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Milwaukee police said they were so afraid of their department-issued handguns randomly firing, they wouldn't bring them home near their family​

Natalie Musumeci
Apr 11, 2023, 3:03 PM





A Sig Sauer P320 handgun. Joe Raedle/Getty Images

• Milwaukee police were worried about their SIG Sauer P320 handguns randomly firing.
• "They don't want it around their family," a police union head told The Washington Post.
• A Washington Post/The Trace investigation found dozens of reports of the handguns firing without a trigger pull.

Officers with Wisconsin's Milwaukee Police Department were reportedly so worried about their SIG Sauer P320 handguns randomly firing that they wouldn't bring the weapon home.

"Our officers are fearful of the gun," Milwaukee Police Association officers union head Andrew Wagner told The Washington Post as part of an investigation published on Tuesday.

"They're not taking it home. They don't want it around their family," Wagner said of the department-issued semi-automatic pistol.

An eight-month investigation by The Washington Post and The Trace found that more than 100 people claim that their P320 pistols fired when they did not pull the trigger in incidents dating back to 2016, according to the report.

The investigation also found that at least 80 people were wounded in those shootings.

A representative for New Hampshire-based gun manufacturer SIG Sauer did not immediately respond to requests for comment by Insider on Tuesday.

In a statement to The Washington Post, the gunmaker denied that the P320 was able to fire without someone pulling the trigger.

In December, Milwaukee police began replacing the SIG Sauer pistols with Glock firearms, local outlet Fox6 reported.

"They're really happy that they are not going to have to worry about endangering the community or themselves when they are carrying these firearms they currently have," Wagner said at the time.

 

[Badungus Kabungus]

In October 1990, in an incident unrelated to the pilot program, an officer pulled the trigger on his Glock while cleaning it in his bedroom and accidentally fired a bullet. He was not authorized to carry a Glock and had not been trained in its use.

Seriously? That's not a Glock problem.

 

[AGPinochet]

I’ve always wondered why they can’t just use revolvers

Revolvers are an old, obsolete* form of Firearm that have been far surpassed in almost every field that is relevant to the majority of people. Revolvers hold less ammunition, are harder to reload, have either no or lessened capability to mount modern optics and lights and have a nasty habit of throwing violently expanding hot gasses near the user's hand that can cause injury in some circumstances.
*Obsolete in the sense that most semi automatics can do everything a revolver can do but better AND do things a revolver can't. A bullet from a revolver will still kill you dead, and Revolvers also come in much more potent cartridges in much greater availability and easy access than Semi-autos for those who need/want them
The 1970 Newhall Incident and 1986 Miami FBI shootout laid bare several problems with revolvers (among many others, and not to say that Revolvers were entirely to blame as there were three agents with S&W Semi automatics present in Miami)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newhall_incident

1986 FBI Miami shootout - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Jean ValJean]

Like we used to say in the Army, "Remember, your weapon was manufactured by the lowest bidder."

 

[Twinkletard]

I've owned a p320 for a few years now and it has been a very reliable pistol. The very first ones did have issues, but they've fixed that.

 

[George Lucas]

Revolvers are an old, obsolete* form of Firearm that have been far surpassed in almost every field that is relevant to the majority of people. Revolvers hold less ammunition, are harder to reload, have either no or lessened capability to mount modern optics and lights and have a nasty habit of throwing violently expanding hot gasses near the user's hand that can cause injury in some circumstances.
*Obsolete in the sense that most semi automatics can do everything a revolver can do but better AND do things a revolver can't. A bullet from a revolver will still kill you dead, and Revolvers also come in much more potent cartridges in much greater availability and easy access than Semi-autos for those who need/want them
The 1970 Newhall Incident and 1986 Miami FBI shootout laid bare several problems with revolvers (among many others, and not to say that Revolvers were entirely to blame as there were three agents with S&W Semi automatics present in Miami)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newhall_incident

1986 FBI Miami shootout - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

I’m not convinced a semi-auto is a good solution to these problems though. If cops really need strong firepower for this kind of stuff, they should be carrying rifles (on their person, not just in the car). Arm them like infantry if you want them to do infantry work.

 

[Secret Asshole]

Give them back their Barettas.

 

[quackrock]

Do they absolutely need to have a round in the chamber when at home? Takes next to no time to rack the slide.

edit: I can't read

 

[JULAY]

Wow, I wouldn't have expected Sigs to have drop safety issues. Kel-tecs, sure, but Sigs? In any case, it makes me glad I carry a Kimber...

Here's an article I found with more info about the P320 issues:

https://www.minutemanreview.com/sig-p320-safety/

 

[Badungus Kabungus]

View attachment 5031072

Except that their alternative was not bringing the gun home at all. If I have to choose between a gun with an empty chamber and no gun at all, it's an easy choice.

 

[Sic Semper Tyrannosaurus]

They laughed at my Beretta APX Centurion but who's laughing now! I still want a Chiappa Rhino or a Mateba so I can blow my hand up though.

 

[quackrock]

Except that their alternative was not bringing the gun home at all. If I have to choose between a gun with an empty chamber and no gun at all, it's an easy choice.

Somehow I missed the "while at home" part when I first read your post. Yeah, you're right.

 

[Duke Nukem]

Most cops carry a 9mm. You can get 9mm revolvers. Some of them carry .40 s/w.... You can get revolvers that load that, too, and there are other very good revolver rounds. It's a capacity and ease of reloading issue, not firepower.

The standard cop firearm shooting these days is basically "magdump a glock, reload, keep firing if the guy is still moving". Need automatics to be that fucking pathetic.

I hear cases of law enforcement dumping 40+ rounds into a suspect at times, they are trained to keep firing until they're sure the suspect is dead in the scenario of an imminent threat. Not defending this practice but there is allegedly a practical reason for it.

 

[WhatInTheActualFuck]

I guarantee some dipshits desk-popped (as dipshits are wont to do) and between that and the (since resolved) drop safety issues being on the news a few years ago they all gravitated to "the guns must be defective" since "cops aren't hired for their dazzling intellect" couldn't possibly be the issue at hand.

 

[make_it_so]

It was the North Hollywood shootout that prompted the fast switch to semi-automatic pistols. New cops had been issued semi-autos but the old guard that came up in the 1970s and 1980s still used their old revolvers they were issued, these guys were told to switch or hit the bricks. The North Hollywood shoot out prompted cops to have a rifle stowed in the trunk because zero pistol rounds penetrated, fired from semi or revolver. The cops used your classic pastoral wood stock rifles through the 90s and in the early 2000s three things merged together, AR-15s came back on the market because the ban ended, the US military realized the M-16 was shit for mounted troops in Iraq since the barrel was too long and shifted to the M4, and picatinny rails started becoming standard feature for most rifles leading to the ACOG or Eotechs being preferred over iron sights and eventually issued by default. By the mid-late 2000s early 2010s most departments realized the AR-15 is an extremely good all-around rifle because it is so modular and the departments had a huge amount of people trained with M-16 and M4s from so it was a natural fit.

I mean, semi-auto Beretta 92s were already the standard for the LAPD at the time of the North Hollywood Shootout, so I don't know I call that what prompted the "fast switch" for departments. What the North Hollywood Shootout did do is prompt departments to start having patrol cars to carry AR-15s and armor-piercing ammo in the trunk so they could be pulled out if any kind of similar scenario came up, and the perps could be put down without it escalating into a massive shootout.

 

[xXx: State of the Union]

The P320 issue has been fixed for over 5 years now.

Some (most) cops are just fucking retards when it comes to firearms, and because of the early issue where if you hit the back with a hammer at just the right point it would fire they're now acting like they fire by themselves to get out of negligent discharges due to mishandling/improper holsters.

 

[Catch The Rainbow]

Over on the East Coast, the NYPD actually still let officers keep their revolvers until 2018 if they had been issued one:

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/31/nyregion/new-york-police-revolver.html

Not like it matters much with the insanely heavy trigger pull that the NYPD mandates.

Reminded me of this meme I saw:

 

[Slappy McGherkin]

Give them back their Barettas.

True dat. Was standard carry weapon for police/military for years. FS-9, super reliable. This was my step-father's (RIP). Mine now.

It's heavy metal though and not as light a carry as the polymer pew-pews these days. But that heavier weight makes it an easier, accurate shoot.

 

[make_it_so]

True dat. Was standard carry weapon for police/military for years. FS-9, super reliable. This was my step-father's (RIP). Mine now.

It's heavy metal though and not as light a carry as the polymer pew-pews these days. But that heavier weight makes it an easier, accurate shoot.

View attachment 5031364

My own go-to gun is an police trade-in M9, thing has been rock solid and great to shoot. Plus overall I think I just prefer hammer-fired pistols to the striker-fired polymer guns.

 

[sadrefrigerator]

All the LEOs I know carry their own personal pistols, usually glocks.
I was a fan of the beretta until I could own guns.. Its one of the most uncomfortable to use guns unless you have massive hands. The mag release and slide release requires you to shift your hands and the dumbass safety was an afterthought added in to win the US military contract. I ended up getting a p228 that had everything I was looking for. My next pistol will probably be a PSA dagger compact.

 

[Calvin Coolidge]

I don't know, I've a revolver. Unlike police, my ass is on the line for each shot I'd take. I lack the luxury of magdumping. More moving parts to go wrong, safeties forgotten in the moment, "most civilian-involved shootings are resolved in 3 or 4 shots." Ergo, a revolver. Plus I can shoot out of my pocket.