Excerpts from a Harvard study on gun ownership and gun control. It’s a fascinating read. They found no correlation between gun ownership and violence.
[T]here is no consistent significant positive association between gun ownership levels and violence rates: across time within the United States, U.S. cities, counties within Illinois, country – sized areas like England, U.S. states, regions of the United States, nations, or population subgroups…
[T]he determinants of murder and suicide are basic social, economic, and cultural factors, not the prevalence of some form of deadly mechanism… This correlation does not necessarily prove gun advocates’ assertion that gun controls actually encourage crime by depriving victims of the means of self – defense. The explanation of this correlation may be political rather than criminological: jurisdictions afflicted with violent crime tend to severely restrict gun ownership. This, however, does not suppress the crime, for banning guns cannot alleviate the sociocultural and economic factors that are the real determinants of violence and crime rates.