I sense a lot of "I've heard tell" here, and not a lot of been there, done that. I daily carry either of my .44 magnums, a 4" pre model 29 or a 6.5" 629 classic. I get flamed on the internet, looked at like I am crazy, and even tounge lashed to a certain degree, because I work church security, and carry a .44 . I have heard that a DA will give a person no end of trouble for carrying a .44 magnum, for carying handloads, for caryying hollow point bullets, etc., etc., etc. The fact is, you are either justified in using deadly force, or you are not. PERIOD! As a concealed carry instructor, I know this. I teach it three or four Saturdays a month. North Carolina places no restrictions on whqt type or caliber handgun may be used as a concealed carry weapon. There is no restriction on what type of ammunition you are permited to carry. PERIOD! I teach this stuff, O.K.?
The national averages for the percentage of bullets fired by law enforcement that actuall hit the target is around 15%. 85% of the bullets fired do not hit the intended target. The 85% are the ones we have control over. Learn to shoot. Then worry about "overpenetration". YOu can't shoot through a hostage, and hit a bad guy, right? So how can you shoot through a bad guy, and hit an innocent person? You are responsible for where your bullets go, either before they hit the intended target, or after.
If you want to study terminal ballistics, the first thing you must understand is the fallacy of gelitin testing. Gellitin simulates muscle tissue. Human beings are not made entirely from muscle. One of the most frequently hit places in a real gunfight are the hands and arms. There a some really big, tough bones in ther, and they are presented such that it is a raking shot, not a pass through of the thinnest cross section. First, a bullet can vere off it's intended course very easily, and this is exerbated by bullet shapes that are not flat. Second, you may have to shoot through ten to fifteen inches of muscle and bone to get a bullet into the vitals this way.
Ballistic testing on cadavers has given human skin an equivalent value of about three inches of muscle penetration. If you bullet passes completely through a skinny crack head, then you must immediately subtract six inches from you calculations for the skin. A minimum of ten inches for his sorry body, and you are left with?.... Not much. The problem is, most adult human males are a lot thicker than ten inches. Go to a prison some time. What do you see? A bunch of guys all swelled up from pumping iron. I personally have a 52 inch chest, and weigh 285 pounds. My real job is stone masonry. Just pull your head out of that gun magazine for a minute, and you will be up gunning tomorrow.
The FBI once spent a lot of money to prove that penetration is the key to bullet performance. They also found that they had never been successfully sued in reguards to a pass through and the resulting damage.
Brassfetcher.com, or something like that is a real eye opener. The so called "service " calibers all penetrate in the 9-13 inch range in gellitin. A 180 grain hornady xtp at 1550 feet per second penetrated Less than most of the service calibers. When you look at the relative feableness of ALL handgun rounds, the size and strength of a likely antagonist, and the fact that clothing, bones, the angle that you are likely to be presented with for a shot
( do you really think a perp is goung to stand there like a target on a firing range?), how can you feel good about anything smaller than a 44 mag, or hot 45 long Colt? I know I don't. That's why I carry what I carry. If you can't handle a magnum, you had better get real good at shooting them through the head while they are knifing you, shooting you, or beating you.