ST PAUL, Minn. — Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison is suing gun manufacturer Glock, Inc., claiming the company has known for decades how easily its semi-automatic handguns could be converted to machine guns but has neglected to solve the problem.
Ellison announced the filing of the lawsuit during a press conference Thursday morning.
"Glock has known about this problem for decades and has done nothing a change of design could prevent these handguns from being turned into illegal automatic weapons, but Glock has turned a blind eye, and again and again, the death toll continues to rise," Ellison asserted.
The lawsuit accuses Glock of violating seven Minnesota laws including negligence, consumer fraud, deceptive trading practices, false advertising and product liability.
“Glock’s design, manufacture, and sale of semi-automatic handguns that are easily converted into illegal machine guns, coupled with Glock’s refusal to fix this known hazard, violates Minnesota law and must be stopped," the lawsuit reads.
"We are not asking Glock to stop selling it," Ellison told reporters. "We are asking Glock to change their design of the semi-automatic handguns available to the public so that they cannot be easily converted into illegal machine guns."
Ellison added that the device is currently being purchased online for "as little as $10" and claimed installing one is like "changing a battery on a remote on your television set."
The city of Chicago filed a lawsuit against Glock with similar claims in March of 2024 but Ellison’s lawsuit goes even further against the well-known firearms manufacturer.
Law enforcement has tied the so-called "Glock switch" to a rise in violence across the country, mainly in large urban areas like Minneapolis and St. Paul. Minneapolis police and the Hennepin County Sheriff's Office say they regularly recover firearms equipped with switches and maintain that the devices are sought after for bragging rights as much as they are for their chaotic firepower.
Minneapolis Police Chief Brian O'Hara joined Ellison at his press conference Thursday morning, thanking the attorney general for taking action to hold the gun manufacturer accountable for the harm the chief says has been inflicted on Minnesotans — both civilians and law enforcement.
"We have been prosecuting dozens of people that have been using these, possessing these illegal machine guns, using them in violent crimes, but it's way too easy for others to do the same," O'Hara said.
The chief related a story about one of his officers who was shot by a weapon equipped with a switch on Aug. 11, 2023. O'Hara said officer Jacob Spies was tailing a vehicle that had been linked to a series of robberies when those inside started shooting, firing at least 14 rounds in an instant. The seven-year MPD veteran was shot in the shoulder and survived.
O'Hara then played a video showing what he said law enforcement is "up against" when confronting someone armed with a Glock switch.
"It's not just a problem in Minneapolis or greater Minnesota, as you see, this is a problem for communities, and it's especially a serious officer safety risk for the entire country," O'Hara said.
According to the chief, automatic gunfire hadn't been detected in Minnesota until August of 2020. He said since then, the number of incidents involving automatic gunfire has only continued to rise.
Greg Johnson, whose son Charlie was killed after being struck by automatic gunfire in downtown Minneapolis just hours before graduating from the University of St. Thomas, spoke at the news conference, saying he now feels it's his duty to speak out about the dangers of the Glock switch.
"My job is to take this abstract notion of machine pistol and bring it to life," he said. "So, we have the honor of being the parents that received that call in the middle of the night, the call nobody wants — that our son, who was getting ready for college graduation the next day, had been killed."
Adding, "After that time, we learned how big of a crowd we were among in terms of families, victims, people that had so often the word 'unspeakable tragedy' is used... well, I need to speak about it," Johnson continued. "They're all over this country, and it's not OK to do nothing. There are some common sense things that can be done."
Court documents claim the founder of Glock, Inc., Gaston Glock, marketed his new Glock 17 pistol by installing an auto sear and firing it with fully automatic bursts during a demonstration in Venezuela in 1988. The story comes from Jorge Leon, the inventor of the Fire Selector System, later known as the Glock switch.
“…after firing the pistol in a standard semi-automatic configuration, Mr. Glock paused and quickly attached a small auto-sear device that he had in his pocket to the back of the pistol. Mr. Glock did so by removing the slide back plate on the handgun and inserting the auto sear, and he then proceeded to demonstrate fully automatic fire using the same gun,” the lawsuit says.
KARE 11's Chris Hrapsky spoke with Leon in early 2024 for a deep-dive report on the Glock switch and its current implications. Leon — just 22 when he fabricated the small metal conversion device — said he intended to give military and police units an advantage in counterterrorism but didn’t foresee the internet, 3D printers and bad actors copying his design and illicitly distributing his invention around the world.
"It’s part of the problem right now. I would rather invent any other thing — something less complicated for the future,” Leon shared.
During the interview, the Venezuelan inventor called on Glock to redesign their pistols so switches can't be utilized on future models.
“They can make a change, a quick change, and they can start with a new generation of pistol that does not allow fully auto firing,” said Leon.
The lawsuit filed by Ellison Thursday also accuses Glock of marketing fully automatic pistols as “fun” and easy to customize, without disclosing the illegal nature of machine guns in Minnesota. The attorney general is asking for a jury trial and damages, including ordering Glock to change the design of their semi-automatic handguns, civil penalties, and investigative and legal costs.
"This is a tragedy that we can prevent if we are willing to act, and we should," Ellison said. "And I want to be clear, I'm very proud of the work law enforcement is doing to take the switches off the street and prosecute people who use them. They're doing their job. There's more of the job that can be done to protect lives, stop funerals and allow people to grow up to be who it is that they're here to be."