I think you are getting mixed up in the terminology here - a mis-fire is a failure to fire. What I think you mean is an accidental/negligent discharge?
That may or may not have happened with this gun but the defence still needs to show how it could have happened. Lets not forget that the FBI had to physically break the gun in order to get it to discharge without the trigger being depressed. If it already had a fault allowing it to do that then it must be easily identifiable. This is a very simple piece of engineering, after all, and the original parts are still with it.
Yes, you're right, the defence has every right, indeed duty, to test the veracity of the evidence. They still can as the gun and it's parts are available to them. Their problem, as I see it, is this; the defence still needs to present a plausible explanation as to how the gun unintentionally fired. It needs to show exactly what was defective about the gun which allowed it to discharge without the person holding it needing to press the trigger - it must show how that hammer bypassed at least three safety systems from it's full-*advertiser censored* position in order to ignite the cartridge in the chamber.
In order to do that they are going to have to come up with some extremely novel and unusual explanation; there are probably hundreds of videos and articles out there by now explaining how these guns work and how exceptionally unlikely it is that these things go off without pressure on the trigger. I am not aware of a single article, video or expert opinion which offers any plausible scenario in which AB's version of events (that it discharged without pressure on the trigger) could be correct. If anyone has any source to a credible differing opinion I'd be extremely interested to see it.
I don't have a dog in this fight other than wanting to promote the vales of safe firearms use. Honestly, if I could see any way in which this gun could have discharged without the trigger being pressed I'd be the first to shout up.
Moving on and looking at the bigger picture, even if we accept, for the sake of argument, that AB is correct and it did discharge without him pressing the trigger, then that does not absolve him of responsibility in this sorry affair. Accidents with firearms (indeed most things) never happen in a vacuum, they are always a consequence of a chain of events or actions which if one link is broken the accident doesn't take place. He pointed a firearm at someone, that firearm discharged and killed someone and severely wounded another person. Pointing it at someone was unnecessary; he didn't satisfy himself that the gun was unloaded; it was unnecessary to even use a real firearm! These are contraventions of the most basic principles of safe gun handling. The most basic one is not pointing guns at people. That alone makes it extremely unlikely that someone is going to get shot.
I thought it sounded a little odd. Don't they usually go to a Grand Jury first?
