“…Multiyear averages were created for the years 2008-2012 to control for yearly fluctuations (and to some extent, measurement errors) in homicide rates (Altheimer, 2008;Cao & Zhang, 2015;Chon, 2011;Krahn, Hartnagel, & Gartrell, 1986). Due to the skewed distribution of homicide rates, the natural log was applied (Altheimer, 2008;Elgar & Aitken, 2011;Sun, Chu, & Sung, 2010); the same solution was applied to other independent and control variables that deviated from a normal distribution.…”