{"id":60365,"date":"2015-06-14T15:26:51","date_gmt":"2015-06-14T19:26:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/valorguardians.com\/blog\/?p=60365"},"modified":"2015-06-14T19:38:25","modified_gmt":"2015-06-14T23:38:25","slug":"lapd-and-accidental-weapons-discharges","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/?p=60365","title":{"rendered":"LACSD and “accidental” weapons discharges"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"M&P9\"<\/a><\/center><\/p>\n

The LA Times<\/a>, whose habit is to blame guns for problems rather than the operator of a firearm, blames the gun for what they call accidental discharges among LA County sheriff deputies since they changed their duty weapons to a Smith and Wesson M&P9. After reading the reports of the weapons discharges, they seem more “negligent” than accidental. In every instance, the officers involved had their finger on the trigger before they intended to fire the weapon.<\/p>\n

The M&P has obvious benefits. It is easier to shoot accurately, can be fired more reliably under stress and is a better fit for people with small hands. The switch was prompted in part by the threat of a lawsuit by women who had failed the Sheriff’s Academy. More recruits \u2014 including more women \u2014 are now passing the firearms test, and veteran deputies are also logging better scores at the firing range.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I don’t know anything about the M&P9, I’m not a S&W fan, but only because of my experience with them decades ago. I’m sure it’s a better pistol than when they tried to keep up with the demand of Models 27 & 29 during the Dirty Harry craze. I’m also not a Beretta fan – the gun that the Smith & Wesson replaced. <\/p>\n

I do have a Glock 30, one of the guns that the Times blames for negligent discharges, but only because it has a couple of 25-round magazines for that day that the Zombie Epoc begins. When I carry it, the chamber is empty, because I don’t like a safety that is on the trigger – that really doesn’t prevent negligent discharges, like the three safeties on a 1911. Which is why I mostly carry my Colt Defender and not my Glock.<\/p>\n

The article complains that the Beretta is too big for folks with little hands to operate;<\/p>\n

People with small hands often have trouble flipping up the Beretta’s safety as they prepare to fire. The first shot requires 12 to 15 pounds of pressure on the trigger, forcing some to use two fingers and reducing shooting accuracy for many. Subsequent shots take about 4 pounds of pressure.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

I haven’t heard any complaints about that from the military, that also uses the Beretta. In fact one of the reasons that military went to a Beretta was because the 1911-style handguns were supposedly too big for the ladies. While the 1911 was the Army’s service handgun, the lady MPs were issued the smaller .38 caliber revolvers for exactly that reason.<\/p>\n

It sounds to me from the description above, that the Beretta is a double action semiautomatic because the initial trigger pull is so much more than follow-on shots. It seems to me that a solution to that would be leaving the gun cocked when the round is chambered – but still you’d have to keep your finger off the trigger until you’re aiming at your target. That doesn’t seem like something in the realm of possibility of the LA County deputies;<\/p>\n

In 2012, there were 12 accidental discharges, none involving the M&P. In 2013, there were 18, eight of which were M&Ps. Of the 30 incidents in 2014, 22 involved M&Ps.<\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

In one December incident, a sheriff’s deputy in Compton approached a car he thought might have been stolen. The occupants had already ran off. As he walked up with his M&P drawn to make sure there was no one else inside, he accidentally pulled the trigger.<\/p>\n

The bullet hit the driver’s side door. There were bystanders nearby, but no one was injured.<\/p>\n

A month earlier, a Lancaster deputy was following a driver he suspected of having a gun. When the man got out and walked toward the patrol car, the deputy took off his seat belt and was pulling out his M&P when he fired it into his own thigh. <\/p>\n

[…]<\/p>\n

In a Walnut-area house in January 2014, a deputy accidentally fired a round into the ceiling when a golf bag fell on his hand. Another deputy was in the room at the time.<\/p>\n

When a deputy tripped over a stroller and fired a round through a wall in October 2014, there was another deputy nearby, with more deputies and a civilian elsewhere in the Huntington Park house.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Yeah, those are negligent discharges. It has nothing to do with “accidental” and everything to do with officers who have their fingers on the triggers when it’s not necessary. You can’t blame the gun for this one either, LA Times – it has to do with training and the operators. <\/p>\n

The bigger question should be; why are they using 9 millimeter handguns? Do they plan to shoot a lot of Europeans or something?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The LA Times, whose habit is to blame guns for problems rather than the operator of … LACSD and “accidental” weapons discharges<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":60366,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[156,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-60365","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-guns","category-media"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60365","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=60365"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60365\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/60366"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=60365"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=60365"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=60365"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}