ABSTRACT
In South Africa, as in the USA, gun control is a subject of much public interest and debate. In a project intended to study the apparently increasing tendency for violent crime to involve firearms, Dr L.B. Lerer collected data relating to homicides and suicides from the South African Police mortuary in Salt River, Cape Town. Records relating to most of the homicide and suicide cases occurring in metropolitan Cape Town are kept at this mortuary. The remaining cases are dealt with at the Tygerberg Hospital mortuary. It is believed, however, that the exclusion of the Tygerberg data does not materially affect the conclusions.
