The Honolulu City Council passed a resolution Wednesday authorizing the Department of the Corporation Counsel to file suit against firearms manufacturer Glock for not taking adequate measures to keep illegal Glock “switches” out of the hands of the public.
Glock switches, also called auto-sears, are devices used to convert semi-automatic firearms into a fully automatic machine gun. As the resolution notes, Glock handguns are designed and manufactured in a way that makes them compatible with the device.
While Glock switches are included in the federal prohibition on machine guns, there have been six federal prosecutions in the state involving the devices, five in Honolulu.
“To be clear, we need to come down on firearms manufacturers who may be acting in dangerous, negligent, and illegal ways,” said Council member Tyler Dos Santos-Tam, who introduced the measure. “‘Glock switches turn handguns into machine guns. Although they are illegal under federal law, they continue to be found in communities across the country, including here in Hawaii. We need to say enough is enough. No one should be able to skirt the law or look the other way when they know their weapons are being used as tools in mass murders.”
The resolution states that the council “believes legal action is warranted to protect the public from these abnormally dangerous weapons and from an unreasonable risk of harm to public health and safety” as well as to “hold Glock accountable for its failure to establish, implement or enforce reasonable controls and for its other knowing violations of state law.”
The authorized legal action, requested by the Corporation Counsel, will seek to prevent further violations and recover unspecified damages, attorneys’ fees and costs and other appropriate relief.
The resolution further authorizes the contracting of attorneys from the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence and Dentons, two law firms with knowledge and expertise in firearms-related litigation, as special deputies corporation council.
The resolution passed with a 6-2 vote, with one member excused.
“Our community deserves to be safe from the type of gun violence that has become all too common in the U.S.,” Dos Santos-Tam said. “Unfortunately, we haven’t been trending in the right direction. On New Year’s Day, an active shooter rampaged across Oahu, shooting two officers. A little over a week prior, a man shot and killed his wife in front of their 8-year-old daughter. That’s why we’ve proposed measures like our game rooms package, which addresses these locations that bring drugs and violence into our residential communities. Public safety has to be our top priority, and we need to be focused on real, tangible action.”