Gun violence accounts for a large portion of the cases Isenberg & Hewitt have dealt with over the past 30+ years. This unfortunately makes sense given the Pew Research Center’s latest data on gun violence indicates that 79% of U.S. murders in 2023 involved a firearm, and the trend continues today. While we at Isenberg & Hewitt are honored to represent victims of violence, we continue to be heartbroken by the seemingly never-ending news of another mass shooting or senseless act of violence.
About Violent Crime in Georgia
According to the latest Georgia Bureau of Investigation (GBI) 2024 Uniform Crime Report, Georgia experiences a violent crime almost four times every hour. These violent crimes include murders (approximately 1 every 12 hours); rape (approximately 1 every 2½ hours); robberies (almost 1 every 2 hours); and aggravated assaults (more than 1 every 21½ minutes). That’s about 730 murders, 3,353 rapes, 4,166 robberies and 24,849 aggravated assaults reported in 2024 in Georgia. Thankfully, the FBI 2024 National Statistics Report, shows Georgia fairing somewhat better than other states in some violence categories.
Georgia, incidentally had the ninth highest gun homicide rate in the country in 2023, according to the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health Center for Gun Violence Solutions. The CDC’s 2023 data recorded 892 homicides from gun violence, with the overall gun death rate increasing by 36% from 2014 to 2023.
The United States Department of Justice (DOJ) Bureau of Justice Statistics’ (BJS) 2024 Criminal Victimization Report released in September 2025, presents official estimates of nonfatal criminal victimization reported and not reported to police from BJS’s National Crime Victimization Survey (NCVS). Violent victimization includes sexual assault, rape, robbery, aggravated assault and simple assault. The report found, in 2024, 1.45% of persons age 12 or older experienced at least one violent victimization, which was similar to 2023. A larger percentage of people aged 12 to 17 experienced one or more violent crimes in 2024 (1.95%) than in 2023 (1.45%).
According to the latest FBI data, and our own experience, apartment complexes are the most common location for violent crimes. In June 2022, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution identified more than 250 chronically dangerous complexes. According to its Dangerous Dwellings series,“…of the more than 250 complexes, 162 accounted for one in every five homicides in metro Atlanta.” Our experience has also shown that gang activity at low-income multi-family complexes is a major factor in episodes of gun violence.
That said, in the FBI’s Gang Activity: 2021-2024 report, “From 2021 to 2024, there were over 100,000 reported offenses involved in about 70,000 gang-related incidents. More than half (53.7%) of gang-related incidents involved the offenses of murder, aggravated assault, rape and/or robbery.
Violent crime at apartment complexes is closely followed by hotels/motels, parking facilities, convenience stores and gas stations. While public streets and highways, parking facilities and gas stations remain a bit higher on CDC, FBI and GBI crime statistics, we continue to see extremely high instances of violent crime at low budget hotels/motels. These low-budget facilities routinely experience high crime rates and typically involve drugs, alcohol, domestic violence, prostitution and robbery. Low room rates, even hourly rates at some of these motels/hotels, combined with minimal staffing and an almost non-existent presence of security or surveillance systems make these facilities hot spots for crime.
The Data on Gun Violence in the United States
According to the latest available CDC data someone in America was killed by a gun every 11 minutes in 2023. The CDC data also shows that 46,728 individuals died from gun violence in the United States in 2023, the third-highest annual total ever recorded. This total includes deaths by suicide, of which firearms were the most common method among most age groups.
Guns were also the leading cause of death for children in the United States. The Annual Gun Violence report by the Johns Hopkins Public Health Center for Gun Violence Solutions showed that more people aged 1 – 17 died from gun violence than car crashes, overdoses or cancer in 2023.
In addition to the physical ramifications of gun violence in the United States, children, parents and teachers also live with the anxious reality that gun violence may visit their classroom one day. According to a 2023 Pew Research Center survey of teachers about gun violence, 59% say they’re at least somewhat worried about a school shooting happening at their school in the future.
Isenberg & Hewitt Advocates for Victims of Gun Violence
Mel Hewitt, a long-term member on the Board of Directors of the National Center for Victims of Crime and is currently serving out his term as vice-chair. Hewitt is also a member of the Advisory Board of the National Crime Victim Bar Association. Both organizations are headquartered in Washington, D.C.
Recently Hewitt attended the 2025 National Training Institute’s annual training event for victim advocates and attorneys. At that meeting, Hewitt had the pleasure of meeting Patricia Oliver (photo below with Mel Hewitt and Florida crime victim advocate and lawyer, Michael Haggard). Ms. Oliver’s son, Joquin was killed at the Marjorie Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. Joquin was killed on February 14, 2018, when an expelled student entered the Parkland school and opened fire, killing 17 people and wounding 17 others, in what became at the time the deadliest shooting at a high school in United States history.
Upon Hewitt’s return to Atlanta, he indicated that “meeting with real people and their advocates from across the country who have been affected by gun violence solidifies and reinforces our commitment to continue helping victims get justice for these heinous, senseless events.”
Our focus at Isenberg & Hewitt is to represent victims of all types of violent crime victims who’ve experienced physical and emotional damage. Our team has years of experience representing victims of gun violence and mass shootings. We’ve represented victims of crime and violence for years, including the countless apartment, multi-family complexes, parking lots and facilities, hotel and motel shooting and assaults. We’ve also represented victims of the Kennesaw, Georgia FedEx mass shooting event in 2014; the Indianapolis, Indiana mass shooting event of 2021 where eight people were killed; and a shooting of a minor by a minor who was able to purchase a ‘ghost gun kit’ on the internet.
We know tragedy, and while we know we cannot singularly stop these meaningless, senseless events, we do know that we can help hold accountable parties responsible for their failures. We can and do everything in our power to keep these tragedies from happening in a nation that continues to face a pandemic of gun violence.
As appropriately put by the Prevention Institute, a national nonprofit that works to put public health and safety policies into place, “It’s not only the high-profile mass shootings that we must work to prevent, but also the daily death-by-guns that claims more than 30,000 lives every year.”
Contact Isenberg & Hewitt if You’ve Been Seriously Injured Due to Gun Violence
We are here to help. If you or a loved one has been seriously injured in a mass shooting or other instance of gun violence, please contact us. Our depth of experience in mass shooting cases and other violent crime lawsuits can help you get the justice and compensation you or your loved one deserves. Fill out a contact form or call us at 770-351-4400.