This incident proves several things.....
One: no two wounds are alike...
Two: Heavy Bullets under 1000fps cannot be depended upon to expand RELIABLY..
Three: The mental state of the assailant may be a factor. Experience and observation tells me that drug use dang sure is
Four: There are no controlling factors in a gunfight.
Five: Whatever can go wrong, WILL go wrong..
There is some back and forth debate over whether the rounds passed through glass.. if so that would explain the "flattening effect" that I saw in the x-rays. The fact that a 180 gr Speer in 40 cal did not open does not surprise me.. that it only penetrated one inch... ahh I have serious doubts
As far as penetration is concerned, without two separate angle views, or rods placed into the wound channels, that information is not ascertainable from the views provided.
I have read and reviewed many similar reports from my own department.. such as..
13 upper torso hits from a 45 ACP 230 grain ball, the suspect continued to fight the officer, and in the process shredded his uniform shirt and outer cover of his vest with a pair of scissors. .. he ran out of ammo and reloaded while this clown was still stabbing him... talk about cool under pressure. But it took 13 rounds..Most passed through... When asked why he shot him 13 times, the officer replied to Homicide and IAD investigators... "Cause I ran outta F-in bullets!" He was actively putting up a fight through out the incident.
Once I arrived just as last rounds were fired in a shooting where officer hit suspect 14 out of 16 rounds with a 9mm 115 gr.. Most solid torso hits, many thru and thru. We also had difficulty handcuffing him. He ran almost 50 yards before we caught him. He died a few minutes later at the scene prior to ambulance arrival.
My Partner was involved in an incident, on my day off, that to this day is an Academy topic. Two suspects, 88 rounds fired BY OFFICERS, both suspects EVENTUALLY DOA... there were incidents of over and under penetration with both Pistols and Carbines deployed. NO TWO GUNSHOT WOUNDS ARE THE SAME... One suspect had taken 7 in the chest with 62gr 223, and two 158 gr .357's and his last words as he was being loaded into the ambulance was "F you pig" .. he passed about an hour later at the Hospital..
I have seen reports of one shot, instant stop kills with a .380, and I have seen reports involving 4 heart lung shots with 240 gr WW soft points, 44 Mag., and the suspect was conscious, alert and oriented when loaded on an ambulance. Later died. (cocaine levels through the roof) Fact is, Man or beast, if it is pumped up and does not want to die, it can take a lot of convincing.
For social work, I personally would not carry ball, and I avoid the heaviest of bullet loadings offered in any particular caliber, regardless of design.
What we as LE hope (note I said HOPE ) to achieve is to instantaneously stop an individual from continuing an attack or imminent threat.
This is USUALLY achieved (again USUALLY) by producing either a CNS/spinal cord shot, or in the case of an upper or lower torso, (yes I said lower, because sometimes that is where they sometimes wind up, it isn't where you were hoping, but sometime in a gunfight you take any hit you can get)
You are wanting to put body fluids in motion, in HOPES to create a hydrostatic shock that will TEMPORARILY shock (it's like hitting them with 50K volts) and they will hopefully drop a weapon or be unable to pull the trigger. Hopefully to put them down (much like a Tazer, only more lasting effects) and give you time to disarm them (take control of weapon or kick it away to deny them it use) , or control (handcuff) them.
This can usually (again USUALLY) be achieved with moderate weight bullets, at very high speeds.. Personally, I use a 135 gr HP in my 40's loaded to about 1350 out of my 96 Beretta's, 44's are 180 grains loaded to over 1400. Heck my .380 launch at 1200.. my 45's are 185 gr at 1250.. , by 357's are 125's loaded to 1380 to 1400.. at least three of those loadings are responsible for one and two shot instant incapacitations by other officer in my department.
We received all the FBI reports, and some of them are, well, we have found flaws in many of them.
The first report that I saw came down to firearms training from planning and research to get a shooters opinion on an FBI report done in the mid 70's on "The effectiveness of modern handgun ammunition in law enforcement".
We questioned some of the findings and that lead to a budget allocation to the firearms training section to conduct our own studies...And we came up with some slightly different conclusions than the FBI... We bought every conceivable caliber, bullet weight, design and manufacture that we could come up with (officers buy their own weapons in our department, and there are few caliber restrictions, 38 spl or larger, 9mm acceptable, off duty limited to .380 or larger)..
We found generally, that over penetration was an issue with heavier, and slower bullets, that ultra light +p's under penetration or "surface bursts" were possible. It was not brand specific. The only SLOW LOAD (under 1000fps) that we found that worked pretty well, was the new at the time, WW Silvertip in 45acp, Chronographed at about 936 on ave, and expansions averaged about .700. Penetration was 12-14 inch average in Gel, and about 4.75 in ductseal.
Maximum desirable results generally were achieved with middle weight bullets for a particular caliber loaded to +P velocities..
We discouraged the use of hand loads, but did not prohibit it. Than for no other reason is there was no control over where the officers obtained them, (hey Uncle Ralph has a reloader), nor control over cleanliness or freshness of components used. It certainly was NOT an issue with hand loaded ammo, just its origins.
This is also why we teach, "Anything worth doing once is worth doing twice", we teach double taps.... minimum...
Just my two cents.... from a pretty solid background of 51 years of shooting, and 30 years on the streets and in firearms ed..
I am a little surprised they didn't fine coke/meth/pcp or something of that nature in his system. But, I guess adrenaline was enough for him.
