Gun discharges, officer injured

[Mr. Clark]

If you point the gun at something and pull the trigger... well the consequences of that should be obvious, but apparently to some they are not.

People who can't handle a Glock safely or are afraid of them should never be allowed around any firearm. They are accidents waiting to happen.

The only way that gun went off is if he pulled the trigger. Period.

If you lay a Glock down on a table and walk away and it fires, then that is a design problem. Otherwise it is just sloppy handling by people who should know better.

 

[Stand_Watie]

http://www.mlive.com/news/muchronicle/index.ssf?/base/news-4/108204039732420.xml


Officials unsure how gun fired, wounding cop

Thursday, April 15, 2004

FROM LOCAL REPORTS

The Muskegon Heights police officer who accidentally shot his little finger off while preparing a suspect's gun for fingerprinting is continuing to recover from his injury

Meanwhile, officials are looking into how the accidental discharge of the .40-caliber Glock40 semi-automatic handgun occurred Friday inside the police department.

Once the followup investigation is completed, it will be up to Police Chief George Smith Jr. to determine whether the officer involved, Mario Sain, will receive any discipline, said Detective Sgt. Clifton Johnson.

Sain, 34, had arrested a suspect in connection with gun-related vandalism at Day's Inn, 3450 Hoyt, on Friday morning. A weapon believed to be the suspect's was found in the 3300 block of Leahy Street.

Late Friday afternoon, Sain was getting the gun ready for the police department's own technician to test for fingerprints when the weapon accidentally discharged, Johnson said.

Procedure calls for the gun to be placed in a box, and then a wooden dowel or some other type of rod is positioned so the trigger cannot be pulled and the gun cannot fire. It was at that point that the accident is believed to have occurred.

Johnson said the bullet that was fired was found on the floor at the police department. Firefighters next door were called to render medical assistance after the gun discharged shortly after 4 p.m.

 

[cracked butt]

most want either a Beretta or a Sig

What rational being wouldn't?

 

[Tamara]

TheFederalistWeasel,

It’s amazing how folks here are quick to blame the operator simply because he/she is a cop there for must be an idiot.

I'm not calling him an idiot because he's a cop, I'm calling him an idiot because he had one finger on the trigger and another in front of the muzzle of a gun he had not cleared. That qualifies pretty much anybody as an idiot by whatever standards one cares to use.

(PS: If you wish to minimize your chances of an ND with your issue piece, I'd cut down on all that administrative handling. You're far more likely to unintentionally bust a cap while unholstering, unloading, reloading or reholstering than you would be if you just left the dang gun loaded and in the holster.)

 

[Marko Kloos]

Cops are humans, too. It's wrong to assume they're somehow too dumb to handle Glocks. For every police officer who shoots himself accidentally with a Glock, I can dig up two or three news pieces dealing with Stupid Civilian Gun Tricks.

However, it's also a fallacy to assume that police officers have innately better gun handling and safety skills than Joe Sixpack.

Last week, I was handed a T&E Glock 23 coming back from the TN LE Academy in Nashville. It was taken out of the UPS overnight box, and I opened the Glock case to check the serial number in order to log the gun into our Big FFL Book O' Guns.

I ejected the magazine, which was empty. I racked the slide, and out of the chamber popped a Remington Golden Saber 165 grain HP round.

And that gun came from a TN Police Gun Skul, a place where they *teach* shooting and safety bits to rank-and-file officers.

Guns don't care if the guy handling them wears a badge or not. Pull the trigger on a Glock without being 100% sure of the loading status of the chamber, and the gun will go "bang". They will not go bang without that trigger being pulled, though, and I call BS when someone says "the gun somehow went off". I don't care whether the story involves a sloshed redneck shooting his TV, or a beat cop with thirty years on the street. If the gun went off, then someone had their finger on the trigger when it wasn't supposed to be there. No excuses, and no credit for profession.