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The city of Philadelphia has filed suit against one specific gunmaker in a race to stop mass shootings in the city.
The 97-page lawsuit jointly filed by the city and District Attorney Larry Krasner alleges that Glock Inc. is contributing to mass shootings by making its semi-automatic handguns too easy to modify into fully automatic weapons.
Public Safety Director Adam Geer says a “manufacturing defect” gives consumers the ability to easily modify Glocks with what is called a switch.
“They turn a semi-automatic, where you have to squeeze the trigger for each round. When you insert the switch, all of a sudden we got a machine gun,” he said.
A Glock switch, a small metal or plastic piece that attaches to the back of the pistol and interferes with its internal trigger components to make it fire continuously, can be purchased online or made with a 3D printer. Geer adds that although Glock doesn’t make the switch, they have promoted it in the past via social media.
“What makes it particularly egregious to me is that they’re actually promoting this, knowing that disproportionately, this is going to affect black and brown communities who are suffering from gun violence,” he said.