NY Triggers -- (rumor) NYPD brass to cops: stop using Kahr K-9

General Firearms Handguns - Semi Auto
1

Somehow I ended up on a “daily” news list called “Tactical Wire”. I never subscribed so I don’t know where it comes from or anything (have not looked to deeply – I skim it and delete)

Today there was a little blurb:

Around the Water Cooler: Rule 3

The blurb from the New York Daily News read, “NYPD brass to cops: Stop using Kahr K-9 semi-automatic pistol as an off-duty gun; Weapon’s light trigger blamed for accidental shootings.” This trigger that’s “so light it’s been blamed for a series of accidental discharges” has a nominal trigger pull of 7 ½ pounds. NYPD brass wanted a trigger pull of 13 pounds.

A thirteen pound trigger on a small pistol weighing 23 ounces . . . no wonder they’re not concerned about hit percentages of 16%! I think they’d worry if the round hit the proverbial busload of nuns. That 13 pound trigger is practically unmanageable. Since Kahr has trouble making a gun with a substandard trigger pull, NYPD had to come up with an answer.

Their solution is to ban officers from carrying any of the 5,000 Kahr pistols they’ve purchased for the purpose of carrying off-duty. From my knowledge of the Kahr line, there’s a few things I know.

  1. They don’t go off when dropped.
  2. They only fire when the trigger is pulled.
  3. Keeping one’s finger off the trigger until the sights come onto the threat and you form the intention to fire will prevent unintended discharges.

Seem easy? A few years back, I got an annual report from NYPD. From their projected losses, they expect a total number of officers around 35,000. We had less than 150 per year, reserves included. I can’t imagine the cluster that scheduling firearms training could be with 35,000 troops. To our trainers for hire out there, these are in-service troops a large percentage of whom don’t want to be there and couldn’t care less. NYPD had thousands of officers who never made it to “required annual range qualification and training.”

This makes it tough to get simple concepts across.

I imagine my class on gun safety would be met with a veteran who’d say, “Finger off the trigger? If I’ve pulled the gun out, I’m not wasting time trying to find the trigger when something happens. Gun out of holster, finger on trigger - just like DeNiro!”

Well, it’s your manslaughter trial, not mine.

Keep in touch.

2

That does seem like a pretty stupid article. not to concentrate negativity on the LEO aspect of it much but a Manslaughter trial for a LEO? That doesn’t happen that often. …well not as often as it does for civilians. :mad:

3

Are there any other major departments in U.S. that require a 12 or 13 pound pull? If not, then NYPD might want to take that as a clue. Then again, if it were up to Bloomberg I’m sure that their officers would be armed with nothing more than rape whistles.

4

Tell that to former BART Officer Merhserle. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BART_Police_shooting_of_Oscar_Grant

This whole thing is a blatant case of a firearm taking the rap for poor training.

5

Absolutely the case. Ever since I can remember the NYPD firearms policies have always been a convoluted excercise in futility and politically motivated all the way back to the sixties.

6

Allowing NYPD brass to drive defensive handgun specifications is like allowing Iran to pilot U.S. drones. Oh…wait…:rolleyes:

7

Unforunalty it is usually the brass that make the weapon choices due to policy, budget etc. And most big departments and agencies don’t bring their weakest shooter up in skill but instead dumb everyone down to the weakest link. That why it is important for a Leo to train on their own.
At least NYPD has a choice on off duty weapons. I work for a federal agency where our duty gun is the only off duty approved firearm.

8

“Technically” they banned them because Kahr didn’t bring the trigger pull to NYPD’s standards.

You are right. Unfortunately the people who makes this decisions, sometimes don’t even know where they are standing :slight_smile:

9

I’ve got a Kahr K9. I’m not quite sure how you could ever have an AD with a Kahr trigger. The pull is so long you have to put some concentrated effort into making the gun go bang. Poor or non-existent training = bad results.

10

Usually the higher ups who select a duty weapon for an agency will never have to carry the weapon. They are either the agency know-it-all, or are grossly incompetent.

11

This whole thing reminds me of what my wife’s department is doing right now. Wasting money, 2 years ago they purchased 1k plus new pistols. I told her flat out against me better judgment “they are giving you a piece of shit”. That purchase was driven by the former police chief now the mayor. Since then the pistols themselves are falling apart. They are now buying 1k plus new Glock 21 to issue and retrain all officers on again.

The point to all this is these decisions should not be driven from the top down. The instructors collectively selected 2 pistols last time after they performed a very thorough evaluation. The Px4 storm was not selected by the trainers the glock and M&P were.

12

Yes it was. They left him hanging on that.

13

Absolutely correct.

14

Not really, that guy has been out of jail for over a year. How long do you think an ordinary citizen would have served for having a ND into a guys throat? Probably more than 16 months.

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15

It’s amazing how departments put a ridiculously heavy trigger in their guns to make up for poor training. I know a local department with a heavy trigger and have had recent issues with people not shooting well…low and behold they’ve tested a standard trigger and amazingly enough, their worst shooters passed. How about take the time to train people instead of just hoping your officers don’t shoot the wrong person because the can’t hit their target with an obnoxiously heavy trigger.

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16

That’s what happens in a liberal state. They way they think is liability and that’s all. They don’t like bein the center of the attention in the news that’s why they do what they do. Is like I said before, is almost 2013 and NYPD does not carry tasers except supervisor and ESU and don’t even mention rifles, ohh lord…

17

I’m in the south and a major department here still doesn’t issue takers across the board. It’s pathetic how cities will constitute a higher risk for officers just to look less aggressive to the civilian population. The sad thing is, they are great deterrents and would save on paying out workers comp claims for officers injured in fights

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18

You are absolutely correct, and I totally agree with you. Even the tasers website they show the stats on how many injuries could be avoided to the officer and perp if its used as well as fatalities etc… etc… Is just stupid that they want us to look like london or tokio soon…

BTW i didnt mean to hijack the thread with a different topic, I just wanted to highlight the other factors that make this great dept special …

19

I could go round and around about asinine policies in departments…

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20

I just thank God I don’t have to work there. The last time I was in NY to visit the 9-11 memorial, I saw at least three different handguns being carried by diferent NYPD divisions. I saw Glocks, Sigs and I believe some older Smiths. I’m not sure who was carrying what but I thought that was kind of stupid. I’m just glad that for a small agency, mine is fairly progressive when it comes to firearms thanks for a lead firearms instructor/Captain who is pretty sharp. I fail to see how giving a weapon a heavier trigger pull is conducive to better shooting, but as has been pointed out, the admin weenies who make these decisions haven’t pulled their firearm in years.