Support of National Violent Death Reporting System

Submitted by: Research Advisory Committee and Firearms Committee

RAC.015.t2017

WHEREAS, in 2015, per the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, over 61,000 people died violently in the United States, which is seven people dying each hour; approximately 18,000 people died as a result of homicide and 44,000 died from suicide; and

WHEREAS, per the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, violent deaths, including homicides and suicides, cost the United States more than $76 billion in medical care and work-loss costs every year; and

WHEREAS, the number of violent deaths tell only part of the story. Many more survive violence and are left with permanent physical and emotional scars; and

WHEREAS, violence also erodes communities by interfering with quality of life, decreasing property values, and overburdening social services; and

WHEREAS, violence prevention has been hampered by fragmented and incomplete information on the circumstances surrounding homicides and suicides that does not afford an accurate assessment of factors associated with violent death; and

WHEREAS, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's (CDC) National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) collects data on violent deaths from a variety of sources, including law enforcement reports, death certificates, and medical examiner and coroner reports. Individually, these sources provide data that explain violence only in a narrow context. Together, these sources offer a comprehensive picture of the circumstances surrounding a homicide or suicide. As a result, NVDRS provides insight into the optimal points for intervention, thus informing and improving violence prevention efforts at the state and local levels to create healthier and safer communities; and

WHEREAS, NVDRS seeks to link records on violent deaths that occurred in the same incident to help identify risk factors for multiple homicides or homicides-suicides; provide timely preliminary information on violent deaths (e.g., basic counts of murders and suicides) through faster data retrieval; describe in detail the circumstances that may have contributed to a violent death; and to better characterize perpetrators, including their relationships to victim(s); and

WHEREAS, current annual funding for NVDRS supports the collection of information in 40 states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico; and

RESOLVED, that the IACP promotes increased law enforcement awareness of and agency participation in the National Violent Death Reporting System (NVDRS) as well as expanded federal funding to enable every state, Tribe, territory, and the District of Columbia to be included in the NVDRS.