MPD transition from Sig Sauer P320s to new Glock service weapon nearly complete
"it's a huge relief for our members to know the gun they're carrying and going to be bringing around their home and around citizens and the public won't misfire without the trigger being pulled," the police association president said.
"it's a huge relief for our members to know the gun they're carrying and going to be bringing around their home and around citizens and the public won't misfire without the trigger being pulled," the police association president said.
"it's a huge relief for our members to know the gun they're carrying and going to be bringing around their home and around citizens and the public won't misfire without the trigger being pulled," the police association president said.
Ninety-five percent of Milwaukee Police officers are now carrying a Glock pistol as their new service weapon, signaling the near completion of the department's transition away from the Sig Sauer P320, a gun suspected of firing on its own.
According to police officials, 83 of the department's 1,572 sworn officers still have yet to complete the training to carry the new weapon.
The switch is the result of a lawsuit the union filed on behalf of an officer injured when his partner's P320 fired while they were putting a man into the back of a squad car in July 2020.
In October 2021, 12 News investigates exposed the internal concern Milwaukee Police officials shared about the propensity for the P320 to fire without a trigger pull.
The 2020 shooting was the first of six unintended shootings involving law enforcement officers across Wisconsin, according to a 12 News investigation and public court records. Of those, three involved Milwaukee Police officers; two of whom were injured. The most recent Milwaukee Police incident was in September 2022.
"We saw the the officer was bending over to finished a search of a vehicle," Milwaukee Police Association President Andrew Wagner said Thursday. "He had bent over to look under some seats or something and his partner's squad cam video shows that, you know, he's just going into the car and that's when his weapon fired and injured his partner.
Wagner said that officer was still recovering. He also said the officer injured in the 2020 incident was back to full duty.
During testing, the department's armorer, or gun expert, could not recreate any of the three scenarios to cause the guns in each incident to fire without a trigger pull. That led department brass to refer to the incidents as "unexplained discharges".
After the most recent unexplained discharge for the department, the union filed a lawsuit against the City of Milwaukee in an effort to force city leadership to replace the guns many officers saw as defective and dangerous.
Some officers expressed concerns for their own safety as well as the safety of their families and the public.
Late last year, Wagner announced an agreement the union reached with Mayor Cavalier Johnson and Chief Jeffrey Norman to swap out the P320's and replace them with Glock pistols.
The new guns cost about $450,000, city officials said. The Common Council approved the expenditure from the Federal Forfeiture Revenue Contribution Account.
Department officials said the most recent academy class was the first to test the new weapons, followed by other members on the force.
Wagner said officers are pleased with the new pistols.
"It's a huge relief for our members to know that the gun they're carrying and going to be bringing around their home and around citizens and the public won't misfire without the trigger being pulled," he said.
Once the transition is complete, Wagner said the union will drop its lawsuit.
There is a separate nationwide lawsuit against Sig Sauer outlining similar safety concerns for officers. The two Milwaukee officers from the department's first unexplained discharge are among 20 plaintiffs in the case.