Bad firearm handling at gunshow?

[parsimonious_instead]

Was at a local gun show yesterday. Two officers from the city in which the show is held walked over to a vendor table and asked to see a 30+ round magazine for a Glock. One officer unholstered (finger properly indexed parallel to the slide), removed his magazine, and proceeded to insert the hi-cap mag to see if it would really fit.
Just curious if they did anything procedurally wrong. Knowing how many firearm handling mistakes police tend to make, I started walking away as he tried the mag in his service gun.

 

[jerkface11]

Surely waving around a gun with a round in the chamber breaks some sort of rule. Shopping on duty probably does too.

 

[parsimonious_instead]

Yup... officer McShopper left a round chambered in his glock while inserting the magazine and checking for overall feel.

 

[docnyt]

Unless he was carrying Israeli style unchambered.

 

[22-rimfire]

He may have left a round chambered in the gun. However, if he continued to handle his gun after inserting the 30-round magazine as if the gun was loaded, than I see no problem. (Mostly finger off trigger and directional pointing toward people verus the roof of the building.) He is an officer afterall and I cut them some slack.

Shopping on duty? I guess they can't get lunch either, right, or walk into a convenience store for a coke or coffee?

 

[ny32182]

Pulling out a loaded gun at a gunshow is bad firearm handling; I don't care if he's a cop or not.

Perfect example of why they ban carry at gunshows.

 

[jpwilly]

"Hi Officer, (insert sarcasm ->) someone just unholsted a pistol that might have been loaded and checked the fitment of a magazine without checking or clearing the chamber...made me a little nervous...could you keep your eyes open this is my first gun show. Could I have your badge number I want to let the chief know what a great job you are doing today" LOL ... Just kidding.

 

[bannockburn]

Not very safety minded. I wonder what the officer would have done if he saw a customer do the exact same thing he did. He really shouldn't be drawing his service pistol out for any reason other than to use it in the performance of his duties. This was not one of them and was not a good idea to my way of thinking.

 

[bigfatdave]

You know, if I saw that exact same event with a proper clearing of the gun included, it wouldn't go past the raised eyebrow stage of disturbing.
But if the chamber wasn't verified empty, that's just plain wrong. The arrogance and ignorance of these "professional" firearms handlers is occasionally appalling ... and there was even a second cop to act as a dummy-check!

I don't care if the gun was carried empty-chamber, unholstering and handling means that you make the gun unloaded, or if it was unloaded in the first place, you check that it is unloaded and make it unloaded if it isn't. No outfit or jewelry can remove that responsibility.

 

[Deltaboy1984]

He failed to properly unload his Glock. But did he violate any other guns safety rules??

 

[parsimonious_instead]

Justified or not, I felt a "skin crawling" feeling on the back of my neck, so I initiated a slow foot-powered departure from that table. So I didn't get to see any additional handling behaviors, good or otherwise.
I was just posting to get a sense of whether or not my concerns were justified.

 

[DammitBoy]

I've only seen one accidental discharge of a firearm at a gunshow in over 35 years of going to gunshows.

It involved a police officer shooting himself in the foot at the concession stand.

 

[youngda9]

Didn't point it at anybody, didn't touch the trigger...none of the 4 rules were broken. Sound like proper firearm handling to me. Why is everyone so uptight. Loaded firearms can be handled safely...I've seen it done myself.

 

[JVaughn]

He is an officer afterall and I cut them some slack.

Why 22 are you cutting him some slack because he is an officer? Chances are that he is not the most capable or knowledgable firearm handler in the building just because he had government sanctioned carrying rights. I appreciate what they do too; but I don't see cutting them any slack on safety and carry issues.

 

[mg.mikael]

I'm suprised everyone here is so quick to assume and criticize without knowing all the facts. The fact is no one knows if that was his issued side arm or perhaps his personal one that he took to the show to compare magazines. It could have been loaded or it could have been unloaded. He may have been in uniform, but was off-duty. Their's alot of unknowns, and I'm not gonna assume I know the 'real' situation.

No body here knows the entire story so I'd say don't be so quick to be judgemental.

 

[sansone]

he probably (hopefully) did not have a chambered round. Let's assume LE did the right thing

 

[Burt Blade]

Sounds like he executed a magazine change. If his finger was off the trigger, and the muzzle was pointed in a safe direction, why sweat it?

The "safe direction" is the only issue I see here. This is a bit of a challenge in a crowded room, with nothing around that can function as a safe bullet catcher, like a clearing barrel, sandbag pile, etc. Perhaps he was at a table along an outside, presumably block-construction wall?

Stating intention to do the fit-check prior to doing so would have been the polite thing to do.

Would there be value in keeping a 5 gallon bucket 3/4 full of sand at each table, for a safe "point gun here"?

 

[jerkface11]

Didn't point it at anybody, didn't touch the trigger...none of the 4 rules were broken. Sound like proper firearm handling to me. Why is everyone so uptight. Loaded firearms can be handled safely...I've seen it done myself.

Where exactly is the safe place to point a gun in a crowded gunshow? And how do you get it pointed there from your holster without it sweeping someone?

 

[Joe in fla]

I was at a large gun show this weekend and the police at the door told everyone to remove their magazines from their guns and not to install them in a gun while in the show. The police also personally checked that all magazines were removed and that all guns were unloaded and slides/bolts/whatever were tied open with nylon ties. That's a standard operating procedure at gun shows in my area. While the officer involved may not have broken one of the four basic rules of gun handling, he did violate what is a SOP, at least in my part of the country. Gun shows are very crowded places with a lot of guns and live ammunition openly available and stricter than normal rules apply, and rightfully so IMO. Just because he's a cop doesn't mean that the rules don't apply to him, especially safety rules!

 

[Robert]

The issue here is, that there are far too few details to draw an accurate conclusion. The OP admits to exiting the area and not seeing the entire event take place. We don't know that the show was crowded or not. Simply put we do not have enough to go on to make an accurate assumption.

I find threads about cops are more about bashing the cops than anything else. Cause as we all know, private gun owners never do stupid things.

And as for the officer carrying a loaded weapon in the show, might it be that he was working as security at the show?

 

[empty's]

you people are to quick to blame...innocent until guilty thats to old way of thinking. the new way of thinking is guilty until proven innocent and we as citizens think that sucks, lets all break the evil chain and give the benefit of the doubt (nobody got hurt right)

 

[jerkface11]

If he hadn't been a cop he couldn't have even carried the gun in. He waved a loaded gun around in a public place. You or me do that and it's brandishing.

 

[Joe in fla]

Waving a gun around is brandishing period, even if it's not loaded. Fla state is is quite specific about that. I expect other state's laws are much the same. Notice that I'm not saying the cop was waving a gun around, just pointing out a legal fact.

Gus said: "I find threads about cops are more about bashing the cops than anything else. Cause as we all know, private gun owners never do stupid things."

Yeah, people do stupid things but, you know what? I expect better from cops! They are supposed to be trained and to act professionally. Or am I expecting too much?

As a matter of fact, if you read my post, all I stated was that I expected the cop to obey same safety rule that everyone else adheres to. IF he was on duty, then he had every reason to have a loaded gun. BUT if he's shopping and needs to try out magazines then he should unload like everyone else!