tonight, this is america. ripped by gunfire. >> the person here died. >> right. >> a police sergeant unable to save his own sister from domestic violence. >> this is my job, protect people. it's a personal failure to me, i wasn't able to do that for her. >> inside the invisible epidemic. >> domestic violence is a real thing. it's the ugly secret in everybody's family that people don't want to talk about. >> the calls for change. this special edition of "nightline," "one nation under fire," will be right back. (vo) for over 50 years purina cat chow has been helping cats feel at home. with trusted nutrition, no wonder it's the number one dry cat food in america. come home to cat chow.

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my sister there in the corner. >> reporter: for greg skaggs, these are the special times with his special, talina huffman, that will stay imprinted in his memory. >> a pick tear of her with my niece when she was a baby. she had a huge heart. i've said over and over, she had more love to give than anybody else that i know. she just never found the right person to love her the same way. >> reporter: fast week she was murdered, shot dead by husband eric. not only after, eric turned the gun on himself. >> the biggest thing i want people to realize, domestic violence is the real thing. it's not the forefront of the news unless something really traumatic happens. but it's the ugly secret in everybody's family that people don't want to talk about. >> reporter: more than half the women killed by gun violence are killed by family members or intimate partners. talina's death one of at least 67 gun incidents related to

domestic violence last week, according to the gun violence archive, a website that tracks gun incidents in the united states. >> we're seeing they will shoot themselves, shoot their kids. we've been seeing several murder/suicides occur and the kids of in the house. >> reporter: across the country, gun violence on the whole has surged in recent months. for one full week in partnership with the gun violence archive and our own owned stations and affiliates, abc news examined the numbers. fo more than 1,100 incidents. over 400 dead. roughly 900 wounded. >> we're seeing numbers that up until last year we had literally not seen since the early '90s. >> reporter: we saw it begin saturday, july 17th, as we started our investigation. gunshots outside of nationals park. but far and away from the cameras, a quiet tragedy unfolded in utah.

>> we had two friends, a 13-year-old and a 15-year-old, who had agreed to meet up and sneak out. one of them had brought a firearm. >> reporter: lance moorhead, 13, accidentally shot dead by his 15-year-old friend. later that night, a mother and her baby caught in the crossfire at a corner store in west philadelphia. wounding a 1-year-old. >> i'm tired of this. i'm sick and tired of this. >> reporter: day after day we saw so many children affected by this violence. one boy shot in a bedroom. >> the bullet just went through the wall. went through his head. >> reporter: tristan daden rosas, san antonio, texas, only 15, playing video games, hit by a stray bullet. >> i should have been there. because when you promise a kid you're going to protect them -- that's a promise you can never take back. >> reporter: altogether an

unspeakable toll. more than 39 dead, 94 wounded ge, the deceased, 6 children under age 12. the violence stretched from rural areas to urban cities. >> it's been a minute since i've done this. >> reporter: in philadelphia we rolled along with the police. a small number of streets infected with gun violence. >> we see this corner store here. i want to come up -- six people shot. this is another corner here where we have multiple shootings. >> reporter: that night the streets were quiet, until they weren't. >> now there's reports of shots fired in another end of the city. >> reporter: a shooting outside this restaurant famous for its cheese sticks. >> that's a shell casing on the ground right there. see where the white circle's drawn around it. i don't know what it is, you get closer to 2:00, stuff starts popping. >> reporter: as we waited at the sce,he horrible news.

>> so he was pronounced deceased. >> the person here died? >> correct. >> that's horrible. >> reporter: philadelphia's police commissioner, daniel ole outlaw, told us the argument was over a parking space. >> whatever disputes are being resolved with a firearm. >> reporter: sadly, we followed reports of domestic violence ticking up, among them, talina huffman. >> a picture of her and eric. >> reporter: she and husband eric had been together 20 years. what were your first impressions of eric, and when did something strike you as making you uncomfortable? >> eric was a really nice, really nice guy from the start. very helpful. came around a lot. never really worked a job or anything for the most part, that was something that always struck me a little odd. >> did there come a time that you sensed that the relationship was becoming abusive? >> no, not -- not for a long

time. we always knew he was kind of psychologically controlling of her. he really had to be around for all conversations, any phone calls. for a long time we kind of suspected that the mental controlling, but not physical abuse. >> reporter: greg, who works as a police sergeant in muncie, india indiana, says he and his sister weren't always in close touch. she and eric struggled with addiction to methamphetamine. did your sister ever express any direct concern about her life to you? >> no. i think a lot of it was mostly due to my profession. if she reached out for advice, i would give her advice. but it was never anything to do with domestic violence, it was usually other legal issues that she was having or he was having. >> reporter: on july 19th, in gas city, indiana, just six days after talina turned free, she and eric were passengers in a

vehicle being driven by eric's father. >> he had basically stolen one of his father's guns and snuck it into the vehicle. they were arguing in the vehicle. and during the argument, she was sitting in the rear seat, and he turned around and shot her at that point. >> reporter: eric's father starts fighting eric for control of the gun, crashing his car into parked semi trailers in the process. >> eric regained control of the firearm at that point and turned it on he was, committing suicide. >> i sense from you a little regret in the sense that you wish you had known more. am i reading it right? >> very much so. one of the comments i had made to my wife was, this is my job, to protect people, this is my job, to save somebody from this. and this is my sister. this is family to me. and i -- it's a personal failure, to me. i wasn't able to do that for her. and it's -- that's something --

that's a burden i have to carry now. >> reporter: according to the national domestic violence hotline, the presence of a gun in domestic violence situations increases the risk of homicide for women by 500%. why is it important for you to tell the story to help america understand how often domestic violence is happening, but also, when you put a gun in the mix, it makes for a lethal situation? >> i mean -- i will -- i will up front say that with him sneaking a gun into the vehicle, he had every intention of killing my sister that day. for me, had it not been a gun, he probably would have taken a knife. he had every intention of killing her that day. >> reporter: in the week we tracked, the shootings related to domestic violence were horrifying. in minnesota, 32-year-old amanda schroeder found dead by police in an apparent murder/suicide. soon after she called 911 to report her partner had been

drinking and throwing things around the residence and that she was unable to leave. in indiana, late at night, 29-year-old joseph banks was killed by his boyfriend, 23-year-old trevor danafill. trevor then turned the gun on himself. in kansas, a domestic dispute resulted in a woman and her child being kidnapped. >> while they were fleeing, he shot at the vehicle. he hit one of them, which was the child. >> reporter: these instances are just a snapshot of the violence. mark bryant, who runs the gun violence archives, says there's so many other shootings that involve domestic violence that we don't even know about. >> if there's someone so the, the most important takeaway is that they were shot. so the police are going to bring out that they were shot. they're not necessarily going to go drill down on individual shootings, that it was domestic violence. and that's the important part to the report. >> reporter: too often, domestic violence cases go unreported.

>> unfortunately, i don't think there's enough resources out there for the victims of domestic violence where they can really feel like they can be safe and get away. just because a lot of times there's financial stability, there's stability for children involved, how are they going to be able to support themselves and their families at that point if they're alone? >> if you had some advice for people today in terms of warning signs and what to do, what would you tell people to do? >> definitely reach out to them. let them know that they have support. whether it's friends, family, the community. there are other programs that are out there. we have battered women's shelters and things like that in place for them and their family to be able to go to. help walk them through the legal aspect of it. because it can be a little overwhelming. >> reporter: as greg lays his sister to rest, we might ask ourselves, when is enough, enough? so many wounded, so many lives

lost. >> the best thing i can do for my sister at this point is to take such a negative tragedy that's happened and try to make something positive out of it. my hope is to bring more attention to domestic violence in the nation. even if i never know about it and it saves one life, it's made it worth it to me. coming up, how to stop domestic violence in its tracks here at home. night. do it. run your dishwasher every night with cascade platinum to save water & energy. did you know an energy star certified dishwasher uses less than 4 gallons of water per cycle while a running sink uses that every 2 minutes? even better, it's proven you can also save up to $130 dollars per year on your energy bill. so do it every night with cascade platinum. the surprising way to save water & energy. people everywhere living with type 2 diabetes are waking up to what's possible

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♪ the cdc reports more than 10 million adults experience domestic violence every year. to break wt wcano stop this

vicious cycle, earlier i spoke with rachel grayberg, director of public policy at the national coalition against domestic mesticnce survivor. joining. rachel, i srth you. i don't think people have any idea just how pervasive domestic violence is in this country. can you give folks at home a sense what was we're talking about? >> absolutely, thank you for that question. about 1 in 4 women and 1 in 7 experience interpartner violence in their lives. every person who is watching this tonight knows someone who has experienced intimate partner violence, whether they know it or not. >> i saw one stunning statistic, that 1 million women have either been shot at or shot in this country. i find that extraordinary. >> actually, there's a new research study out that found that 13.6% of american women

have been threatened by a domestic abuser with a gun. and of those, 43% have been injured in some way, whether it's being shot or pistol whipped or sexually assaulted with a firearm. >> that's just horrible. stacy, i was thinking about your story. and i was thinking about how fortunate you are to be alive. tell us that day when you were shot, what happened? >> that day is still fresh in my mind. february 23rd, 2019. i went to virginia beach with then my fiance. and he was an alcoholic and started to drink. ad became very aggressive. i asked him to leave the hotel room. he did. he then wanted his jewelry back from me, which was another way of him trying to control my

mind. by taking things away from me that he gave to me. so i decided to go ahead and give him his jewelry and meet him at the hallway, which later, going to that hallway would be almost fatal. he got off the elevator, and he pushed me to the ground. and he shot me three times in my abdomen. >> oh my god. >> the lord placed some angels in that hotel. because it was a police convention. and aid was given to me right away. so i'm just thankful. >> it's a blessing that you survived. were there different points where you could see it escalating toward that? >> definitely the behavior, it gets worse. it starts out with maybe maybe e mind games.

then the jealousy. the accusations of cheating. and then possession. and i honestly felt like he was going to do something to harm me but did not think that he was going to try to take my life. >> i've known of women who have dealt with abusive men, and the control aspect, it just intensifies and intensifies, am i right? >> that is correct. he pretty much wanted to isolate me and take me away from my friends and family. so that he could pretty much have me to himself. and do what he wanted to do, and i would have no outlet. >> rachel, what more should we be doing to provide support to women who are facing this challenge? and men, quite frankly, as well? >> one of the most important things we can do is making sure that survivors have somewhere safe to go, that we fund our

domestic violence programs, and last week we actually passed a bill through the senate. it was signed by the president. that provides an extra $2 billion annually of nontaxed money for victim services. as stacy was saying, one of the things abusers often do, they isolate survivors and tell survivors, nobody cares about you, i'm the only person who cares about you. and last week, congress and the president, they made it very, very clear that they do care about survivors. there are many different types of interventions that we can take, legal interventions, to prevent homicide. and one of those, honestly, is keeping guns out of the hands of adjudicated domestic abusers. so we have been working for several years, i think this is our third iteration now, to reauthorize the violence against women act. and it includes a number of provisions addressing

access to firearms. >> stacy, what's your message for women out there facing these challenges, and men, what is your message to them? >> what i would say is, you're not alone. please tell someone. if you feel like you have nowhere to go, call the police and ask them. i would also say to women, if you're in a relationship and the first time someone becomes aggressive with you, please leave. because it only gets worse. it never gets better. >> that's very sound advice. i want to thank you both for taking the time tonight. we wish you well, we hope that we shed some light on this tonight. thank you again. >> thank you. >> thank you. we'll be right back with "the final note." . ♪ things are getting clearer. ♪ ♪ i feel free to bare my skin yeah, that's all me. ♪

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800-799-7233 for free confidential assistance. there's help out there, but clearly we have a lot of work to do. based on our tabulations last week, someone was shot every 10 minutes in this country. there's shootings happening right now. that's it for "nightline." we'll see you the same time next week. thank you for watching. i'm pierre thomas. have a great weekend. good night. [hippo groans melodically] [iguana belts major 3rd] [gator reverb] [sgi indris uffaish tii] [cassowary crescendo] ♪ [goat does a sick vibrato]