NEW YORK, June 2 (Xinhua) -- In the past 10 years, good guys with guns have been present or quickly arrived at the scene of nearly every major mass shooting in the United States but failed to stop the gunman before he was able to take multiple lives, reported the Time magazine on Tuesday.

       "Good guys with guns don't always win gunfights," said David Hemenway, director of the Harvard Injury Control Research Center and the Harvard Youth Violence Prevention Center, refuting the previous assertion that "the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun."

       The assertion was made by head of National Rifle Association Wayne LaPierre in 2012, following the shooting at the Sandy Hook Elementary School, where 20 children and six staff members were killed. Amid the tragedy, the nation then debated tougher gun control measures.

       "Sometimes having a gun is useful but a lot of times it makes things worse, even when there's a clear bad guy," said Hemenway, adding that "bad guys get such military-style weapons, and now wear protection so that even if you shoot them, they may not get hurt."

       Research also disputed the assertions that armed law enforcement on campus is "the most effective tool for keeping kids safe," with a 2021 JAMA Network Open study finding "no association between having an armed officer and deterrence of violence."