In a Friday statement, a Department of the Air Force spokesperson said that the unidentified arrested person is accused of making a false official statement, obstruction of justice and involuntary manslaughter.
In this case, the whole "it want off by itself" claim was a lie.
https://www.airforcetimes.com/news/your-air-force/2025/08/08...
Maybe the issue is that the 320 is too close to a competition trigger, and it isn't appropriate for a duty gun. But the gun has been under a microscope for years now, and no one has shown a design defect that causes the gun to fire by itself.
A hair trigger is unsuitable for combat use because of the "errybody be muzzle sweeping errybody up in here" nature of combat.
Those two uses are 99.99% of what the air force needs its pistols to do.
They could give it better tolerances so it has a "good trigger" without "hair trigger" but that will cost a lot of money. Or they could give it an absurd trigger pull like duty guns had in the "good old days" but that will cost just as much money for equivalent results because you'll need to train the force more to get the same accuracy of fire.
Additionally, with the fairly sloppy nature of these guns and the fundamental nature of how handguns work, it's not unforeseeable that they do get clapped out to the point of just going off if you bump the slide right as they age since they're so close to that as is.
Considering how many people need to be trained/equipped and how often the air force fires sidearms in "real" situations both of these solutions are way, way, way more expensive than a few bodies.
I think we need to await the facts of the case and the judgement. The only public information I've seen strikes me as unusual.
The accused airman is being charged with involuntary manslaughter, which coupled with the extensive issues with the P320 brings up more questions than it answers.
I could come up with my own conjecture based on that information, but there's enough people doing that already.
The fact remains that the P320 malfunctions. There's been countless documented cases, and numerous recorded demonstrations of the issue on YouTube and elsewhere.
This is why I came around to appreciating the California Roster of Handguns regulation. Firearm manufacturers should be held to a higher safety standard.
Originally I thought it was ridiculous that my first conceal carry sub-compact Springfield XD-S came in a case with a large sticker across one side saying it was illegal in CA. At which point I learned about the stringent drop, firing and performance test that was required and how manufacturers will make a separate and specific quality and safety upgrades to the model variant legal in CA. After a fair amount of use I understood why the XD-S was not and is still not legal in CA. Mine had a higher-than-I-am-comfortable-with rate of jamming. I'll be buying CA approved firearms from now on.
Interesting info about the P320 M18:
The P320 M18 has 3 variants: 320CA-9-M18-MS, 320CA-9-M18-MS-10, 320CA-9-M18-MS-CA.
The 320CA-9-M18-MS-CA is the only one legal in CA [0]
According to Sig Sauer site wording, the CA tested version came after the version issued to the military -- thus I am taking a guess that t was not as rigorously tested as the CA version (and probably has fewer safety or other military specific features that make it less reliable)
[0] https://www.oag.ca.gov/firearms/certified-handguns/search?ma...
It can be both Sig and this Airman’s fault at the same time.
Carrying a handgun relies on that rule not being followed and instead the holster preventing anyone from pulling the trigger, but if the gun can go off without a trigger pull all bets are off.
In case anyone else is interested:
UCMJ Article 119 (Manslaughter): https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/10/919
UCML Article 118 (Murder): https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/10/918
But IANAL, and to the extent I pay attention to the law, that kind of basic criminal law isn't it.
As is classifying all the documents about the pistol and its issues.
There is nothing even remotely credibly related to national security about the P320 or issues related to it.
Sunlight is the best disinfectant, and the military has a very long history of covering up issues with corruptly procured weapons.
Just one particularly notorious example of many: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Iowa_turret_explosion
> The first investigation into the explosion, conducted by the U.S. Navy, concluded that one of the gun turret crew members, Clayton Hartwig, who died in the explosion, had deliberately caused it. During the investigation, numerous leaks to the media, later attributed to U.S. Navy officers and investigators, implied that Hartwig and another sailor, Kendall Truitt, had engaged in a romantic relationship and that Hartwig had caused the explosion after their relationship had soured. However, in its report, the U.S. Navy concluded that the evidence did not show that Hartwig was homosexual but that he was suicidal and had caused the explosion with either an electronic or chemical detonator.
Policies that people had objected to at the time, but had been pushed through regardless due to ‘stop being a worry wart’/no one wanting to spend the money.
They still have the accident down as ‘Unknown causes’.
That's the Air Force's accusation.
This might be true, but nowhere in the article you posted does it say that.
