An Evaluation of the Impacts and Implementation of Florida’s Risk Protection Order (RPO) Law on Suicide, 2018-2023

Overview

This project will create a database on all risk protection orders (RPOs) issued in the state of Florida from 2018 to 2023. Three sets of quantitative analyses at the individual, county, and state levels will subsequently be used to evaluate the efficacy of RPOs in reducing firearm suicides.

Status

Awarded

Purpose

The goals of this project are to determine: (1) the individual characteristics associated with RPOs, including features of RPO cases and respondents; and (2) the impacts of RPOs on suicide among individuals, and at the county and state levels.

Approach

Collect and code all RPO petitions granted in Florida since the policy’s enactment in 2018 to the end of 2023, linking them to public health records. Utilize rigorous statistical techniques to answer the following questions:

1. What types of individual circumstances facilitate suicide, even after firearm removal?
2. Do counties with higher implementation rates of RPOs have lower firearms suicide rates?
3. Do states with red flag laws have lower firearms suicide rates?

Significance

Red flag laws have been promoted as an indispensable tool to reduce gun violence and suicide. This project will evaluate the efficacy of RPOs in reducing firearms suicide, informing gun control policy.

Investigator Bios

Emma E. Fridel is an assistant professor in the College of Criminology and Criminal Justice at Florida State University. She studies lethal violence, focusing on homicide, suicide, gun violence, school violence, and serial and mass murder. Dr. Fridel’s work has been published in Criminology, Social Forces, The Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, and Justice Quarterly, and she is a co-author of Extreme Killing: Understanding Serial and Mass Murder (2023).

Jillian J. Turanovic is an associate professor in the department of sociology and Fellow of the Institute of Behavioral Science at the University of Colorado Boulder. Her research focuses on identifying the sources and consequences of serious violence and victimization. She is the author of Confronting School Violence: A Synthesis of Six Decades of Research (2022), Thinking About Victimization: Context and Consequences (2023), and various articles published in scholarly journals.