Mass Shooting in Birmingham Sheds Light on Public Safety Crisis Across the Country: DIY Machine Guns Continue to Devastate American Communities

A mass shooting occurred Saturday evening near the campus of the University of Alabama at Birmingham, which resulted in the killing of four people and wounding of at least 17 others with a weapon law enforcement suspect was outfitted with a machine gun conversion device.

This shooting highlights that when Alabama lawmakers repeatedly fail to pass common sense gun safety laws, including regulations that prohibit rapid fire conversion devices, like auto-sears—often referred to as “Glock switches”— our communities are left to pay the price.

“Machine gun conversion devices, including the Glock switch used to carry out this tragedy, have long been used by criminals to bridge the gap between hard-to-acquire machine guns and readily available semi-automatic weapons,” said Nick Suplina, Senior Vice President for Law and Policy at Everytown for Gun Safety. “These small parts are showing up at more and more crime scenes around the country, with devastating consequences. Gun industry giants have a duty to step up and prevent their guns from being so easily manipulated.” 

What We Know About Auto-Sears and Glock Switches

Police believe the shooters Saturday used an illegal machine gun conversion device, often referred to as a “Glock switch,” the department said in its Sunday news release. 

“Glock switches” are cheap, small devices – roughly the size of a quarter – that allow pistols to fire up to 1,200 rounds per minute, a rate as fast as, or faster than, many fully automatic machine guns used by the United States military. These devices pose a particular threat to law enforcement officers. Glock switches have been used in shootings that injured or killed law enforcement officers across the country, including in Mississippi, Texas, and Colorado. 

Yesterday, Alabama House Democrats, Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin, and HB 26 Republican co-sponsors including Rep. Treadaway have all responded to the atrocity with the need to pass a bill to regulate these deadly conversion devices. HB 26 has bipartisan support, and is sponsored by Rep. Ensler (D) and co-sponsored by Reps. Treadaway (R), Bedsole (R), Hendrix (D), Reynolds (R). Last session, lawmakers came close to passing this legislation, but the legislative session ended before it could get across the finish line. The deadly shooting in Birmingham is a crucial reminder that lawmakers must take action to get these dangerous, DIY machine guns off of our streets.

Police are also adamant supporters of regulating Glock switches due to the significant community safety risk posed by such machine gun conversation devices. Before the tragedy this past Saturday, there have been multiple previous mass shootings across Alabama using these devices, including at a dance studio, at a New Year’s Eve party, and in a convenience store.

The Alabama Law Enforcement Agency, District Attorneys Association, Sheriffs Association, Fraternal Order of Police, and Alabama Big 10 Mayors support legislation to regulate Glock switches at the state level.

Multiple Republican-led states have already passed such legislation, including Mississippi, where Governor Reeves signed legislation last year to ban devices that convert semi-automatic firearms into machine guns. Earlier this year, Virginia Republican Governor Yougkin signed similar legislation into law.

What We Know About Alabama’s Weak Gun Laws

Alabama has some of the weakest gun laws in the nation –Alabama has the 3rd-highest societal cost of gun violence in the US at $1,654 per person each year. Gun deaths and injuries cost Alabama $8 billion, of which $433 million is paid by taxpayers. Guns are the leading cause of death among children and teens in Alabama.

What We Know About Mass Shootings in America

According to the Gun Violence Archive, the shooting in Birmingham was the 404th mass shooting of the year in the U.S.

Remembering the Victims

Police identified the four people killed as Anitra Holloman, 21; Tahj Booker, 27; Carlos McCain, 27; and Roderick Lynn Patterson Jr., 26.

About National Efforts to Get Glock Switches Off Our Streets and Hold Glock Accountable

When it comes to the crisis of “Glock switches” on our streets and in our communities, there is no question that the gun manufacturer Glock holds the greatest burden of responsibility for the proliferation of DIY machine guns across the country. Even though Glock switches are not manufactured by Glock, Glock handguns are uniquely easy to convert into illegal machine guns using Glock switches. Glock has allegedly been aware of this lethal vulnerability for decades but has done nothing to update its pistol design. This is an issue unique to Glock-style pistols: Pistols made by other large manufacturers require extensive engineering beyond the average person’s capabilities to convert their handguns into machine guns, but a Glock handgun can easily be converted into an illegal machine gun with a $25 Glock switch and screwdriver. Glock has been able to profit from this design feature, as the company’s pistols are a go-to for criminals looking to circumvent federal law banning machine guns.

The City of Chicago, represented by Everytown Law, the litigation arm of Everytown for Gun Safety, recently filed suit seeking to hold Glock accountable for the spread of illegal machine guns across the city. Additionally, lawmakers in New York recently introduced historic legislation that would prohibit the future sales in New York of any semi-automatic handguns  — like Glock pistols and their clones — that can be converted into fully automatic machine guns simply by the installation of a Glock switch. Recent legislative efforts to prevent the proliferation of Glock switches have been bipartisan. Just this year, Republican governors in Virginia and Mississippi signed legislation into law to regulate these conversion devices. To date, 24 states across the country have passed laws that ban or regulate Glock switches and similar machine gun conversion devices. 

In March, a coalition of attorneys general from twelve states and Washington, D.C., sent a letter to Glock, calling on the company to preserve documents related to its pistols being able to be converted into machine guns, an indication that the states and D.C. may be investigating whether the sale of such easily modifiable guns violates their laws.

If you’re interested in talking to a policy expert or volunteer with the Moms Demand Action chapter in Alabama please reach out to [email protected].