One Man is Crowdfunding an End to Gun Violence

When Ian Johnstone was just 10 years old, his father was shot during a random robbery attempt in San Francisco. The perpetrators were a group of teenagers who had been using drugs; the 16-year-old shooter fired once into the elder Johnstone's back, instantly paralyzing him. A week later, his dad died in the hospital from complications

"You can't help but feel frustrated and jaded and powerless about the issue," says Johnstone.

Those feelings returned to the forefront of his mind in late 2013 after the shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown, Conn. While working in the tech industry, the idea of crowdfunding gun buyback programs came up while he was speaking with a group of friends. Instead of relying on funds from cities or grants, money raised to finance buybacks could come from private online donations -- often from people in the very communities most affected by gun violence.

From this conversation, Gun By Gun was born. In less than two years, the organization has crowdsourced more than $80,000, using the money to collect more than 750 guns in four cities over the course of five campaigns.