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The call came just after midnight. Residents report a queue so fast it sounded like a machine gun shot. When the police reached the street, they found shell casings scattered on the sidewalk. A surveillance camera captured the shooter, but the weapon in his hand looked like a regular Glock pistol. On the other side of town, another team is preparing to raid a suspected drug operation. They expect drugs, money, and maybe a few guns. Instead, they'll find weapons straight out of a gangster movie, including something hidden so carefully that a police dog would have to find it.
What should be of more concern to officers? An exotic weapon in a hidden vault or a gun that looks like millions of Americans already own it? If police had to bet on which gun they could recover, the Glock would be a smart choice. This brand is common in civilian ownership and frequently appears among firearms seized and traced by law enforcement. The Glock 17 and the smaller Glock 19 are particularly well-known examples. Both fire the widely available 9mm cartridge. They are light enough for everyday wear, known for their reliability and ease of use. A standard Glock 17 magazine holds 17 rounds, while a Glock 19 typically holds 15. Typically, each pull of the
trigger fires one shot. But if you look closely at the surveillance video, something doesn't fit. The shooter barely pauses between shots. Investigators suspect the gun was equipped with a small illegal device known as a switch. What does this little device change, and why are police departments so concerned about it? Meanwhile, an officer making an unrelated arrest finds a battered pocket pistol in the suspect's jacket. It's tiny, ugly, and looks like it might fall apart if dropped on concrete. It belongs to the loose category of weapons commonly referred to as "Saturday Night Specials." These guns were once infamous enough to become part of American criminal folklore. Compared to a modern service pistol, some of them
seem almost ridiculous. So why have such weapons caused problems with the police for generations? Back at the original crime scene, investigators have an answer regarding the Glock. A trigger is a machine gun conversion device that allows a compatible semi-automatic pistol to fire continuously when the trigger is held down. Depending on the setup, a converted Glock can fire at a theoretical rate of fire of over 1,000 rounds per minute. A standard magazine can be emptied in about a second. The problem is not that a shooter suddenly becomes a skilled shooter. Everything is almost the opposite.
Controlling automatic fire from a light pistol is extremely difficult. Shots can hit parked cars, apartment windows, or houses further down the street. People in danger might not participate in the confrontation at all. Extended magazines can make those lines longer, and conversion devices are so strictly restricted by federal law that the device itself is legally considered a machine gun. Authorities report a sharp increase in the number of seizures of these devices in recent years. Officers who heard the automatic gunshot now understand how something that looked like a regular gun could have produced it. But there is another question. What happens when criminals get their hands on weapons that
were actually designed as submachine guns? During a drug raid, officers move through a building, cataloging cash, suspected drugs and several conventional handguns. Then one of them opens the desk drawer. Inside is the Intratec TEC-9. Its cylindrical receiver, perforated barrel shroud, and enlarged magazine make it look like something a movie villain would carry. In another room, officers discover two compact, box-shaped pistols from the MAC family. The detective in charge immediately recognizes the silhouettes. These firearms became infamous in the 1980s and 90s, when gang violence in Hollywood helped turn them into icons. But there is an important detail that most movies ignore
. Not everything that resembles a machine gun actually fires automatically. Before we get to that, let's look at the small gun found in the jacket. "Saturday Night Special" is not a separate model or manufacturer. This is a broad, often derogatory term for inexpensive, easily concealed handguns. For many years, this designation was applied to small semi-automatic models in.22,.25, or.32 caliber, as well as to cheap revolvers of various types. Some were poorly made, others worked great, and this category was never really accurate. A well-made 38 Special snub-nosed revolver may be small enough to fit in your pocket, but that doesn't automatically make it cheap or unreliable.
These short-barreled revolvers became famous through detective stories and gangster films, and were also carried by plainclothes police officers and civilians. Their compact size was more important than their impressive ammunition capacity. This is a real problem for the police. An inexpensive pocket pistol may only hold a few rounds, but it can still kill. It can also be difficult to spot unless someone points it out. Police officers cannot assume that a suspect is unarmed simply because they do not see a full-sized gun. And criminals don't buy weapons from one neat catalog. Some are stolen, some pass through illegal gun trafficking networks, and others are regular commercial firearms seized from legal possession. This
explains why evidence storage rooms can hold everything from old Browning Hi-Powers to modern Sig Sauers, vintage revolvers, and the occasional huge Desert Eagle. The most dangerous weapon is not necessarily the most common. Sometimes the most dangerous weapon is the one that no one has noticed. Returning during the raid, the dog suddenly starts rustling at the bottom of the closet. His dog handler finds a hidden compartment behind a panel with a heavy canvas bag wedged inside.
The officer unzips the zipper, looks at it, and calls the rest. The bag contains three weapons with folding stocks and magazines threaded through the pistol grips. For now, the officers are putting them aside. They still need to establish exactly what they found, because appearances can be deceiving. Tech Nine is a great example. Its history began with the Swedish Interdynamic MP9 submachine gun, which failed to win the military customers its developers had hoped for. Redesigned for the American market, it became a semi-automatic pistol, later known as the Tech Nine. It was relatively inexpensive to manufacture and had a distinctive appearance with magazines that could hold far more ammunition than many conventional pistols. But despite its
appearance and reputation, the standard Tech Nine fired one shot per pull of the trigger. MAC pistols had a different origin. Designer Gordon Ingram created compact, economical submachine guns in the 1960s. The MAC-10 used a telescopic slide and a magazine housed in the handle to keep the weapon short. Versions fired 45 ACP or 9mm with an extremely high rate of fire. Its smaller cousin, the MAC-11, fired the 380 ACP even faster. Later, semi-automatic doubles added to some confusion, and officers discovered that their two supposed MAC -10s were actually smaller MAC -11 weapons.
Their exact legal and mechanical status will need to be verified. Both families have gained incredible reputations through films, television, and music. One experienced officer mentions "Miami Police." The junior officers pretend to know what he's talking about. But the most unusual find is still waiting in this bag. The three concealed weapons are Uzis, Israeli submachine guns designed by Uziel Gal and adopted into military service in the 1950s. In contrast to the Tech-9's reputation in the civilian market, the Uzi earned its fame as a practical military weapon, built for durability and reliable performance.
It later became Hollywood shorthand for a well-financed gangster. Find three of them in a secret compartment, and you're tempted to imagine an international cartel operating behind the scenes. There is only one problem with this conclusion. Officers can't tell just by appearance. There are semi-automatic versions and Uzi doubles. True fully automatic instances are much more tightly regulated in the United States. Investigators need to determine exactly what models they are, whether they are functional, and how they got into the building. The dramatic discovery is a clue, not proof of the existence of a specific criminal organization. And this is the main
twist of the entire raid. The weapons that appear most dangerous and that audiences most often associate with crime are not necessarily the ones most often seized by American police. Conventional pistols make up the vast majority of criminal weapons recovered. The Uzi would make impressive photographic evidence, and K9 certainly deserved his award. But while the officers finish packing up the evidence, another patrol responds to another report of shots fired. No exotic submachine gun this time, just a regular pistol, maybe with a tiny illegal switch. And it may be a weapon they have much more reason to fear.
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