Editing 2012

{{Yearnav}}

== Events ==
* January 16 - Beginning of the Mali Civil War.
* January 23 - [[Al-Nusra Front]] is founded as [[Al-Qaeda]]'s branch in Syria.
* February 25 - [[Ali Abdullah Saleh]] resigns as President of Yemen.
* February 26 - 17-year old Trayvon Martin is killed by George Zimmerman in a highly controversial shooting in Sanford, Florida.
* February 27 - [[TJ Lane|Chardon High School shooting]]
* March 11 - Staff Sergeant [[Robert Bales]] goes on a killing spree while stationed in Afghanistan, killing sixteen civilians and wounding six others in the Panjwayi District of Kandahar Province, Afghanistan.
* March 11 to 22 - [[Mohammed Merah|Toulouse and Montauban shootings]]
* April 2 - [[One L. Goh|Oikos University shooting]]
* April 26 - The Special Court for Sierra Leone finds [[Charles Taylor]] guilty of 11 counts of aiding and abetting [[war crimes]] and [[crimes against humanity]] and sentences him to 50 years in prison.
* May 7 - [[Vladimir Putin]] is elected President of Russia for the second time, replacing [[Dmitry Medvedev]], who subsequently becomes Prime Minister.
* May 12 to 13 - [[Los Zetas]] massacres 49 members of the [[Gulf Cartel]] on Mexican Federal Highway 40 in Nuevo León, Mexico.
* May 15 - [[Nicolas Sarkozy]]'s term as President of France comes to an end.
* May 25 - [[Luka Magnotta]] uploads his homemade [[Snuff Film|snuff film]] ''1 Lunatic, 1 Ice Pick'' to www.bestgore.com. The video depicts Magnotta horrificly and gruesomely mutilating, torturing, and [[cannibal]]izing an unidentified man, including performing acts of [[necrophilia]]. The victim in the video is later identified as 33-year-old Chinese student Jun Lin. This begins an international manhunt for Magnotta.
* May 26 - [[Rudy Eugene|Miami cannibal attack]]
* June 2 - Former Egyptian President [[Hosni Mubarak]] is sentenced to life in prison for ordering the [[murder]] of peaceful protesters in February 2011.
* June 4 - Luka Magnotta is captured by Berlin Police at an Internet café in the Neukölln district while reading news stories about himself.
* July 19 - Beginning of the Battle of Aleppo.
* July 20 - [[James Holmes]] kills 12 people and injures 70 others in a [[Mass Shooting|mass shooting]] during a midnight showing of ''The Dark Knight Rises'' at the Century 16 movie theater in Aurora, Colorado.
* June 30 - [[Mohammed Morsi]] is elected President of Egypt, becoming the first [[Muslim Brotherhood]] member to lead the country.
* August 5 - [[Wade Michael Page]] kills 7 people and injures 3 others before committing suicide as part of the Wisconsin Sikh temple shooting.
* August 15 - [[Floyd Lee Corkins]] enters the headquarters of the [[Family Research Council]] in Washington D.C. and opens fire, injuring one person before being attacked and subdued by security guards.
* September 5 - [[Samuel Little]] is arrested in connection with three [[murder]]s committed in the 1980's.
* September 11 to 12 - [[2012 Benghazi attack]]: militants from [[Ansar al-Sharia]] attack the US diplomatic compound and CIA annex in Benghazi, Libya, killing four and injuring eleven.
* November 15 - [[Xi Jinping]] is named General Secretary of the [[Communist Party of China]].
* December 10 - Beginning of the Central African Republic Civil War.
* December 14 – Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting: 20-year-old [[Adam Lanza]] kills his mother Nancy at their home before killing 26 people (20 children and 6 adults) at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. Lanza would commit suicide before first responders could apprehend him.

== Births ==
=== Victim births ===
* January 12 - Neveah Bravo
* January 12 - Eliahna Torres
* February 2 - Jayce Luevanos
* February 6 - Tess Mata
* February 7 - Antonio Santiago
* February 28 - Jeanne Carlopoli 
* March 5 - Lincoln and Parrish Auzenne
* March 12 - Xavier Lopez
* March 28 - Xavier and Mason Ingle
* April 19 - Makenna Seiler
* April 28 - Alithia Ramirez
* May 10 - Amerie Garza
* May 25 - J.J Vallow
* June 4 - Ellie Garcia
* June 10 - Jackie Cazares
* August 6 - Bella Bond
* December 31 - Tylea Moore
* Unknown - Cooper Harris
* Unknown - Ko Joon-hee
* Unknown - Ashton Perry

== Deaths ==
=== Villain deaths ===
* January 8 - [[Edward Muscare]]
* January 11 - [[Katherine Dufresne]]
* February 1 - [[Gerlando Alberti]]
* February 5 - [[Josh Powell]]
* March 22 - [[Mohammed Merah]]
* May 2 - [[J. T. Ready]]
* May 26 - [[Rudy Eugene]]
* June 12 - [[Henry Hill]]
* June 30 - [[Yitzhak Shamir]]
* July 9 - [[Muhammad Shabbir]]
* August 5 - [[Wade Michael Page]]
* August 20 - [[Meles Zanawi]]
* September 25 - [[Trevor Hardy]]
* October 7 - [[Heriberto Lazcano Lazcano]]
* November 17 - [[Bal Thackeray]]
* November 21 - [[Ajmal Kasab]]
* December 1 - [[Jovan Belcher]]
* December 2 - [[Israel Keyes]]
* December 14 - [[Adam Lanza]]
* December 29 - [[Ruth Ann Steinhagen]]

=== Victim deaths ===
* February 5 - Charles & Braden Powell
* February 26 - Trayvon Martin
*March 19 - Mark, Lawton and Rhonda Sesler
* May 25 - [[Luka Magnotta|Jun Lin]]
* July 6 - Skylar Neese
*July 10 - Amara and Sophie Schaffhausen
* August 10 - Melanie Davis
* September 11 - J. Christopher Stevens and Sean Smith
* September 12 - Tyrone S. Woods and Glen Doherty
*September 12 -  Audrie Pott
*October 10 - Amanda Todd
*December 14 - Nancy Lanza and the victims of the Sandy Hook shooting