Being familiar with how litigation goes, and being a pal of Mas Ayoob's for more than 30 years, I'd always counsel caution about removing something from any firearm mechanism that is a "safety." I had a heck of a time explaining this once to a friend who wanted to permanently lock down the grip safety on his 1911.
After gently asking him, "ARE YOU NUTS??!!!!! " we had this jovial conversation about lawsuits and jail food and charges of gross negligence.
Thank you all for an invigorating chat.
As for it being "early yet," that's only because someone forgot to set his clock ahead
Dave:
I recognized your name from numerous article mentions, and the holster named after you! I have great respect for Mas, and his opinions on the subject of what has come up in litigation are valid and well-researched, depite many nay-sayers, some of whom are on this forum.
Like many such things, if a rational explanation is given, effective counsel can neutralize claims that the armed citizen is a "gun nut looking to kill someone."
My thoughts on the internal lock are that it is not a safety device in the sense that anyone would carry or keep a gun needed for immediate availability for self-defense with it activated. It is really more of a device to assist a user in safe storage to keep unauthorized persons, such as a minor, from using the weapon. In my own case, such arms are either on my person or locked in a vault. Period.
Mas contributed to a long discussion on the lock on this forum a few years ago, and my recollection is that he suggested that anyone who deactivates or removes the internal lock be able to explain the rationale for doing so, and I seem to recall that he suggested printing and keeping a copy of that thread, which had incidents of lock failure within the thread.
In addition, Mas wrote an article which appeared in his column in Guns magazine, I think, detailing a couple of lock failures. The really amusing thing was that, in the VERY SAME MAGAZINE, gun writer Charles Petty, wrote an ad for S&W disguised as an article (ever seen one of those?) in which, like the proverbial person with his head in the sand, he "reported" that no one knows anything about a lock failure ever having occurred - not the author, Petty, nor anyone at S&W, nor anyone else in the world. It just wasn't a problem, because if it were, S&W would have heard of it, blah, blah.
That sophisticated piece of investigative journalism was hilarious (embarrassing for Petty, I am sure, and if not, it should have been) in light of the fact that Mas' article detailing DOCUMENTED failures of the S&W internal lock appeared IN THE VERY SAME MAGAZINE just months before. (I suppose it is possible Petty's article was authored prior to Mas' article, and just not published immediately, and if so, it is an editorial problem, and Petty's article never should have seen the light of day.)
So, God forbid the issue ever comes up because no rational, caring human WANTS to shoot anyone, but unfortunate situations requiring shooting do come up and are recognized in the law as a defense to shooting someone. But in the case of lawful self-defense, I want a tool that will work immediately (thus, the IL is NOT activated anyway when carried or kept for such immediate use) when callled on for such use. I also want such tool to be as close to 100% reliable as possible, and it is PROVEN BEYOND DOUBT that IL failures have occurred on S&W's used for defense. Removal of the lock ONLY AFFECTS safe storage, and I use a safe for such purposes, and would not have had the lock activated when carrying anyway, so I see it as a non-issue.
A certain federal agency holster is designed so that agents can insert a pad lock through the holster in such a way that the lock fits behind the trigger guard of the issue SIG Sauer. I am willing to bet the farm that agents do not carry the weapon with the lock in place, unless in an isolated case, some agent forgot to remove the lock. I see no real distinction. Along those lines, I can see someone forgetting to unlock the IL. Although we should never be complacent, it does happen - ever heard of a LE officer leaving his weapon in the stall of a public restroom?
There are those who may disagree, and they are certainly free to their opinion on the subject. I am just explaining mine in response to your post, in order to let you know that I have taken into account the issues raised by Mas regarding the issue.
I think removal of the IL is even more defensible in light of the fact that S&W's most commonly sold revolver for defense, the Centennial, is still offered, to this day, without the lock, as are ALL of their self-defense semi-auto pistols.
In my own case, it has become a non-issue, as I ALMOST NEVER carry a revolver for defense, having switched over to the semi-auto exclusively LONG AGO.
I appreciate you taking time to respond to my earlier post. Thanks for your consideration of my thoughts on the topic.
Best regards,
Shawn
