I happened to be watching the news that day.
I’ve been unable to find those studies, however, I recall well the time a Las Vegas police officer was pointing at a guy on the ground that her partner was handcuffing and she had an ND. (He, too, advocated for keeping your finger off the trigger.) When I was training a few years ago with a former Chicago SWAT operator (and IDPA shooting champion) with a heck of a lot of experience pointing guns at people, much more than my aforementioned friend, he said that there were studies that showed that under stress a person will involuntarily tighten both their grip and feet. Therefore time, albeit very minimal and almost without comparison anyway, isn’t worth the risk. That’s about the same for both shooters-the one with his finger already staged on the trigger and the one with his finger off the trigger and in the index position. Assuming you’re already pointing the gun center mass, the delay, if any, has to do with the time it takes a shooter to make the decision to shoot the thought goes from the brain, through the brain stem and to the trigger finger. The difference is almost without comparison. With the finger on the trigger, it takes about the same fraction of the second to pull the trigger. Seriously? It takes a nanosecond to move the finger from the frame of the weapon to the trigger. Time was the biggest factor in the debate. This shooter, who I’m choosing to not identify, said this to me: “You and I both know that although we get taught to stay in the index position, in reality, we’ll keep our finger on the trigger.” In all my experience, and in working with everyone from LAPD SWAT to tier I Special Operations personnel, I had never met anyone who would even debate this issue. “Don’t move!”) or just pointing a gun at a person that you may have to shoot but haven’t decided to shoot yet. Everybody knows to keep your finger off the trigger when giving commands (e.g. Honestly, like I said, with my friend’s background and experience, I was shocked that this was even a debate. I’ve pointed my gun at plenty of people under stressful circumstances too. My background in tactical firearms training, including time spent in the military, as a private security contractor, on a SWAT team and as an undercover Federal Air Marshal, also gave me some considerable weapons handling experience. That said, because of his background, I was totally shocked he would even suggest such a thing as resting his finger on the trigger when pointing at someone he hasn’t decided to shoot. In fact, with his military and law enforcement background, I was confident he had pointed a gun at people before, although I can’t be sure how often. My friend’s position, on the other hand, was to rest the finger on the trigger just in case he had to shoot.Īs I recall this shooter held a master or grandmaster rank in the USPSA and IPSC competitive shooting, so he didn’t lack gun handling experience. My stance was to keep the finger off the trigger until I’ve made the conscious decision to shoot.
The index position, of course, is keeping the trigger finger straight and off the trigger and outside the trigger guard, ideally resting on the frame of the weapon. A few years ago, a seasoned shooter and I had a small debate about keeping one’s trigger finger on the trigger when pointing at a “bad guy” or keeping the finger in the index position.