A common teaching tool among professional firearms instructors is the “three threes:” gunfights take place within three yards, take three seconds, and no more than three rounds are fired. As a means of focusing student’s minds on the realities that when things go bad, they go bad fast, and one must be prepared for that, it’s a useful idea, but does it represent the truth? That depends on to whose statistics one refers, also whether the “gunfights” involve citizens or on-duty policer officers. In 2021, Chris Baker at Lucky Gunner provided pertinent details.

Decades ago the FBI was a primary source of law enforcement wisdom. That hasn’t been true for a long time, as I recently noted in FBI Credibility?

Consider this from the FBI’s 2019 Uniform Crime Report:

Graphic: You Tube Screeshot, Chris Baker

About 65% of officers were killed within approximately 3 yards. Oddly, more were killed at more than 50 feet—nearly 17 yards--than from 21-50 feet. The “three threes” are holding up pretty well thus far.

Consider this from the LAPD from 2010 and 2012:

Graphic: You Tube Screeshot, Chris Baker

Only 12% met the “three threes” rule, and a surprising 34.5% were at 46 to more than 60 feet. For most people, cops included, handgun accuracy approaching and exceeding 20 yards is iffy indeed. Consider these NYPD stats from 2014-2019:

Graphic: You Tube Screeshot, Chris Baker

A full 50% were within the three threes rule, but the way longer distances are recorded isn’t very helpful. What these stats don’t tell is whether the involved officers also shot their attackers, how many rounds were exchanged, or anything about the incidents. Nor do they tell us how many rounds entirely missed or how many hit innocents, which is common in the NYPD. 

No article can cover every related topic, but most Americans don’t know the police tend not to be good shots. Most aren’t gun guys and girls, qualifications are once a year at best, have generous passing standards—most allow 30% completely missing the target—and officers can shoot as often as necessary to make that weak standard. In agencies overwhelmed by DEI, the situation is even worse, and there are many cases where officers and bad guys have emptied their guns at each other at touching range to no effect. 

But what about citizen gunfights?

For example, John Correia from the Active Self Protection YouTube channel has watched thousands of gunfight videos and he’s mentioned the three to seven yard range as the most common. Claude Werner (aka The Tactical Professor) did an analysis of several years’ worth of stories from the Armed Citizen column in The American Rifleman. His summary on distance was that the majority of the incidents were “slightly in excess of arm’s length.”

Again, the three threes apparently hold up, but there’s an inherent problem. There is no single, scientifically oriented, database on citizen shootings, which is why Correia and Werner were forced to rely on anecdotes. This might be more accurate and credible:

The best resource that I’m aware of that has actual numbers I can put on a neat little graph for you rather than general impressions comes from Tom Givens of Rangemaster Firearms Training. Tom has been teaching defensive shooting classes for several decades. He keeps a database of all of his past students who have been involved in shootings. The best place to find his most recent commentary on those events is in his book Concealed Carry Class. 

So far, there have been 67 incidents with shots fired involving his former students. Three of those students were killed because they were unarmed at the time of the attack. The other 64 fought back and survived. Only three had minor injuries and none of them were convicted of any wrongdoing.

Graphic: You Tube Screeshot, Chris Baker

These stats are very different from the previous sources, and Baker suggests that most of these involved crimes like armed robbery or sexual assault, which tend to be close range encounters. Baker also notes Givens’ students might be presumed to be more experienced and well trained than most. People without such training might be expected to react more slowly, shortening the range to two yards or less.

What lessons can we learn from these admittedly limited statistics? We might revise the threes rule to “around three yards+.” We don’t know the duration of these incidents, the accuracy of the anecdotes, nor the numbers of rounds fired. Experience suggests three rounds is in the ballpark, but that applies to the innocent shooter. More may be fired by bad guys.

By all means, practice to shoot from three yards, but always work for smoothness because smooth is fast and accuracy is final. Also practice at greater ranges and carry as many rounds as you reasonably can. No one can know when they’ll need a handgun, nor how many rounds they’ll need.

Mike McDaniel is a USAF veteran, classically trained musician, Japanese and European fencer, life-long athlete, firearm instructor, retired police officer and high school and college English teacher. He is a published author and blogger. His home blog is Stately McDaniel Manor.