Heavy Trigger Pull For Law Enforcement?

[GLOOB]

A police officer's greatest weapon is his radio. Worrying about an inch or two of accuracy at 30 feet is nonsense.

 

[wlewisiii]

Shrug. Dunno about police. I do know that I find the stock trigger on a Glock to suck - it's too light & I hate the way it stages. A NY1 spring & a 3.5 connector turn it into a very revolver like 5.5 -> 6.0 lb trigger. Very much more like my Model 10. That I'll take over the stock trigger every time.

 

[X-Rap]

I think strykervet said it very well, administratively liability and one size fits all has to come into play in standardizing. I also agree with his view on the active shooter scenario and have the same point of view for myself personally.
I think a good look at real life shootings will show that the closer one perceives the danger the more likely one will have his finger inside the trigger guard. I don't know what the right trigger weight or system is for everyone but for me and those that seek my recommendation I say DAO or Striker for a defensive handgun and believe that trigger stroke is probably more important than the weight since at some point the stroke dictates how light the trigger can be made within some mechanical dependability constraints.

 

[P-32]

Sorry guys some posts are clearly made by those who don’t have a clue about what goes on in a Cop’s life. It’s not all roses. The last thing a Cop wants to do is pull that trigger on a human. In a world full of rose colored glasses, a heavy trigger pull might work. But let me ask this, how many of you walk around with an knowingly overly heavy trigger pull on your pistol? Why doesn’t that first shot hit the X ring? Not only do we need to hit the bad guy but we want to miss the good guy in the back ground. A heavy trigger pull hinders this requirement/desire. I’ve shot a New York trigger and it sucked. I don’t care how much practice you put into a New York trigger it still sucks. How many shoot their non tuned wheel guns in DA and still shot as well in S/A? We often times have micro seconds to make a decision the lawyers and judges get to take months or years figuring out if we were right. Dammed if you do dammed if you don’t. Glocks are great duty weapons because they do always do go bang every time. They are easy to take care of. I’ve never witnessed a Glock discharge without the trigger being pressed. Follow the four safety rules and you’re good, always, but use some common since too.

 

[kayak-man]

IMO, AD's are a symptom, not the problem. Its a software issue, not a hardware issue. Get better and more frequent training for the police.

Chris "the Kayak-Man" Johnson

 

[sugarmaker]

At some point they'll require that the weapon be carried unloaded with a trigger lock, affixed to the end of a stick, to be used only as a blunt clubbing instrument. Making up for accuracy with rounds count seems like a bad idea, and with very heavy, gritty, creepy triggers accuracy is difficult.

 

[hardluk1]

I wonder how many rounds you could fire at 20lbs of trigger pull before you rip a tendon and have to go out on medical.

 

[ATLDave]

I don't know if I think they should have "heavy" pulls, but they shouldn't be light. Most of us civies will go our whole lives never "covering" a person with the muzzle of a loaded gun. LEOs are quite like to have to do so a lot. A peace officer who, in the heat of the moment accidentally pulls the trigger has just, as an officer of the state, executed someone, and likely someone who could not legally have been sentenced to death. If one buys the old addage that it is better to let 10/20/100 guilty men go unpunished than have one innocent man wrongly punished, then even one discharge that the LEO would have foregone with an extra .01 second to consider is unacceptable. I'm very sympathetic to the trauma that LEO's face in having made the split-second decisions about whether to pull that trigger or not... if a stouter trigger saves one cop a year from a shoot that he or she regrets, that's pretty positive.

At some point, of course, the trigger becomes so heavy that the accuracy loss and resultant stray bullets endanger more innocent people than the lighter trigger would have.

 

[ForumSurfer]

Training eliminates the problem of a heavy trigger pull. For myself, anything over 10lbs requires that I spend quite a nit of time staying proficient with it. (I really hated the NY-1 spring when I tried it on a glock, so much that I sprang for a stamp so I could give it to a fellow forum member).

The question is, will the officers get enough training to be able to maintain proficiency with that heavy trigger in a variety of circumstances?

Now once we start talking about triggers over 16lbs, I think we are getting carried away. If it is that heavy, you are going to need quite a bit of training and practice.

 

[jmr40]

Exactly... a heavy trigger pull is a crutch for lack of proper training.

Of course claiming you can't hit with a heavy trigger pull is also just an excuse for poor shooting skills. If you can shoot, you can shoot a gun with a 10 lb trigger. If you can't shoot, a 3 lb trigger won't help much.

Most of this is lawsuit driven. Any time a cop fires his gun, even if no one is hit, there is a VERY good possibility of a lawsuit. When it goes to trial the Police Dept. lawyers will have to have documentation to prove the officer involved had proper training. They will have to provide proof that the gun was not defective, and that the trigger pull was not so light as to have easily been accidentily discharged.

Plaintiff lawyers will often try to prove that their client was accidently shot, even when it was clearly a "GOOD" shoot where the officer had to stop an agressive attack. If they can confuse a jury enough to believe this it is very possible their client could collect damages.