Reporting on US gun violence in 2021 revealed how the toll is spread unequally

Shootings, and the grief and trauma that follow, are concentrated in lower-income, mostly Black and Latino communities

When I ask parents, siblings and children what they want Guardian readers to know about their family member lost to gun violence, each one emphatically tells me their relative didn't deserve what happened to them. They tell me their loved ones adored animals, loved kids - that they were just special. The people I speak with, especially parents, want the world to know their sons and daughters weren't stereotypes.

This desire for posthumous exoneration isn't anything new, but the pleas sounded especially urgent in 2021.