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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-13364365
Met Police to use Jean Charles De Menezes death bullets.
The Metropolitan Police is to issue all its firearms officers with the type of ammunition used to kill Jean Charles De Menezes.
Hollow point bullets flatten and widen on impact, causing maximum damage to vital organs.
The Met says the round is less likely to splinter, harming bystanders.
Mr De Menezes, a Brazillian falsely identified as a suicide bomber, was shot dead in 2005 with hollow point bullets.
'Comprehensive testing'
After it emerged he was killed with the ammunition, cousin Alex Pereira said: "I am shocked and angry. I had no idea.
"How can the police in the UK use bullets that the Army is not allowed to use?"
The ammunition was previously chosen to be used on suspected suicide bombers because it has the best chance of killing them before they can set off a device.
Former US mayor Rudolph Giuliani faced sharp criticism when he tried to bring in the ammunition in New York in the 1990s.
All 3,000 Metropolitan Police firearms officers will now be issued with 9mm hollow point rounds.
Police said the hollow-point bullets had undergone the "most comprehensive" testing process ever undertaken by them.
Commander Jerry Savill, head of the firearms unit, said the research on ammunition would be made available to all other UK police forces but he said it would be up to them which bullets were used.
David Dyson is a barrister and ballistics consultant.
Asked whether the rounds were unsurvivable, he said: "Yes. They don't use these bullets in the anticipation that people will survive.
"They expand, so you get the mushroom effect when the bullet hits the body.
"Much more energy is being imparted into the victim."
From John Farnam:
What Progress!
11 May 11
Magic Bullets in the UK!
In a news article today, the BBC laments that London Metro Police (the few of them who are actually armed) will now be issued "unsurvivable" hollow-point ammunition, "outlawed in warfare under the Hague Declaration in 1899."
As a side note, you won't find the term "hollow-point" anywhere in the 1899 Hague documents. The actual language vaguely describes small-arms bullets which "easily expand." Curiously, during the 1899 debate on the subject, it was in fact, the British themselves who defended the use of such ammunition!
In the often-incorrectly referenced "Geneva Conventions" of 1864, 1906, 1929, and 1949, the subject isn't even mentioned. Those discussions concerned themselves mostly with treatment of prisoners and non-combatants.
"Much more energy is being imparted into the victim," continues the article. Of course, said "victims" are violent criminals, so adored by the media, there and here.
Not a word, of course, about the way this ammunition will make injury to officers, innocent citizens, and bystanders far less likely. After all, who cares about any of them?
Gotta love those Brits! They've now "advanced" from seventy-five years behind-the-times to a mere thirty years behind-the-times.
What's next, shotguns in beat-cars?
/John
http://www.defense-training.com/quips/11May11.html
As for me - Dam. I'm so cutting edge. I've been using hollow point for years...when I upgrade from a flintlock to a cap & ball revolver I may even go to jacketed bullets!
Met Police to use Jean Charles De Menezes death bullets.
The Metropolitan Police is to issue all its firearms officers with the type of ammunition used to kill Jean Charles De Menezes.
Hollow point bullets flatten and widen on impact, causing maximum damage to vital organs.
The Met says the round is less likely to splinter, harming bystanders.
Mr De Menezes, a Brazillian falsely identified as a suicide bomber, was shot dead in 2005 with hollow point bullets.
'Comprehensive testing'
After it emerged he was killed with the ammunition, cousin Alex Pereira said: "I am shocked and angry. I had no idea.
"How can the police in the UK use bullets that the Army is not allowed to use?"
The ammunition was previously chosen to be used on suspected suicide bombers because it has the best chance of killing them before they can set off a device.
Former US mayor Rudolph Giuliani faced sharp criticism when he tried to bring in the ammunition in New York in the 1990s.
All 3,000 Metropolitan Police firearms officers will now be issued with 9mm hollow point rounds.
Police said the hollow-point bullets had undergone the "most comprehensive" testing process ever undertaken by them.
Commander Jerry Savill, head of the firearms unit, said the research on ammunition would be made available to all other UK police forces but he said it would be up to them which bullets were used.
David Dyson is a barrister and ballistics consultant.
Asked whether the rounds were unsurvivable, he said: "Yes. They don't use these bullets in the anticipation that people will survive.
"They expand, so you get the mushroom effect when the bullet hits the body.
"Much more energy is being imparted into the victim."
From John Farnam:
What Progress!
11 May 11
Magic Bullets in the UK!
In a news article today, the BBC laments that London Metro Police (the few of them who are actually armed) will now be issued "unsurvivable" hollow-point ammunition, "outlawed in warfare under the Hague Declaration in 1899."
As a side note, you won't find the term "hollow-point" anywhere in the 1899 Hague documents. The actual language vaguely describes small-arms bullets which "easily expand." Curiously, during the 1899 debate on the subject, it was in fact, the British themselves who defended the use of such ammunition!
In the often-incorrectly referenced "Geneva Conventions" of 1864, 1906, 1929, and 1949, the subject isn't even mentioned. Those discussions concerned themselves mostly with treatment of prisoners and non-combatants.
"Much more energy is being imparted into the victim," continues the article. Of course, said "victims" are violent criminals, so adored by the media, there and here.
Not a word, of course, about the way this ammunition will make injury to officers, innocent citizens, and bystanders far less likely. After all, who cares about any of them?
Gotta love those Brits! They've now "advanced" from seventy-five years behind-the-times to a mere thirty years behind-the-times.
What's next, shotguns in beat-cars?
/John
http://www.defense-training.com/quips/11May11.html
As for me - Dam. I'm so cutting edge. I've been using hollow point for years...when I upgrade from a flintlock to a cap & ball revolver I may even go to jacketed bullets!
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