This story was published in partnership with <\/em>The Trace<\/em><\/a>, a nonprofit newsroom covering gun violence in America. Sign up for its <\/em>newsletters here<\/em><\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n Shortly after dark<\/span> one day in September 2022, police officers Yang Lee and Charles Laskey-Castle arrived on Milwaukee\u2019s west side to investigate a car abandoned on the sidewalk. Lee knelt to examine the driver\u2019s side floorboard as Laskey-Castle stood behind him. Then Lee rose \u2014 and his holstered gun fired a bullet into his partner\u2019s leg.<\/p>\n The shooting was captured on body camera footage, and it was at least the third time in three years that a Milwaukee officer\u2019s SIG Sauer P320 pistol had allegedly fired without a trigger pull, according to lawsuits and police records. The following month, the Milwaukee Police Department moved to replace its P320s with weapons from another manufacturer.<\/p>\n \u201cThere is no higher priority than the safety of the people who protect our city,\u201d said Milwaukee Mayor Cavalier Johnson at an October 2022 news conference announcing the switch. \u201cUnexplained discharges, they have injured people. That\u2019s completely unacceptable to me.\u201d<\/p>\n At the same event, Milwaukee\u2019s police chief revealed that, to offset the cost of the new weapons, the department would be reselling its P320s to a gun dealer. Soon, the old P320s \u2014 deemed too dangerous for the city\u2019s officers \u2014 would be available for purchase by civilians.<\/p>\n The decision in Milwaukee follows a pattern that has been repeated in cities across the nation as police departments reevaluate their use of the P320 amid mounting concerns about the weapon\u2019s safety. A 2023 investigation<\/a> by The Trace and The Washington Post<\/em> revealed that the P320 has gruesomely injured scores of people who alleged in lawsuits that it has a potentially deadly defect. SIG Sauer denied these claims.\u00a0<\/p>\n Over the past two months, The Trace surveyed more than 60 law enforcement agencies whose officers once used the P320. More than 20 of those agencies \u2014 including police departments in Oklahoma City, Denver, and Chicago \u2014 have moved to prohibit the gun because of fears about unintentional discharges. Twelve agencies said they resold their P320s to the public after determining the model was unsafe for officers to use.\u00a0<\/p>\n Cumulatively, these departments sent at least 4,000 P320s back into the commercial market.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIf the primary function of law enforcement is to protect and serve, one would think that returning a problematic weapon to the public is not particularly consistent with that mission,\u201d Jonathan Jacobs, director of the Institute for Criminal Justice Ethics at New York\u2019s John Jay College, told The Trace. \u201cThe ethical issues here are very, very plain.\u201d<\/p>\n A Milwaukee police spokesperson said \u201cthe trade-in was a cost-savings for the department.\u201d <\/p>\n SIG Sauer declined to comment on the specifics of this story and directed questions to p320truth.com<\/a>, a website it created about the gun. The gunmaker has previously denied that the P320 is capable of firing without a trigger pull and cited accounts of unintentional discharges with other firearms as evidence that such issues are neither uncommon nor suggestive of a defect.<\/p>\n Concerns Grow After Multiple Shootings, Lawsuits<\/strong><\/p>\n Concerns about the<\/span> P320 surfaced recently in Washington, where in February the state\u2019s Criminal Justice Training Commission banned the P320 from its facilities, citing<\/a> an \u201cabundance of allegations of un-commanded discharges occurring around the country.\u201d Because the commission hosts mandatory training for police officers, its decision pressured law enforcement agencies across the state to reconsider their use of the P320.\u00a0<\/p>\n The ban came after at least two shootings involving P320s among Washington law enforcement. Last year, a Kitsap County sheriff\u2019s deputy\u2019s holstered P320 discharged while she apprehended a suspect in a grocery store, according to body camera footage<\/a> obtained by local media. Nobody was injured, but after the shooting, the Kitsap County Commission offered to fully fund the purchase of different guns plus the cost of destroying the old P320s to remove them from circulation.\u00a0<\/p>\n The Sheriff\u2019s Office declined the offer, and in March, it said<\/a> it would be reselling more than 200 P320s to a dealer. \u201cIt seemed like the fiscally responsible thing to do,\u201d Kitsap County Undersheriff Russ Clithero told The Trace. The office received roughly $300 per resold weapon \u2014 more than $60,000.<\/p>\n One of the most popular handguns in America, the P320 has been used by officers at more than a thousand law enforcement agencies across the country. But according to police records and lawsuits, as of April 23, at least 120 people have alleged that their P320 fired without the trigger being pulled. Those shootings resulted in more than 110 injuries and at least one death.<\/p>\n Dozens of people have sued SIG Sauer over P320 discharges. Several cases have been dismissed, and the company won a jury trial in 2022. More recently, however, two juries have ruled against SIG Sauer, awarding more than $13 million in damages. After the most recent verdict, in November, the national Fraternal Order of Police sent a letter to SIG Sauer requesting an accounting of measures taken by the company to address widespread concerns about the P320.<\/p>\n \u201cThe officers who rely on your products must have absolute confidence in the safety and performance of their weapon,\u201d the letter<\/a> read.<\/p>\n The Trace contacted 69 law enforcement agencies for this story and 41 responded. A total of 16 confirmed that after issuing the P320 to officers, they switched to a new pistol out of concern about the P320\u2019s safety. Four others had acknowledged publicly that their departments switched pistols because of safety reasons, but did not respond to The Trace.<\/p>\n The Pasco County Sheriff\u2019s Office in Florida resold more than 800 P320s after three officers survived incidents in which they say their P320s discharged although nobody pulled the guns\u2019 triggers, records show.<\/p>\n \u201cThe trade-in value was necessary to facilitate the transition to the Glocks we currently use,\u201d a spokesperson for the Sheriff\u2019s Office said. \u201cWe cannot speak for what actions the vendor took with the weapons after we traded them back.\u201d<\/p>\n The Police Department in Bridge City, Texas, resold its P320s after one of its officers claimed she was shot in the groin by a holstered gun zipped inside her purse, a police report shows. The bullet missed her spine by inches.<\/p>\n R.D. Bergeron, the assistant police chief of Bridge City, said the department kept the gun involved in the shooting. \u201cThe last thing we would want is anyone, officer or civilian, to get hurt due to it firing uncommanded,\u201d Bergeron said.\u00a0<\/p>\n A Common Police Practice<\/strong><\/p>\n Law enforcement agencies<\/span> generally resell weapons for budget reasons. Used police guns are popular among gun buyers because they\u2019re relatively inexpensive and often in good condition. Resales have drawn criticism<\/a> from law enforcement experts and gun violence researchers, who have argued that introducing used police weapons to the civilian marketplace risks fueling crime.\u00a0<\/p>\n At least 52,000 police guns had been involved in crimes \u2014\u00a0 including homicides and other violent assaults \u2014 since 2006, according to an investigation<\/a> by The Trace, CBS News, and Reveal from The Center for Investigative Reporting. While that tally includes guns lost by or stolen from police, many of the firearms were resold by law enforcement.<\/p>\n Ed Obayashi, a deputy sheriff in Modoc County, California, and a national police ethics expert, said reselling an allegedly defective gun poses an added threat to public safety, even if it never slips into criminal hands. For this reason alone, he said, departments should not resell P320s if they believe the guns to be defective. \u201cThere are situations in law enforcement where you\u2019re going to have to do the right thing, even if it\u2019s going to cost you financially,\u201d Obayashi said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n In Laredo, Texas, the Police Department resold about 500 P320s after an officer experienced an unintentional discharge, officials said. The officer was not injured, but investigators concluded that his gun had fired \u201cwithout the trigger being pulled,\u201d according to a Bexar County Criminal Investigations Laboratory report obtained by The Trace.<\/p>\n When asked why the agency had resold its P320s after pulling them from service, a police spokesperson did not respond.<\/p>\n In addition to the 12 agencies that resold P320s to dealers, two \u2014 the Southeastern Pennsylvania Transit Authority and the Honesdale Borough Police Department, also in Pennsylvania \u2014 returned their guns to SIG Sauer, The Trace found.\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"Array](\"https:\/\/www.motherjones.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/05\/GettyImages-1037870392.jpg\")
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