Faculty Profile

April Zeoli

April M. Zeoli, PhD, MPH

  • Associate Professor, Health Management and Policy
  • Policy Core Director, Institute for Firearm Injury Prevention

Dr. Zeoli is interested in the impact of state-level firearm safety laws on interpersonal firearm violence and the implement Epidemiologylic health, criminology, and criminal justice-is focused on firearm policies that restrict high-risk individuals from purchase and possession of guns and those that facilitate the implementation of firearm restriction policies. Much of Dr. Zeoli's research has focused on domestic violence-related firearm restrictions, such as laws that require or allow firearm restrictions on domestic violence restraining orders, and whether these laws are associated with reductions in intimate partner homicide.

She is also interested in how local courts and law enforcement implement the restrictions to ensure that an individual who is newly prohibited from having a firearm does not have a firearm. Dr. Zeoli is also interested in extreme risk protection orders (or "red flag laws"), their impact on firearm violence, including suicide, and the implementation and enforcement of these orders. The goals of her research are to provide evidence on whether and how firearm safety policies reduce firearm violence and to improve the implementation of these laws through science.

  • PhD, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, 2008
  • MPH, University of Michigan School of Public Health, 2000
  • BA, University of Michigan, 1998

Firearms, intimate partner violence, homicide, firearm laws, and extreme risk protection orders.

Research Projects:
Zeoli's six-state study on extreme risk protection orders (ERPOs) is the largest study of its kind and explores the risk profiles of respondents to the orders, factors that are associated with ERPOs being granted, the use of ERPOs in cases of threats of mass shootings, and whether ERPOs are associated with reductions in firearm suicide.

Zeoli is collaborating on a case-control study of the risk factors for intimate partner homicide, including factors related to gun access and use, in six states.

Zeoli is leading a study on the implementation and outcomes of domestic violence restraining order firearm restrictions for restraining order petitioners who have experienced gun-involved intimate partner violence. This study is being conducted in three states to compare results across differing state laws.

Zeoli is collaborating on a project to analyze whether permit-to-purchase firearm licensing laws are associated with reductions in intimate partner homicide in states that have these laws. Permit-to-purchase laws require an individual who wants to purchase a gun to obtain a license through local governmental authorities.

Zeoli AM, Paruk J, Branas CC, Carter PM, Cunningham R, Heinze J, Webster DW. Use of extreme risk protection orders to reduce gun violence in Oregon. Criminology and Public Policy. 2021; 20(2): 243-261. DOI: 10.1111/1745-9133.12544.

Zeoli AM, Paruk JK. Potential to prevent mass shootings through domestic violence firearm restrictions. Criminology and Public Policy. 2020; 19: 129-145. DOI: 10.1111/1745-9133.12475

Zeoli AM, Goldstick J, Mauri A, Wallin M, Goyal M, Cunningham R. The association of firearm laws with firearm outcomes among children and adolescents: A scoping review. Journal of Behavioral Medicine. 2019; 42(4): 741-762. DOI: 10.1007/s10865-019-00063-y

Zeoli AM, Frattaroli S, Roskam K, Herrera A. Removing firearms from those prohibited from possession by domestic violence restraining orders: A survey and analysis of state laws. Trauma, Violence, and Abuse. 2019; 20(1): 114-125. DOI: 10.1177/1524838017692384.

Zeoli AM, McCourt A, Buggs S, Frattaroli S, Lilley D, Webster DW. Analysis of the strength of legal firearms restrictions for perpetrators of domestic violence and their associations with intimate partner homicide. American Journal of Epidemiology. 2018; 187(11): 2365-2371. DOI: 10.1093/aje/kwy174

View full list of publications at: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=QHzNAqcAAAAJandhl=enandoi=ao

Email: azeoli@umich.edu
Address:
M3164 SPHII
1415 Washington Heights
Ann Arbor, MI 48109

For media inquiries: sph.media@umich.edu

Areas of Expertise: Firearm Injury Prevention,  Health Policy