The Thousand Oaks Shooting and the Geography of American Gun Violence

What started out Wednesday night as a college country music night at the popular Borderline Bar & Grill in Thousand Oaks, California, ended up as the deadliest shooting in the state since 2015. At around 11:20 p.m., a gunman entered the bar and fatally shot at least 12 people, including Ventura County Sheriff’s Sgt. Ron Helus, who was first to respond to the 911 calls. Also dead is the the gunman, a 28-year-old Marine veteran named Ian David Long, who was discovered by police inside the bar.

Thousand Oaks is a city of 129,000 people located 40 miles west of Los Angeles. As The Atlantic reported, it’s considered one of the America’s safest cities, a well-off suburban area where, according to Census data, median household income hovers around $101,000. At the time of the shooting, the venue was holding its “College Country Night,” and the bar was filled with students from nearby schools like Pepperdine University and Cal State Channel Islands. “The reality is that these types of incidents can happen really at any place, at any time, even in communities that are considered extremely safe,” Mayor Andy Fox told CNN.