Another thought on the statistics of crimes involving guns in a mostly unarmed society such as most of europe:

In an unarmed society a criminal with intent to do personal or property theft / damage / assault / death can do so with less powerful arms since the victim will be less able to defend.

In an armed society criminals with intent to do personal or property theft / damage / assault / death must consider the potential lethal defense and some may be disuaded whilst others will arm themselves appropriately.

On the net there may be a limited drop in crimes accompanied with a rise in crimes involving arms in the armed society. These are just thoughts - I haven't done the research on the stats to back up these speculations but I am sure that someone could make the numbers say this. (or anything else they want them to <img src="images/graemlins/wink.gif" alt="" /> ).