Gun Digest April 2022

On Friday, February 18, 2022, Judge Regina Chu presided over a courtroom in downtown Minneapolis. Kim Potter, a former offcer within the Brooklyn Center Police Department, stood before Chu, awaiting sentencing. Potter had been tried and found guilty of manslaughter two months prior for the killing of Daunte Wright during a traffc stop, when Potter mistakenly pulled and discharged her Glock instead of her taser. With the livestream cameras rolling, Chu sentenced Potter to two years in prison. Before that courtroom was emptied, protesters began demonstrating outside the Hennepin County government building, and three activists were arrested in the lobby. That was a Friday. By the following Sunday, nearby business had been looted and damaged, mimicking—albeit on a smaller scale—the aftermath of the George Floyd incident that took place less than two…

HISTORICAL NOTES If there’s one shotshell that holds all titles as most versatile, most popular and most varied in loading, the 12 gauge is it. Except for the .22 rimfire, the 12 gauge is the most popular sporting chambering ever offered. It’s commonly available with shot made of lead, steel, tungsten/iron, tungsten/polymer or bismuth. Current shot charges range from about ⅞ ounce to 2½ ounces. Common shot sizes range from No. 9 through 000 Buck. Slugs are typically 1 or 1¼ ounces, but other weights are available. Further, it’s relatively simple to have a moderately sized batch of custom-loaded 12-gauge ammunition (with either an odd-sized shot or reduced velocity), produced by a major manufacturer. To gain a true perspective, consider that, at one time in this country, there were literally thousands of distinct…

For decades, some scoffed at the Deep South as a hub for worldclass technology, but they weren’t paying attention. Alabama, and especially the intellectual lightning rod city of Huntsville—headlined by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center—is home to some of the world’s most advanced scientific and engineering minds. Brothers Matt and Dave Tandy are two such minds. Together, the military veterans parlayed their love for shooting sports with an aerospace engineering background into one of the world’s most innovative rifle stock companies—AG Composites—a grand feat that should be taken lightly … very lightly. AG Composites doesn’t just make composite stocks; they make incredibly light and remarkably durable composite stocks that, on average, weigh as little as 25 ounces in their AG Privateer line. Their heavyweight stock, the AG Carbon K2 Adjustable, averages 45…

The reloading of a defensive handgun is generally considered a baseline skill. It’s something that every defensive handgun training course I’ve taken spends a good bit of time teaching. This makes sense because an empty gun is mostly useless. Most doctrine separates reloading into three techniques. These include the administrative reload, the tactical reload and the speed reload. Although all three serve the same purpose of keeping your handgun full of ammunition, they have different application. THE ADMINISTRATIVE RELOAD Administrative reloading is something that has no tactical value. It’s nothing but the administrative steps you take when you’re readying your pistol for carry, or when you get to the range and are readying your pistol for training … though you do often see it used during handgun training courses when students step…

We don’t all live in a location or situation that lets us wear a gun around the house … or have racked rifles or shotguns at the ready. When you’re not there, or perhaps while you’re sleeping, your home-defense gun has to be someplace secure. Enter Gun Vault. They make heavy-gauge steel lock boxes that you can access with a press of (several) buttons, or use a key as the manual override. MICROVAULT XL The model I have is the MicroVault XL, also known as the MV1000. There are four buttons on the lid. You open the box by pressing them in the open sequence. Well, you do that after you’ve used the supplied key to open it and have installed the battery. It comes pre-programmed with a factory default code, so you can…

One of the most misunderstood aspects of a selfdefense trial, and the legal strategy that goes into it, is the role of the expert witness. FEDERAL RULES OF EVIDENCE, 702 STATES: A witness who is qualified as an expert by knowledge, skill, experience, training or education may testify in the form of an opinion or otherwise if: (a) the expert’s scientific, technical or other specialized knowledge will help the trier of fact to understand the evidence or to deter-mine a fact in issue; (b) the testimony is based on suffcient facts or data; (c) the testimony is the product of reliable principles and methods; and (d) the expert has reliably applied the principles and methods to the facts of the case. This means two hurdles must be met. First, the proffered expert witness must be able to…