“Vernon police want to phase out their arsenal of bean bag-propelling shotguns on favor of a more efficient ‘less than lethal’ weapons system,” vernon.patch.com reports. “Police are asking permission from the Town Council to trade 20 Mossberg Model 590A1 shotguns to a ‘licensed federal firearms dealer’ in exchange for 14 new Glock Model 36 handguns [above].” Huh? What’s “less than lethal” about a Glock 36? Still, ever since drug thugs wielding ATF-enabled modern home sporting defense rifles gunned down U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, equipped with a beanbag-firing shotgun, I’ve gone off the whole idea of LEO’s with diminished lethality firearms. Anyway, let’s try and straighten this out . . .
The 12-gauge shotguns were deployed in departmental vehicles and were loaded with a shell that fired a bean bag. It would “cause pain without the severe injury associated with using lethal force,” police officials said in a memo to the council.
The shotguns were originally acquired in 2001 for $652.06 each and are being eliminated in favor of a more cost-effective and efficient system. Annual training costs “far exceeded” the cost of the shotguns, police officials said in the memo.
Lt. William Meier on Friday said the newer system is a 40mm launcher that fires rubber-coated projectiles. SWAT officers currently use that system, he said.
The shotguns were “effective, but not cost-effective” compared to the new system, police official said in the memo.
Nope. Still not getting it. A Glock 36 is a single stack .45. That’s a long way from 40mm. And what’s wrong with a TASER or, for that matter, the way cool TASER XREP shotgun, other than the fact that they don’t seem to sell it anymore?