Detroit police
are reporting that a tragedy was caused by a woman's hug of an off-duty police officer. Having actually carried a pistol in public, I'm skeptical; would any reputable holster maker manufacture a holster that left the trigger of a pistol exposed to be pulled? For explanation, here is
a link to Galco's array of shoulder holsters. Look through them a while and see if you can spot an exposed trigger.
Correction: the DetNews reports today that it was a hip holster. You won't find exposed triggers there, either--at least if the holster is designed for the gun being holstered.
Hint; you won't have an exposed trigger in a
shoulder holster of the kind that the off-duty officer ought to have been using if he needed to carry his weapon at this party. Nor will you see many holsters, especially those designed for police work, which would allow a weapon to unintentionally move, even in "energetic" dancing. Think about the legal liability to Galco and other manufacturers if they did, not to mention the police department liability.
So what really happened? I don't know, but the top possibilities are that (a) the officer was using a holster that did not fit his gun or (b) the gun wasn't in the holster after all. I hope that someday journalists start to ask the relevant questions in as obvious a "hush-up" as this.
3 comments:
I am admittedly not a "gun guy", but in addition to the question of holster design you raise, wouldn't such a weapon have a safety, and shouldn't the safety be on while holstered (especially when off duty)?
I mean, I can see a the safety being turned off incidental contact, OR the trigger being pulled by the same (maybe), but both in rapid succession such that the gun goes off?
Yeah, I don't buy that either.
The article specifically mentioned that the gun was holstered. There's no way for a modern gun to discharge from a simple hug if that indeed was the case.
Something's rotten here.
Brian
Actually, if the officer should have been carrying, the safety should be off. Think of what could happen to the officer if actually confronted with one of Detroit's finest gangbangers and he's fumbling for the safety. (the safety is really a nice feature for when you need to have the gun loaded, but you're not going to imminently use it)
And for that matter, at 12:30 am at a party where a lot of drinking was going on, the officer probably didn't need to be carrying in the first place.
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