I was just cleaning it, it went off in my hand – and other bullshit
A policeman, who was probably not following gun safety, was shot by his Glock. Or that’s what he’d like us to believe. He’s suing Glock for making a defective product:
A Tac-team cop who was accidentally shot in the right knee is suing the makers of the Calgary Police Service-issue Glock pistols. In a statement of claim filed in Court of Queen’s Bench, Const. Thomas Marston says his holstered service weapon discharged Dec. 6, 2002, while he got out of his police vehicle.
“Const. Marston was opening the passenger door to the vehicle … when the pistol discharged suddenly and without warning, wounding (him) in the right knee,” the lawsuit says.
“Const. Marston was not attempting to fire the pistol when it discharged and had his right hand on the vehicle’s door,” says the claim, a copy of which was obtained yesterday by the Sun.
Marston and his partner, Const. Shannon Scott, had been called to assist another police unit in a downtown alley at the time his weapon fired, it says.
The court action, which seeks damages of $150,000, alleges the gun’s manufacturer, Georgia-based Glock Inc., produced a faulty weapon.
Since the firing mechanism on the Glock requires that the trigger be pulled to pull the pin back, one of three things likely happened here:
1 – The Glock safety feature failed, this is highly unlikely.
2 – A holster problem where some part of the holster actually applied pressure to the trigger, which has happened before.
3 – The cop is lying. Unless he was using a cowboy action holster that is tied to his leg, a holstered weapon can not shoot him in the knee. Tactical holsters rest on the hip and I don’t see how a holster in that position can ever point the weapon at a knee. If the gun was holstered and it was a holster problem, I don’t see how it is possible for the guy to have been shot in the knee.
My bet’s on number three. I think the guy goofed up and is trying to save face.
December 7th, 2004 at 8:03 am
Time and time again, this is the same story. Some “expert” manages to pull the trigger and shoots himself, but it’s the gun’s fault.
I’ve got in excess of 75,000 rounds through my Glock 17 (my competition gun), and it has yet to 1) shoot me or 2) go off by itself.
Glocks discharge only ONE way: you pull the trigger, and that’s what happened here.
For more information on self-discharging weapons, go here: http://www.assaultweaponwatch.com/
December 7th, 2004 at 11:54 am
My cousin is married to a NY City Police Detective (he’s got 19 years on the force – he’s one of the toughest people I’ve ever met – he was a marine sniper in Desert Storm and returned to the NYPD asnan undercover cop dressing up as a homelessman and waiting for liquor stores to be robbed. He know serves warrants in the middle of the night).
Anyway, he’s a Sig snob, but generally thinks that Glocks are dangerous for cops to carry most generally know next to nothing about guns and invariably fail to follow proper safety procedures.
Itss his belief that the vast majority of cops only fire 100 or so rounds through their service gun a year – one box to warm up and then one box to qualify. As a result, they forget all about the little things, like muzzle control and checking the chamber. That, combined with a hard ass attitude and the need to depress the trigger to field strip a Glock, has led to a large number of cops being shot in the thigh/knee as they attempt to service their service weapon.
I don’t know if thats what happened here, but my guess, dollars to donughts, is that this is almost surely the cops fault.
December 7th, 2004 at 6:15 pm
Even knowing that it’s likely the cop’s fault, how many of these cases do companies like Glock simply pay off rather than deal with all the political entanglements? $150,000 might just be less than it would cost to take to court…
December 7th, 2004 at 6:16 pm
True. That is why Bushmaster paid $550K in the DC sniper case. Less hassle to pay the cash.
December 7th, 2004 at 9:20 pm
And because they’re paying for it, it sets the precident for later. Well, I don’t work for Glock, so I really can’t help them dictate policy, can I now?
December 8th, 2004 at 5:26 am
There is a good chance that they won’t settle it. The lawfirm that I work for had a case (that I was proud to work on) with alleged product liability for a munitions product (a flash bang that happened to go off when you pull the pin and let the spoon go). It is the policy of that company to never settle a lawsuit, because when all you do is make commercial explosives and munitions, you can’t take the chance of liability suits becoming a cottage industry. Even if you pay out, you have to make the plaintiffs work for it.