violence Archive.

In very recent days, Columbia-area leaders have decried the violence locally, after a string of shootings involving teenagers and young adults in the Midlands including a high-profile shooting at the popular Columbiana Centre mall that left nine people with gunshot wounds.

Richland County Solicitor Byron Gipson recently said shootings in the county have become “another type of pandemic.”

“We can’t arrest away this problem,” Gipson said at a May 26 news conference. “I’ll tell you, you can’t prosecute away this problem.”

Richland County Sheriff Leon Lott published an editorial in The State newspaper this week in which he lamented, “We are losing a generation of 14-to-28-year-olds to gun violence. ...

“(We) must become that village, a community that stands up and meets the needs of our youth who are adrift, those who don’t possess the values and innate compassion to moor them safely to real life,” the sheriff wrote. “We must let them know that someone loves them; we must provide them with the lessons, the need to accept responsibility, and the human values they need to become responsible citizens. Everyday when we simply talk, but don’t act, people are dying.”

In the wake of several mass shooting incidents that have happened in rapid succession across the nation — including the shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, and the racist shooting at a grocery store in Buffalo, New York — activists and political leaders have renewed calls for reformed gun laws, including stricter background checks and bans on military-style assault weapons. President Joe Biden has joined those calls.

“For God’s sake, how much more carnage are we willing to accept? How many more innocent American lives must be taken before we say ‘enough’? Enough,” Biden said June 2, as he called on lawmakers to ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines or at least raise the purchasing age to 21 years old, strengthen background checks, pass safe-storage laws and red flag laws and “address the mental health crisis deepening the trauma of gun violence and as a consequence of that violence.”

Here is the number of mass shootings this year in each state as of June 7, according to data from the Gun Violence Archive:

  • Alabama, 7

  • Arizona, 6

  • Arkansas, 4

  • California, 22

  • Colorado, 6

  • Connecticut, 2

  • Washington, D.C., 3

  • Florida, 12

  • Georgia, 9

  • Illinois, 16

  • Indiana, 5

  • Iowa, 2

  • Kansas, 1

  • Kentucky, 3

  • Louisiana, 16

  • Maryland, 7

  • Michigan, 7

  • Minnesota, 3

  • Mississippi, 5

  • Missouri, 5

  • Nebraska, 2

  • Nevada, 4

  • New Jersey, 3

  • New Mexico, 1

  • New York, 8

  • North Carolina, 8

  • Ohio, 5

  • Oklahoma, 2

  • Oregon, 4

  • Pennsylvania, 12

  • South Carolina, 13

  • Tennessee, 7

  • Texas, 24

  • Virginia, 5

  • Washington, 2

  • Wisconsin, 6