Whipped Cream Difficulties

Last August, I noted an LAT article about allegations that LAPD SWAT members were purchasing specially made and marked LAPD SWAT Kimber pistols at a steep discount and reselling them on the open market. At that time, it was unclear if this violated any regulations or laws; LAPD conducted one investigation, which was badly botched, and had just started a second investigation when the LAT ran their report.

Today’s update: the investigation has expanded to include LAPD’s Special Investigative Section (SIS), who also had custom Kimber pistols made for them. And the FBI is involved.

…the company unveiled a new edition of its model 1911 pistol that had been designed for officers in the Special Investigations Section. The weapons were emblazoned with the SIS insignia, and the company made the .45-caliber handgun to address specific requests made by SIS officers. The guns, for example, were lighter than those typically carried by LAPD officers and could be cocked and fired with one hand, in case the other was injured or otherwise unavailable.

Yeah, I remember the Kimber SIS guns. I thought they were kind of neat looking, but:

1. I need another .45 like I need another hole in my head. Not that that stops me from looking and drooling, but
2. I already have one Kimber (from prior to 2000), and…
3. This was the period when I heard bad things about Kimber’s quality control, especially on the smaller guns. (I understand the person who was in charge at Kimber during this time has since left and gone over to Sig Sauer. I don’t know if Kimber’s QC has gotten any better.)

Kimber appears to no longer sell the SIS gun. However, it continues to sell another version of the pistol that it says on its website is “identical to the pistol carried by LAPD® SWAT.”

Yeah, see my previous entry for more details on the LAPD SWAT gun. As for the SIS gun, here’s an example from GunBroker. N.B.: I am not the person selling this, I have no connection to that person, and the GunBroker link is for illustrative purposes.

Andrea Ordin, president of the L.A. Police Commission, which oversees the LAPD, declined to discuss the specifics of the investigation but said the decision to alert federal authorities was probably made because they would be better qualified than LAPD investigators to assess whether any of the country’s often arcane, complicated gun laws had been violated.

I’m sorry. Did the LAT, which has been calling for more gun control, just refer to Federal gun laws as “arcane” and “complicated”?

And here’s a small note that amuses me: this month’s American Handgunner (July/August 2013) has an article on the new LAPD SIS gun: the Glock 30S, which was custom built for LAPD SIS, but:

Good news travels fast, however, and it wasn’t long before members of a federal law enforcement agency caught a glimpse of the unique gun and requested a run for their agency as well. Convinced they were definitely onto something, Glock’s plan for a small run of off-catalog guns soon evolved into a plan to make the gun available as a standard model — the G30S.

More from the Glock website. I suspect this won’t be quite as controversial as the Kimber, only because Glock seems to have eschewed adding the “SIS” logo to the slide.

(And is there anyone out there who can explain to me why Glock’s .380 pistols are law enforcement only?)