The city of Chicago has sued the Austrian firearms manufacturer Glock, accusing the gunmaker of knowingly ignoring a design flaw that allows its pistols to be converted into automatic weapons.
According to the lawsuit filed by the City of Chicago Law Department along with Everytown Law and Paul, Weiss, Rifkind, Wharton & Garrison, LLP, the converted weapons are contributing to violence in Chicago.
Despite media coverage of the high rate of violence in Chicago, the city saw a drop in murders and shootings last year. In January, the Chicago Police Department reported there were 617 murders in the city last year, down from 709 in 2022.
The number of shooting victims also dropped from 3,484 in 2022 to 2,883 in 2023. That data does not indicate how often Glock firearms were used in shootings.
"Glocks pistols are the most popular firearm in America. They are also the firearm most favored by criminals, especially in Chicago," the suit said. "Instead of taking reasonable action to put an end to the modification of its pistols by civilians, Glock has made the business decision to continue profiting from the sales of its easily modifiable guns to the civilian market."
Newsweek reached out to Glock via email on Tuesday for comment.
The filing continued: "The result endangers the health and safety of Chicagoans and increases and exacerbates the injuries and death from gun violence—draining the city's public health, safety, investigative, and judicial resources, and causing some city residents to fear using public streets, parks, schools, and transportation."
According to the lawsuit, police officers in Chicago confiscated over 1,100 Glock pistols that had been converted into automatic weapons in the past two years.
The lawsuit acknowledged that "Chicago has long struggled with an epidemic of gun violence," but alleged that "the ease of modification of Glocks and the resulting prevalence of modified Glocks have made the situation worse."
In a press statement, Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson spoke of holding Glock "accountable."
"The City of Chicago is encountering a deadly new frontier in the gun violence plaguing our communities because of the increase of fully automatic Glocks on our streets," Johnson said.
"Selling firearms that can so easily be converted into automatic weapons makes heinous acts even more deadly, so we are doing everything we can in collaboration with others committed to ending gun violence to hold Glock accountable for putting profits over public safety."
Eric Tirschwell, executive director of Everytown Law, echoed some of Johnson's comments while describing the alleged ease with which Glocks can be modified.
"Right now, anyone in the United States with $20 and a screwdriver can convert their Glock pistol into an illegal machine gun in just a few minutes," Tirschwell said in a statement.
"We intend to hold Glock accountable for the unconscionable decision to continue selling its easily modified pistols even though it could fix the problem, knowing that by refusing to do so it is exacerbating gun violence in Chicago."
Update 3/19/2024 3:09 p.m. ET: This story has been updated to include more information.
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