TABLE 1.

Time and Distance From First Sale by a Licensed Retailer to Recovery by a Law Enforcement Agency for Guns in California and Texas: 2003–2006

Time from Gun Sale to Recovery by Police	Miles from Purchase to Recovery
	0–25, No. (%)	≥26, No. (%)	Total, No. (%)
1–28 d	680 (1.0)	284 (0.4)	964 (1.4)
29–90 d	1009 (1.4)	442 (0.6)	1451 (2.1)
91–365 d	2710 (3.9)	1699 (2.4)	4409 (6.3)
≥366 d	30 260 (43.2)	32 894 (47.0)	63 154 (90.2)
Total	34 659 (49.5)	35 319 (50.5)	69 978 (100.0)

Note. Percentages are of all guns in the table. Data were missing for another 79 122 guns. For a gun to be added to the table, dates and places for both sale and recovery were required. Data were missing for a variety of reasons: a retailer may not be able to provide a date of sale, for example, or the serial number on the gun may have been obliterated, making tracing impossible. Some traces for handguns recovered in California may have been extended beyond the first retail sale, as the state maintains a computerized archive of handgun purchases that is used for crime gun tracing. With few exceptions, traced guns have been used in a crime or recovered under circumstances that suggest criminal use.

Source. G. Pierce, A. Braga, and G. Wintemute, unpublished manuscript, 2010.