Firearm Product-Defect Litigation

• ·Purpose, and How to Use This GuideOpen
• Part 1The Defect TaxonomyOpen
• Part 2The Human-Factors HingeOpen
• Part 3The Models and the ChargesOpen
• Part 4The NumbersOpen
• Part 5Legal Theories at a GlanceOpen
• Part 6What the Expert Work Actually InvolvesOpen
• Part 7Winning These CasesOpen
• ·Child Safety: Securing Firearms at HomeOpen
• ·A Note for Attorneys Who CarryOpen
• ·Appendix: Sources and NotesOpen
• ·About the AuthorOpen

This guide is for attorneys evaluating or preparing a firearm discharge or defect case.

First, it is a working reference on the firearms most often named in accidental-discharge, drop-fire, and defective-product cases: what the alleged defect is, what legal theories drive each matter, and how the litigation has resolved.

Second, it shows how these cases are analyzed and prepared, and lays out exactly what the opposing side will argue and how that argument is met, so counsel can see both the case and the rebuttal in one place.

The figures come from public reporting, court records, and manufacturer notices. Estimated numbers are stated as such. Incident rates in this field are softer than they look, and the gap between a documented rate and an alleged rate is where many cases are won or lost.

The numbers

Incident counts and install-base figures are approximate. The charts give an order-of-magnitude picture, not a precise tally.

The analytical posture

Every case comes down to a single question, namely whether the discharge was caused by the firearm or by the person holding it. That is a human-factors question before it is an engineering one. The manufacturer's first and strongest defense is always that the user broke a handling or safety rule. The plaintiff's case often depends on proving the opposite, that the user handled the gun correctly and the gun fired anyway. This guide is written so that the same disciplined human-factors analysis can be turned to whichever side the facts support. Part 2 sets out that framework; the model notes and the methodology sections carry it through.

Almost every case traces back to 1 of 6 mechanical stories. Knowing which one you are looking at tells you what to test, what documents to demand, and what the manufacturer will argue.

1. Inertial firing pin and drop fireA free-floating firing pin is held off the primer only by a spring, and by being shorter than its channel. A hard enough impact, usually muzzle-down or on the rear of the slide, can drive the pin forward by its own inertia, and fire a chambered round with no trigger pull. This is the classic drop-fire mechanism. The cure is a positive firing pin block that physically obstructs the pin until the trigger is pulled.
2. No hammer block on single-action revolversTraditional single-action revolvers carry the hammer resting directly on the firing pin, which rests on a live primer. A blow to the hammer fires the gun. The historical workaround was to load five chambers and leave the hammer down on an empty cylinder. The engineering cure is a transfer bar that sits between hammer and firing pin only during a deliberate trigger pull.
3. Trigger connector misalignmentSome trigger groups use a small floating connector between the trigger and the sear. If debris, wear, or a jolt moves that connector out of position, the sear can release when the safety is moved or the bolt is worked, again with no trigger pull. This is the heart of the Remington Walker matter.
4. Striker sensitivity and uncommanded dischargeIn a pre-cocked striker pistol, the striker is already under spring tension before the trigger is touched. If the trigger or its safety lever can move under impact, inertia, or a foreign object, the gun can fire. The dispute is usually whether an external manual safety should be standard and whether the trigger mass makes the design sensitive to handling forces. This is the core of the SIG P320 litigation, and it is worth taking apart in detail because the mechanism is now much better understood on the public record. The P320 uses a fully pre-tensioned striker, meaning the striker sits 100 percent cocked as soon as a round is chambered, unlike a Glock or an M&P where the striker is only partially cocked and the trigger completes the compression. Two independent failures have to occur to fire a P320 without a trigger pull: the sear has to release the striker, and the striker safety lever has to fail to block the striker from reaching the primer. Both failures are small. Public teardown work and the February 2025 Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission report describe a captive safety lever with a roughly one-millimeter L-shaped tab on a weak torsion spring, a sear-striker engagement measured in fractions of a millimeter, and slide-to-frame play that in some pistols exceeds half a millimeter, which is enough to destabilize that engagement. The trigger has roughly two millimeters of pre-travel and then less than a millimeter to striker release, so a very small displacement anywhere in that chain can drop the striker. The engineering cure is the same class of positive block found on other striker pistols, and the litigation cure is a tabbed trigger, a manual thumb safety, or both.
5. Unloading-sequence designA pistol can be mechanically sound yet defective in how it forces the user to unload it. If the design requires disengaging the manual safety to clear the chamber, or requires a trigger pull to de-cock, then a routine unloading becomes a discharge waiting to happen. The Bryco Model 38 verdict turned on exactly this.
6. Defeated or omitted safeties through modificationA factory safety that has been removed in the aftermarket is its own category. The Colt 1911 illustrates it: the Series 80 added a trigger-actuated firing pin block, and gunsmiths sometimes strip those parts out for a lighter trigger, returning the gun to inertial-only protection. Whether a positive block was present, intact, and functional is often the first inspection point.

Strip any of these cases to its core and the same question is left standing: did the firearm cause the discharge, or did the person? That is a human-factors question, and it is where my primary expertise lives, in handling, gun-handling violations, and safety-rule compliance. The engineering establishes what the gun is capable of. The human-factors analysis establishes what the user actually did, and whether the design invited the error in the first place.

Causation runs through both.

The manufacturer's first move is always user error

Across every matter in this guide, the defense opens the same way: the gun did not malfunction, the user broke a rule. The shooter had a finger on the trigger. The holster was wrong, or worn out. The pistol was modified. The rifle was dropped through carelessness. The unloading was done improperly. This is not a side argument; it is usually the whole defense. A plaintiff who cannot answer it loses, no matter how strong the metallurgy looks.

That is the opening I built to close. When I can show, to a professional standard, that the user did not violate a handling or safety rule, user causation falls away and the cause points back to the firearm. The defect theory does not have to prove the gun fired itself in the abstract; it has to prove the gun fired when a competent user did everything right.

Establishing the second is human-factors work.

The same analysis serves either side

This expertise is symmetric, and that's a strength on the stand. The method does not change with the retaining party; only the facts decide the conclusion.

A neutral, rule-based method that reaches whichever conclusion the evidence supports is exactly what survives cross-examination and an admissibility challenge. It also lets me work either side of the docket without contradiction.

Figure 1 · The causation hinge

The four rules, and what compliance looks like

The universal firearm safety rules are the yardstick for any handling analysis. Each one maps to a factual question an expert can answer from the scene, the injuries, the equipment, and the witness record.

For a more comprehensive discussion of the rules, see any of my books.

Design-induced error: the bridge between the two sides

A rule violation is not the end of the inquiry. The deeper human-factors question is whether the design invited the violation. A pistol that forces the user to pull the trigger to unload, as the Bryco Model 38 did, manufactures the very rule violation the maker then blames the user for. A trigger that can be reached or moved by something other than a finger blurs the line between a handling failure and a design failure. Design-induced error is where human factors and product defect meet, and it is the argument that can turn an apparent user-error case back toward the firearm.

How the handling question plays in each matter

SIG P320.

The holstered-discharge claim is the cleanest example: if the pistol fired in the holster, no trigger-finger violation is possible, so the maker's user-error defense has to reach for holster fit, foreign objects, or improper re-holstering. The human-factors work is showing the holster and re-holstering were correct, which closes those exits and isolates the gun. The rule violation would be Rule 2, in allowing the muzzle to point in an unsafe direction, such as at one's own leg.

Remington 700 and the Walker fire control.

The defense alleges a finger on the trigger. The plaintiff's case is reconstructed including muzzle discipline and trigger-finger discipline, with the discharge occurring on safety release or bolt manipulation rather than on a trigger pull. Establishing correct handling converts a hunting accident into a defect case.

Bryco Model 38.

The design forced the rule violation by requiring the safety be off in order to unload it. The human-factors analysis is foreseeable use: a reasonable user following the only available unloading procedure was steered into a discharge. This is design-induced error in its purest form.

Taurus drop-fire matters.

The contest is whether the drop itself was negligent handling or whether a minor, foreseeable drop that a properly designed firing mechanism is designed to withstand, fired a defective gun. Quantifying what handling was reasonable, and what a drop-safe firearm should tolerate, sits squarely in this expertise.

The table below is the quick reference. Detailed notes and the supporting charts follow.

Master reference. Caliber and model designations are kept as they appear in the litigation record.

SIG Sauer P320: the current center of gravity

The P320 is where the volume is right now. Plaintiffs allege the pistol can fire without a trigger pull under impact or ordinary handling, often while holstered, and that the civilian model should have shipped with the external manual safety found on the military M17 and M18 variants. As of mid-2026 there are well over 150 alleged unintentional discharges and more than 120 federal lawsuits on the docket. Two juries found the design defective in 2024, in Georgia and in Philadelphia. SIG denies a defect and points to industry-standard compliance, Army testing, and the difficulty plaintiffs have had replicating a discharge in the laboratory. No formal recall has issued; the 2017 Voluntary Upgrade Program is opt-in.

The 2025 and 2026 developments the attorneys need on their desk

The docket moved substantially in the last twelve months, and the pattern is not one-directional. Some rulings help plaintiffs, others help SIG, and the strategic implications of each are specific.

Glasscock v. SIG Sauer, 8th Circuit, No. 25-2707 (July 16, 2026). The Eighth Circuit vacated the first-ever P320 class certification for lack of Article III standing. The named plaintiff had never experienced an uncommanded discharge; he alleged only that the class of pistols was defective. The panel held that owning a possibly defective firearm, without an actual malfunction, is not a concrete injury. The opinion is at FindLaw and the parties' releases at PR Newswire. The lesson for plaintiff counsel is direct: build the case on plaintiffs who have actually experienced a discharge, not on the theoretical defect alone.

Colwell v. SIG Sauer, 2nd Circuit (May 28, 2026). A divided Second Circuit reinstated the design-defect claim of a Troy, New York police detective whose holstered P320 fired into his leg during training. The trial court had granted summary judgment for SIG after excluding the plaintiff's engineering experts. The Second Circuit held that even without expert causation testimony, a reasonable jury could apply common sense to find that a tabbed trigger would have prevented the discharge. Reuters coverage is here. Colwell is the case attorneys will cite when the defense moves to exclude their experts and then argues that exclusion is the case.

New Jersey v. SIG Sauer, Essex County Chancery Division, ESX-C-000217-25 (filed October 16, 2025). The first state to sue SIG directly. New Jersey seeks a mandatory recall, an injunction against sale of the P320 in the state, and disgorgement, under the Consumer Fraud Act and public nuisance. The complaint is at the New Jersey Attorney General's office, and Reuters' write-up is here. In July 2026 a federal magistrate recommended remand to state court, which if adopted keeps the case where the plaintiff wants it. Coverage of that step is at Legal Newsline. Watch for other state attorneys general to follow.

Schreiber v. SIG Sauer, W.D. Washington, No. 2:25-cv-02303 (filed November 17, 2025). A Washington state class action alleging the P320 is "extraordinarily dangerous" and that the design should have shipped with a tabbed trigger. The complaint, hosted at ClassAction.org, ties the discharge theory into the Washington Consumer Protection Act.

Cole v. SIG Sauer, D. Maine (verdict August 7, 2026). A Somerset County sheriff's deputy shot in the leg by his holstered P320 in 2022. The parties agreed the trigger was pulled; the fight was over what pulled it. SIG argued a jacket zipper; the plaintiff argued the design. After a two-week trial in Bangor, the jury sided with SIG on all three questions submitted, finding no failure to warn, no negligence, and no defect at the time of sale. Coverage from the Bangor Daily News and the Central Maine Morning Sentinel. The verdict is a defense win on the holstered-discharge fact pattern, and it undercuts the assumption that a holstered discharge alone is enough to reach a defect finding. It also confirms what Part 6 warns about: a jury will hold plaintiffs to a case-specific causation showing, and "the P320 can fire on its own" is not the same as "this P320 fired on its own on this day." Cole should be read alongside the plaintiff wins in Georgia and Philadelphia, not in place of them. The docket is not one-directional.

Northrup v. SIG Sauer, Fla. 2d DCA No. 2D2024-0869 (per curiam affirmance February 28, 2025). A Hillsborough County law-enforcement officer shot in the leg by his holstered P320 in 2020. The trial court granted summary judgment on the ground that the plaintiff's engineering experts had not tested the subject firearm. The Second District affirmed per curiam. The Justia docket is the cleanest primary reference; the April 2026 oral argument is available on the appellate court's YouTube channel. Northrup is the case that makes Colwell's later opposite result meaningful: a Florida panel held that without an inspection and test of the specific pistol at issue, general defect testimony cannot bridge to specific causation on this discharge. Plaintiff counsel filing outside the Second Circuit should assume Northrup is the ceiling until the case is distinguished on its facts, and should test the subject pistol.

New Hampshire shield law (May 23, 2025). Governor Ayotte signed HB 172, which bars product-liability claims against a firearm manufacturer premised on the absence of an external mechanical safety, a magazine disconnect, a loaded-chamber indicator, or a smart-gun feature. SIG is headquartered in New Hampshire, and the statute is transparently aimed at the P320 docket. Coverage from New Hampshire Public Radio. Important limits: the statute does not reach a manufacturing-defect claim, and it does not bind courts outside New Hampshire on venue and choice-of-law grounds. Plan filings accordingly.

Air Force grounding (July 2025) and the Michigan State Police / FBI Ballistic Research Facility work (August 2024). The Air Force grounded M18 issue after Airman Brayden Lovan was killed by an uncommanded discharge, and the Michigan State Police and FBI produced test-conditions results in which a P320 struck the primer without a trigger pull. Both are useful for notice, for the manufacturer-knowledge case, and for the human-factors argument that even trained users are not the cause. See Outdoor Life's summary of the FBI-linked findings and the February 2025 Washington State CJTC report (PDF).

The countervailing note. SIG has reported roughly twenty P320 case dismissals to date, including Massachusetts and Colorado dismissals in May 2026, and the Slatowski appeal in the Third Circuit sharpened the defense's argument that plaintiff experts must connect a specific external force to the discharge. As of mid-2026 there is no formal MDL. The docket remains a jurisdiction-by-jurisdiction fight.

Why it matters for an expert

The case turns on replication. Several plaintiff experts have been excluded because they could not reproduce an uncommanded discharge under controlled, documented conditions. An expert who can design a sound, repeatable protocol, or who can explain rigorously why a discharge is not reproducible on demand, is the difference between admissible and excluded testimony.

The mechanism, at the level of parts

The public technical record on the P320 has matured. A retained expert should be able to walk a jury through the whole chain, in these terms.

The pre-tensioned striker. Once a round is chambered, the striker is fully cocked. The trigger does not add compression; it only releases what is already stored. That is the design choice that makes every downstream tolerance load-bearing.

The two-lock architecture. Between the loaded striker and the primer sit two independent barriers. The sear holds the striker back against spring pressure. The striker safety lever, a small captive part with an L-shaped tab and a torsion spring, sits in the striker's path and is meant to be lifted out of the way only by the trigger bar. For an uncommanded discharge, both barriers have to fail.

The tolerances that decide the case. The sear-striker engagement is measured in fractions of a millimeter. The striker safety tab is roughly a millimeter long on a light torsion spring. The trigger has roughly two millimeters of pre-travel and less than a millimeter of further movement to release the striker. Slide-to-frame play greater than about half a millimeter destabilizes the sear-striker geometry. Any of these tolerances, drifted or stacked in the wrong direction, moves the pistol from safe to sensitive. Public teardown work by workmanfirearms.com is at this page, and a second-source description of the same architecture appears at Modern Engineering Marvels.

The spring-decay theory. The retention spring load in the striker channel decays over cycles, while the striker spring load stays high. Over time, the barrier holding the striker weakens against a load that does not. This is one of the leading theories for why uncommanded discharges are documented on guns that ran clean for years.

Delayed striker follow. In some documented incidents, the striker slips off the primary sear notch some time after the slide has already gone into battery, which is why the discharge appears causeless to a witness who never touched the trigger. The public Wyoming Gun Project material and the Washington State CJTC report treat this as one of the recurrent failure modes.

The Voluntary Upgrade Program is not a complete answer. Post-upgrade pistols continue to show uncommanded discharges on video and in agency reports, which matters both to the defect argument and to the sufficiency of the manufacturer's chosen response.

Taurus: two generations of the same problem

The Millennium series is the precedent. A 2018 settlement of roughly $239 million covered nine handgun models alleged to fire when dropped or to discharge with the safety on, and Taurus agreed to recall about one million pistols. The GX4 is the sequel: a 2023 safety notice for certain serial numbers that can discharge when dropped, an expanding affected-serial list, and a 2026 class action alleging deaths and an inadequate, non-recall response. Together they establish that drop-fire is a documented, repeated pattern for this manufacturer, which matters for notice and punitive-damages arguments.

Remington Model 700: the most-litigated long gun in America

The Walker fire control sat in more than five million Remington rifles across the Model 700, Model Seven, 600, 660, 721, 722, 725, 710, 770, and XP-100. The allegation is that a small jolt can knock the trigger connector out of alignment, after which the rifle can fire on release of the safety or operation of the bolt, even when merely touched. A 1994 Texas verdict awarded $17 million after a foot amputation. A nationwide class settlement followed, with Remington agreeing to replace the triggers at no cost. The internal-document record assembled by a father whose nine-year-old son was killed by a Model 700 in 2000, later amplified by national television reporting, is the backbone of the manufacturer-knowledge case.

The class action itself, Pollard v. Remington Arms Company, was filed in the Western District of Missouri in January 2013 and settled for a nationwide retrofit covering approximately seven and a half million rifles containing a trigger connector. The 2017 final approval order and the Eighth Circuit affirmance in 2018 together create the record every product-defect brief on a trigger-connector case now cites. Contemporaneous CNBC reporting placed the death toll linked to unintended discharges at approximately twenty-four and serious-injury reports in the hundreds. Remington's own position, preserved in the settlement papers, was that the guns were safe and the discharges were user error. That position, held for decades against thousands of complaints, is the counterexample plaintiffs use when a modern manufacturer takes the same posture on a different pistol.

Bryco / Jennings Model 38: the unloading-defect landmark

A twelve-year-old, Brandon Maxfield, was paralyzed when a family friend tried to unload a Model 38 and the trigger had to be pulled to clear it. A jury found the pistol defective in design and found that the maker knew unloading was accident-prone and that the manual safety was the only guard against firing. The roughly $24 million judgment was affirmed on appeal in 2005; the company filed for bankruptcy the day after the verdict. Cite this case for the principle that a design must accommodate foreseeable unloading without forcing the user into a discharge, despite concurrent Rule 1 and Rule 2 violations.

Ruger and Colt: the engineering baselines

The Ruger old-model single actions and the Colt 1911 Series 70 versus Series 80 distinction are less about live litigation than about teaching the jury what a drop-safe design looks like. They give you clean, uncontested examples of the cure: the transfer bar and the positive firing pin block. Use them to frame what the defendant could and should have done.

The Series 70 pattern is not a historical footnote. It remains in current production under multiple brands, sold as "GI" or "Government" model 1911s: Rock Island Armory / Armscor, Tisas, Springfield Armory GI, and Taylor's & Company, among others. The distinguishing feature is the same one Colt built in 1911: a free-floating inertial firing pin, no trigger-actuated pin block, and reliance on firing-pin mass, spring strength, and, in some builds, a titanium firing pin, to prevent a drop-induced discharge. The Armscor product literature for the GI line is candid about the design lineage. Whether that design meets modern drop-safety expectations is a per-pistol question. The California Roster drop test is the practical yardstick a plaintiff expert should invoke: a Series 70 clone that will not pass the California test is a pistol whose inertial protection depends entirely on parts that can be measured. Where a modern 1911 discharges when dropped, the case is a Part 1 item 1 case unless the record shows a positive firing pin block was present and intact.

Other consequential defect matters worth knowing

Beyond the headline dockets, several older and smaller matters are useful in briefing, jury education, and cross-examination. Each one maps to a taxonomy item in Part 1 and shows either a manufacturer admission, a recall short of admission, or a plaintiff or defense outcome that turns on a specific evidentiary lesson.

Ruger Mark IV pistol (2017 recall).

In June 2017 Ruger recalled all Mark IV pistols manufactured before June 1, 2017, on the ground that the safety lever, if left in a mid-position between "safe" and "fire," could cause the pistol to discharge when moved to "fire" with no trigger contact at that moment. The recall notice is Ruger's own. This is a clean example of what a manufacturer-issued recall looks like, and how far it is willing to go on the record: Ruger described the mechanism, identified the affected serial-number ranges, offered a free retrofit, and asked owners to stop use in the meantime. Use it as the contrasting baseline against SIG's opt-in 2017 Voluntary Upgrade Program.

Savage Axis II and the tang safety (McAllister trial, March 2024).

A Florida plaintiff shot in the leg by her Axis II rifle sued Savage in federal court, alleging the tang safety could rest in a mid-position where the safety appeared engaged but the rifle would fire on the next bolt manipulation or safety movement. A Pensacola jury returned a defense verdict. What matters for other cases is the internal record produced at trial and reported by The Trace: Savage's own quality group flagged the "mid-safe" and "fires on safe" issues repeatedly between 2013 and 2019, and by 2018 had designed a sixteen-cent screw change to eliminate the mid-position, which it did not implement in production until 2020. The plaintiff's rifle was built during the interim. See The Trace's reporting on the internal documents. This is a Part 5 negligence and failure-to-warn case in its purest form: manufacturer knowledge, engineered cure, delayed rollout. The defense verdict is a reminder that internal knowledge without a case-specific causation showing can still lose.

Kahr CW9 (Lyons v. Saeilo, 11th Cir. 2025).

A Kahr CW9 dropped from a holster onto a garage floor and fired, striking the plaintiff. The theory was Part 1 item 1, inertial firing pin, coupled with a disconnector-tab defect. The district court excluded the plaintiff's expert testimony on the inertial-energy defect and granted summary judgment; the Eleventh Circuit affirmed in a 2025 panel opinion, holding that a dual-defect "in-tandem" theory was forfeited by not being pled in the district court, and that the disconnector-tab theory rested on speculation without proof of foreign material or wear at the time of the incident. The district court opinion and Casemine's summary of the Eleventh Circuit affirmance are worth reading together. Lyons is the teaching case on how not to plead a drop-fire matter. Plead every theory with specificity, retain a Daubert-compliant expert, and do not surface a new causation theory at oral argument.

Canik TP9SF Elite (Hill v. Century Arms, E.D. Tenn. 2021).

A holstered Canik TP9SF Elite fell to the ground and discharged, injuring the plaintiff. The Eastern District of Tennessee allowed the punitive-damages claim to proceed against the importer and distributor, on the ground that Century Arms's own 2017 "Product Safety Warning and Severe Duty Upgrade Notice," which acknowledged that "dropping of pistols may result in damage to safety features and unintentional discharge," was enough to plead prior knowledge. The opinion is at Casetext and Bloomberg Law's summary is here. Hill is useful when the defendant's own upgrade notice is available: the notice itself carries the failure-to-warn theory.

FMK 9C1 Fast Action Trigger (2013 recall).

FMK Firearms recalled 9C1 pistols fitted with the original Fast Action Trigger after determining the pistols could discharge if dropped with a round in the chamber. The company's own recall notice uses the word "discharge" and instructs owners not to load or fire the affected pistols until retrofitted. The corrected trigger is marked "316." This is a compact example of an admission-of-defect recall, and it belongs alongside the Ruger Mark IV notice as a manufacturer-issued benchmark.

Walther PPS M2 (November 2018 recall).

Walther Arms recalled certain PPS M2 pistols on the ground that "under certain conditions it is possible that some of these pistols may fire when dropped." A Part 1 item 4 striker-sensitivity matter, disclosed by the manufacturer rather than driven by verdict. Cite it when the defense argues that no reputable striker-pistol manufacturer has ever conceded a drop-fire risk.

Four pictures: the money, the install base, the reported volume, and the prevalence read with appropriate caution.

Monetary outcomes

Note the distinction the chart draws. The Taurus figure is an aggregate class settlement fund, not a single plaintiff's recovery; the others are individual verdicts or judgments. Comparing a settlement fund to a single verdict overstates the per-case exposure, and opposing counsel will say so.

Install base

How many of each model are in circulation sets the denominator for any prevalence argument. These are approximate: the P320 family is roughly 3.6 to 4 million civilian guns plus military variants; the Walker-trigger Remington population exceeds five million; the recalled Taurus Millennium run was about one million.

Similarly, there are more Chevrolets on the road than any other car, so we see more Chevy accidents.

Reported incidents and litigation volume

Plotted on a log scale because the magnitudes differ by orders of magnitude. The P320 numbers are recent and growing; the Remington figures reflect decades of complaints and at least two dozen documented deaths; the Taurus Millennium recall was framed around drop-safety risk rather than a published incident count.

Relative prevalence: read with caution

This is the chart the retaining attorney will want and the chart most likely to get an expert in trouble. The bars are floors, not true rates. Reporting is voluntary and incomplete, definitions of an incident differ across sources, and the real denominator, guns actually in service rather than total sold, is unknown.

The arc of the litigation

The same handful of theories recur. Plaintiffs usually plead several together; the matrix shows which have featured prominently in each matter.

Featured prominently in that matter Not prominent

A filled circle means the theory has featured prominently in that matter. Pleadings vary by jurisdiction and case.

What each theory needs from an expert

Design defect.

Most jurisdictions use a risk-utility test, a consumer-expectation test, or both. The expert supplies the feasible alternative design: the transfer bar, the positive firing pin block, the external safety, the redesigned unloading sequence. Show the safer design existed, worked, and was affordable at the time of manufacture.

Failure to warn.

The expert establishes what the maker knew, when, and whether the warning matched the hazard. Recall notices, internal testing, and prior incident logs are the raw material.

Negligence and fraudulent concealment.

These ride on the manufacturer-knowledge timeline. The Remington internal documents and the SIG military-versus-civilian design split are the templates.

The deliverables

A retained expert in these cases typically conducts an investigation or digests the investigative report, creates physical or video demonstrative evidence, expresses the human factors, engineering factors in simple but accurate terms for a lay audience, ensures that the testing and lab work is done according to Daubert standards that can be clearly communicated to a lay audience, produces a written report under the federal disclosure rule or its state equivalent, sits for deposition, and testifies at trial. The report states qualifications, materials reviewed, opinions, the basis for each opinion, and the exhibits.

The engineering analysis

Establish the mechanism.

Identify which one, or ones, of the six defect stories applies and trace the exact part path from rest to discharge.

Inspect the subject firearm.

Document its as-found condition before anything is touched, including any aftermarket modification that adds or defeats a safety.

Test against a standard.

Compare the gun's behavior to the published drop and abusive-handling protocols and to the maker's own specifications.

Identify the feasible alternative.

Name the safer design, show it existed at the time, and quantify its cost and effect.

Reproduction is everything

The single most important lesson from the current docket: courts exclude experts who cannot support their opinion with reliable, repeatable methodology. In the P320 cases, the defense has won exclusions precisely because plaintiff experts could not reproduce an uncommanded discharge under controlled conditions. Build the protocol first. Use instrumented drop fixtures, high-speed video, and documented repetitions. If the event is intermittent, say so honestly and explain the mechanism that makes it intermittent rather than overclaiming a result you cannot repeat on demand.

Human-factors reconstruction

Running parallel to the engineering is the reconstruction of what the user actually did. This is where the causation question is won. The method is disciplined and repeatable, which is what keeps it admissible.

Reconstruct handling at the moment of discharge.

Use the wound path, the physical evidence, the equipment, and the witness record to establish muzzle direction, trigger-finger position, and the administrative state of the gun.

Test each of the four rules against the facts.

Determine, rule by rule, whether it was observed or violated, and state the basis for each finding rather than a conclusion.

Assess foreseeable use and design-induced error.

Ask whether a reasonable, trained user following the available procedure was steered toward the outcome, and whether the design tolerated foreseeable handling.

Separate user causation from firearm causation.

Only after the handling analysis is complete can the expert say whether the discharge is explained by the person, the gun, or the interaction of the two.

The pairing is the product. Engineering shows what the firearm can do; human-factors reconstruction shows what the user did. Causation is the intersection. I work both, credibly and from either chair.

Testing standards to know and name

Industry voluntary standards.

The Sporting Arms and Ammunition Manufacturers' Institute publishes the abusive-mishandling and drop protocols the industry treats as the baseline. Know what they require and where they stop.

State drop-safety requirements.

California's handgun-roster drop test is the most-cited: a primed but inert cartridge, a drop from a fixed height onto a hard surface, in several orientations, with no discharge permitted. It is a useful, concrete yardstick for a jury.

Military testing.

The Army's Modular Handgun System evaluation produced drop and safety data on the P320 platform. The contrast between what the military required and what the civilian gun shipped with is a recurring theme.

Law-enforcement standards.

The National Institute of Justice maintains performance standards for duty firearms that can frame what a reasonable safety baseline looks like.

Evidence preservation: the protocol

Get this in front of the retaining attorney early, because evidence is usually spoiled before the expert ever sees it.

Range safety, range design, and range incidents

Discharge incidents on a shooting range raise a distinct set of questions that combine facility design with handling and supervision. The analysis asks whether the range was designed and run to a recognized safety standard, and whether a given discharge was a handling failure, a supervision failure, or an uncommanded discharge that points back to the firearm.

Range design and layout.

Firing-line geometry, baffles and backstops, downrange and ricochet containment, bay separation, ventilation and lead-exposure controls, unburned powder accumulation mitigation.

Operation and supervision.

Range safety officer presence and duties, posted rules, range commands, shooter-to-supervisor ratios, and whether each was followed at the time of the incident.

Range uncommanded discharges.

The same firearm-defect analysis used elsewhere in this guide, with one advantage: a controlled range setting often preserves witnesses, video, and the firearm itself far better than a street incident, which strengthens both the reconstruction and the testing.

Authored references

Two titles in my Wolf Safety Series bear directly on these matters. These links take you to complete and unabridged online versions of these books.

This section is written for the retaining attorney. It is the strategy layer that sits on top of Parts 1 through 6, and it reflects what the docket, and my work in it, has actually taught over the last two years. The theory of a defect is not enough. Cases are won by matching the right plaintiff to the right fact pattern, choosing the right forum, and locking in the engineering and human-factors record in a form that survives Daubert.

Pick the plaintiff and the fact pattern with care

The Eighth Circuit's Glasscock decision drew a line every plaintiff lawyer now has to respect. A theoretical defect is not an Article III injury. The plaintiffs who move a P320 case forward are the plaintiffs whose pistols actually discharged. Within that set, the strongest fact pattern is a holstered discharge. When the pistol fired while properly holstered, no trigger-finger violation is available to the defense, and the four-rules analysis in Part 2 lines up cleanly on the plaintiff's side. The next strongest pattern is a documented uncommanded discharge on a range or duty environment with witnesses and video. The weakest is a solitary claim without corroboration, on a modified pistol, in an ambiguous handling posture. Recognizing which category the case falls into is the first strategic call.

Beat the Daubert exclusion before it is filed

The single most common way plaintiffs lose a P320 case is expert exclusion. Slatowski, Colwell at the district court level, and several unreported orders all turned on the same finding: the expert opined that a defect caused the discharge without identifying how the pistol went from holstered to fired on this specific gun with this specific holster and this specific ammunition. Guay v. SIG Sauer limited a plaintiff expert whose credentials were in law enforcement without engineering. The playbook that survives is:

Choose the forum with the shield law in mind

New Hampshire's May 2025 statute bars product-liability claims premised on the absence of an external safety, a magazine disconnect, a loaded-chamber indicator, or smart-gun technology. It does not bar a manufacturing-defect claim on a specific pistol, and it does not, on its face, bind courts outside New Hampshire on venue and choice-of-law grounds. The practical response is:

Use state consumer-protection statutes as parallel tracks

The New Jersey Consumer Fraud Act, the Missouri Merchandising Practices Act, the Washington Consumer Protection Act, and their counterparts survive where product-liability preemption or shield laws would not. New Jersey v. SIG Sauer and Schreiber both ride this rail. The theory is not that the pistol is defective in the tort sense; it is that the marketing overstated the pistol's safety while the manufacturer knew about uncommanded discharges. Consumer-protection statutes bring attorney's fees, statutory damages, and, in a state attorney general's hands, mandatory-recall relief. Keep them in every complaint where the elements fit.

Preserve the evidence, then preserve the story

The Part 6 evidence-preservation rules are the floor. On top of them, the winning file needs three things a jury can hold:

A physical timeline of the incident.

The subject firearm as-found, the holster as-worn, the magazine and ammunition, and, where possible, body-cam or duty-belt-cam video. In the Cole trial in Maine, the whole case turned on whether the jury believed the holster interaction the defense described. Reconstruct that interaction before the defense frames it.

A written record of the design choice.

The military-versus-civilian split, the 2017 Voluntary Upgrade materials, the internal drop-test data produced in discovery, and the growing body of independent reports (Michigan State Police, FBI, Washington CJTC). This is the manufacturer-knowledge case. It is the same shape as the Remington internal-document record that won Collins and framed the Model 700 settlement.

A demonstrative that a juror will remember.

The tolerance drawings, the two-lock cutaway, the video of the Sear Movement Test on the subject pistol, and side-by-sides with a tabbed-trigger design or a Glock-style striker safety block. Jurors decide on what they can see.

For defense counsel: what plaintiffs are still doing wrong

Symmetry matters, and the same case audit is available to the defense.

The bottom line

Two years ago, the P320 docket was a scattered set of individual cases against a manufacturer that would not concede a defect. Today, the mechanism is described in the public record, two verdicts have been affirmed against SIG's core positions, a state attorney general is seeking a mandatory recall, and one federal appellate court has said a jury can find causation on common sense. Two other rulings, Glasscock on standing and the New Hampshire shield law on design-defect claims, mark the outer bounds of what plaintiffs can attempt. Cases are won inside those bounds, with a real plaintiff, a testable pistol, a two-expert team, and a forum chosen with the shield law in mind.

Most child firearm injuries trace back to one failure: a gun a child could reach. Guns and unsupervised children don't mix, and the fix is the same standard that holds up in any safe-handling analysis.

A curious child can find a gun in seconds, and a child can't tell a real firearm from a toy. Secure storage removes the access that almost every one of these cases turns on.

Hiding isn't securing

A high shelf, a sock drawer, or the top of a closet isn't storage. Children climb, they explore, and they know the hiding spots better than you think. The only thing that stops access is a lock the child can't open.

The secure storage standard

Choosing a method

What the failure costs

When a child reaches an unsecured gun, the result is measured in seconds and it can't be undone. Secure storage is tied to lower rates of firearm injury and death among young people. It's the single most effective thing a gun owner can do.

Teach children what to do

Storage is the first defense. A child who knows what to do if a gun ever turns up is the second.

Common questions

Lawyers who read this guide sometimes ask the natural next question: is there a striker-fired pistol with a clean record, and if not, what should I carry?

The honest answer starts with what the record actually shows. Every popular striker-fired platform in the United States has, at some point, been the subject of a reported unintentional discharge, a lawsuit, a warning bulletin, or a recall. That is not the same as saying every pistol is equally likely to fire when it should not. It is a statement about what public records contain. On a large enough install base, and with enough time in the field, incidents surface. A pistol with no incidents on the record is usually a pistol with a small install base, not a pistol with a superior design.

What the litigation and recall record shows, model by model

The picture below is limited to what is in the public record: reported unintentional discharges, filed cases, manufacturer notices, and recalls. Absence of a public-record entry is not proof of a superior design. A newer model with a smaller install base will always show fewer entries than a mature model that has been in service for decades. The record is a floor, not a ceiling.

1. Glock 17, 19, 21, 22, 23, 26, 43, and their variants. The most-litigated striker-fired platform in the country. Chavez v. Glock, involving a Glock 21, settled on the eve of trial in Los Angeles after an appellate panel held the trigger and safety design were jury questions. Oglesbee v. Glock, a Tenth Circuit case decided in 2024 on a modified pistol, affirmed summary judgment on failure-to-warn grounds rather than on a finding that the platform is drop-safe in every configuration. Bunce v. Glock, filed in Vermont in 2023 over a Glock 26, proceeds on the theory that a light-triggered pistol without a grip safety or manual safety is defective when marketed for home defense. The Spence class action against Glock in the early 2000s alleged a firing-pin-safety defect on models manufactured between 1986 and 1997. Every Glock model shares the same basic Safe Action trigger and lacks a manual safety in its standard configuration.
2. SIG P320, in every variant, including the M17, M18, and X-series. The subject of Part 3 of this guide. The core theory across the pleadings, adopted in the Georgia and Philadelphia verdicts and reinstated by the Second Circuit in Colwell, is that the pistol can discharge without a trigger pull under conditions the carrier did not create. Cole v. SIG Sauer, tried in the District of Maine in July and August of 2026, produced a defense verdict on all three questions. New Jersey's Chancery Division suit seeks a state-level recall.
3. Smith and Wesson M&P Shield, all generations manufactured before August 19, 2013. A Smith and Wesson safety alert identified a trigger-bar-pin condition that could defeat the drop safety on Shields built before that date. The company's alert instructed owners to stop using the pistol until inspected. The condition was corrected in later production.
4. Smith and Wesson M&P Shield EZ, certain serial-numbered pistols. A 2026 Smith and Wesson recall covers a hammer-and-sear condition that can, with the grip safety depressed, ignite a round when the slide is released or cause a follow-on discharge as the slide cycles. The company describes the condition as limited to two hammers, but the recall is on the record.
5. FN FNS and FN 509, original striker assembly. FN America revised the striker after a slide-press condition was reported that could defeat the striker safety. Pistols in the field with the original striker are the ones with the corner case; owners who accepted the free upgrade to the redesigned striker have generally reported no further issues.
6. CZ P-10 pistols with the firing-pin-safety assembly installed in reverse orientation. A factory-assembly error on some early P-10s left the firing-pin-safety spring installed backward, defeating the block. Owners had to inspect and correct the orientation. The base design passes standard drop tests when assembled correctly.
7. Ruger Mark IV manufactured before June 1, 2017. A safety-lever mid-position defect prompted a full recall. Serial numbers begin with "401" for 2017 production and "WBR" for 2016. The condition is a hybrid of striker-era and hammer-era mechanics; it is on the record as one of the cleaner recall responses in the industry.
8. Walther PPS M2, subject to the November 2018 recall. The company's own language stated that "under certain conditions it is possible that some of these pistols may fire when dropped." That is the exact concession plaintiffs in P320 matters have sought and not obtained.
9. FMK 9C1 with the original Fast Action Trigger, subject to the 2013 recall. A drop-fire condition was cured by a retrofit to the "316" Elite Trigger.
10. HK VP9 and P30 SK. No manufacturer recall has been issued for either model. Isolated unintentional-discharge reports appear in owner forums and range incidents, but no reported case has produced a verdict against HK on a striker-fired platform in the United States. The install base is smaller than Glock or M&P, and the record is correspondingly thinner. HK's operator's manual states, in the same language every manufacturer uses, that the pistol has no manual safety and will fire if the trigger is pulled with a round in the chamber.
11. Walther PDP, all sizes. No manufacturer recall has been issued for the PDP itself. The line is relatively new to the U.S. market, and the record is thinner than on older platforms.
12. Springfield XD, XD-M, and XD-S with grip safety. No manufacturer recall on the striker mechanism. The presence of a grip safety on this line puts the XD family in a different category from most striker-fired pistols, because the pistol will not fire when the grip safety is not depressed.
13. Taurus GX4. Discussed in Part 3. A 2023 safety notice covers certain serial numbers that can discharge when dropped. A class action continues, alleging deaths and an inadequate, non-recall response.
14. Taurus Millennium, PT-111, PT-132, PT-138, PT-140, PT-145. Discussed in Part 3. The 2018 settlement covered approximately one million pistols and about $239 million in relief.

The pattern across the model list is not that a single design is universally unsafe. It is that every striker-fired pistol, at some point in its production life, has been shown to have a corner case in which the pistol can fire when the carrier did not intend it. Some corner cases involve dropped pistols. Some involve trigger-guard intrusions from holster material or foreign objects. Some involve assembly errors. Some involve upgrades that improved the platform. What none of them show is that a striker-fired pistol without a manual safety, carried in a nylon or damaged holster, is as tolerant of a mistake as a hammer-fired DA/SA pistol or a modern revolver.

Design features that add mechanical margin, by model

For a carrier who wants more mechanical margin than a bare striker-fired pistol provides, the features that matter are known, and each is available in specific production models today. Each feature adds a layer that has to fail before the pistol can fire.

1. Manual thumb safety, striker-fired. The Smith and Wesson M&P 2.0 thumb-safety variants, the Springfield XD-M Elite OSP with thumb safety, the Walther PDP with manual safety, the Ruger Security-9 thumb-safety variant, and the Smith and Wesson M&P Shield Plus with thumb safety. A manual safety is the only feature that reliably prevents a trigger-guard intrusion from firing a striker-fired pistol.
2. Grip safety, striker-fired. The Springfield XD, XD-M, and XD-S line. The grip safety requires a firing grip before the pistol can fire, which addresses child-access and pocket-carry scenarios directly. The Springfield XD line is the only mainstream striker-fired platform that ships with a grip safety as a standard feature.
3. Grip safety, hammer-fired. The Smith and Wesson M&P Shield EZ (subject to the 2026 recall discussed above, but the design category still applies to corrected pistols) and every 1911 pattern pistol. The 1911 grip safety, combined with a manual thumb safety and a series-80 firing-pin block on many production models, is the most-redundant defensive-handgun safety package in production.
4. Heavier and longer first-shot trigger, DA/SA. The SIG P226, P229, and P239 in DA/SA configuration; the Beretta 92FS, 92X, and PX4 Storm; the CZ 75B, 75 SP-01, and 75 Compact; the HK P30, P30SK, USP, and USP Compact; and the Ruger P-series legacy models. A double-action first pull typically runs about ten to twelve pounds and travels farther than a striker-fired trigger. That travel and weight is the resistance a carrier is buying.
5. Decocker. Standard on the SIG P226, P229, P239, and P226 X-Series in DA/SA; on the Beretta 92FS (safety and decocker) and 92G (decock-only); on the HK P30 and USP in variants two, three, and seven; and on the Walther PPQ Classic and P99. The decocker returns the pistol to a long double-action first pull after firing, without asking the carrier to lower a hammer over a live round.
6. Single-action pistol with a manual thumb safety. The 1911 in every current production form, including the Springfield TRP and Prodigy, the Staccato P and Staccato 2011 pistols, the Kimber Custom II, the Colt Government and Commander, the Wilson Combat CQB, the SIG 1911, and the Smith and Wesson Performance Center 1911. Carried cocked and locked in a rigid holster, a 1911 requires the thumb safety to be swept, the grip safety to be depressed, and the trigger to be pulled before the pistol can fire.
7. Modern double-action-only revolver. The Smith and Wesson J-frame family, including the Model 442, 642, 638, and 340PD; the Ruger LCR and LCRx; the Colt King Cobra Carry; and the Kimber K6s. Long, heavy trigger pull. No external safety and no striker. Shrouded or bobbed hammers on the pocket-carry variants will not snag on clothing. The mechanical simplicity of a modern revolver has produced the smallest litigation footprint of any defensive handgun category.

What that means in practice

An attorney who carries a striker-fired pistol is not making an unsafe choice, so long as the holster fully covers the trigger guard, is rigid enough that nothing can press the trigger through the holster wall, and is inspected regularly for wear, foreign material, and holster-body deformation. The Safariland and SIG holster bulletins in the P320 matters, and the Goodrich holster verdict against a Pennsylvania State Police holster, are the record on what happens when a holster fails a striker-fired pistol.

An attorney who wants more mechanical margin, either because of the professional exposure that comes with carrying while handling client matters or because of a household with children, has fact-based options. A Beretta 92FS or SIG P229 in DA/SA with a decocker, a 1911 such as a Springfield TRP or Wilson Combat CQB carried cocked and locked in a rigid holster, or a Smith and Wesson 642 or Ruger LCR revolver each carry meaningfully more mechanical protection against a trigger-guard intrusion than a striker-fired pistol without a manual safety.

The safest carry pistol, in the record, is not a specific model. It is a pistol whose trigger cannot be reached by anything other than the carrier's finger, holstered in a rigid holster that has been inspected, on a carrier who has trained to keep the finger off the trigger until the sights are on the target and the decision to fire has been made. Every feature discussed above is a supplement to those habits, not a substitute for them.

Public reporting and records consulted for the figures in this guide. Verify the current status of any active matter before relying on it in a filing.

1. SIG P320 litigation statusVerdicts, class certification, and agency actions: contemporaneous legal-news and trade coverage, 2024 to 2026.
2. Glasscock v. SIG Sauer, 8th Cir. No. 25-2707 (July 16, 2026)Class certification vacated for lack of Article III standing. Opinion at FindLaw; parties' releases at PR Newswire.
3. Colwell v. SIG Sauer, 2d Cir. (May 28, 2026)Reinstating a Troy, N.Y. police detective's design-defect claim tied to a holstered discharge. Reuters coverage at reuters.com; Bloomberg Law summary at news.bloomberglaw.com.
4. New Jersey v. SIG Sauer, Essex Cty. Ch. Div., ESX-C-000217-25 (filed Oct. 16, 2025)Complaint hosted at the New Jersey Attorney General's Office; Reuters coverage at reuters.com; July 2026 remand-recommendation coverage at Legal Newsline.
5. Schreiber v. SIG Sauer, W.D. Wash. No. 2:25-cv-02303 (filed Nov. 17, 2025)Class complaint hosted at ClassAction.org.
6. New Hampshire HB 172, firearm shield law (signed May 23, 2025)Coverage from New Hampshire Public Radio.
7. Washington State Criminal Justice Training Commission P320 report (February 2025)Available as a PDF from the state's Criminal Justice Training Commission.
8. FBI Ballistic Research Facility and Michigan State Police findingsSummarized at Outdoor Life.
9. Public teardown and mechanism analysisP320 tolerance and two-lock architecture at Workman Firearms and Modern Engineering Marvels.
10. SIG P320 install baseManufacturer fact sheet and public-radio reporting, 2024 to 2025 (roughly 3.6 to 4 million sold; military variants additional).
11. Remington Model 700 Walker fire controlClass-action filings, the 1994 Collins verdict, the nationwide settlement and trigger-replacement program, and national television investigation.
12. Taurus Millennium series2018 settlement of approximately $239 million and recall of about one million pistols.
13. Taurus GX42023 safety notice, expanded serial-number list, and 2026 class action.
14. Bryco / Jennings Model 38Maxfield v. Bryco, approximately $24 million judgment (2003), affirmed on appeal (2005), and the subsequent bankruptcy.
15. Ruger old-model single actionsThe 1973 New Model transfer-bar redesign and the free conversion program.
16. Colt 1911 Series 70 and Series 80Firing pin block design and the Swartz alternative.

Authored works

Wolf Safety Series, by Steve Wolf: Firearms Safety On Set and The Smart Citizen's Guide to Concealed Carry.

Contact

Steve Wolf  |  wolf.steve@gmail.com  |  (512) 653-9653  |  SteveWolfExpertWitness.com

If you need a link to a printable version of this guide, click here.

Expert Witness in Human Factors, Firearms, and On-Set Safety

Steve Wolf is a nationwide firearms and safety expert witness, retained by plaintiff and defense counsel in civil and criminal matters. In more than thirty-five years of hands-on work he has built a record of thirty-one retentions and thirty-one wins, including a $66.5 million New Mexico verdict that ranks among the largest personal injury verdicts in the state's history. His cases span shootings, gun ranges, and accidental discharge; pyrotechnics, fire, and explosions; wildfire and property loss; stunts, rigging, and aerial work; on-set and theatrical accidents; climbing gyms and ropes courses; and related safety matters.

Wolf's command of on-set firearm safety placed him at the center of the public analysis of the Rust shooting, the 2021 incident on the New Mexico set of the Alec Baldwin film in which cinematographer Halyna Hutchins was killed and director Joel Souza was injured. Engaged to examine the incident, he laid out how a single-action revolver discharges, why trigger-finger discipline is decisive, and where the production's safety practices broke down. His assessment was sought by national outlets including CNN, Fox News, and CBS, and it drew on his earlier work investigating movie-set shootings, among them the 1993 death of Brandon Lee. The Rust analysis is the central question of this guide in its starkest form: whether the firearm discharged on its own or a person's handling caused it.

Attorneys retain Wolf because he makes complex cases clear to a jury. He pinpoints the preventable failure, explains causation in plain language, ties conduct to accepted safety standards, builds demonstratives jurors remember, and holds his ground under cross-examination.

His expertise rests on decades in film special effects and firearms work, eleven patents, and a long record of firearms instruction and on-set safety supervision. He is the author of the Wolf Safety Series, including Firearms Safety On Set and The Smart Citizen's Guide to Concealed Carry.

Steve Wolf  |  wolf.steve@gmail.com  |  (512) 653-9653  |  SteveWolfExpertWitness.com