Background Checks for Gun Sales Top 2 Million
Tuesday, March 5th, 2013 -- 8:32 AM
-FBI background checks on gun sales have now topped two million in each of the past four months, according to the latest figures made available on Monday.Although the law enforcement agency does not offer public analysis of its figures, the high check rate occurs amid debate in Washington over new gun control measures mainly in response to December's school shooting in Connecticut.
The agency performed more than 2.3 million checks in February using the National Instant Criminal Background Check System.
The numbers do not reveal how many guns were purchased because some buyers could have bought more than one.
The monthly record of 2.7 million occurred in December. January was the second-highest month at 2.4 million. Prior to November, the number of monthly FBI background checks had never exceeded 1.8 million.
As of Sunday, the number of checks so far this year that resulted in rejections totaled 20,004, or almost 1.3 percent, according to the FBI.
High numbers of background checks are usually seen during the holiday shopping months of November and December. There also is often a spike in checks after a dramatic incident of gun violence.
The numbers usually decline in January. But that hasn't happened this year.
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