The earsplitting, heart-stopping roar of fully automatic weapons hasn’t been often heard on America’s streets since Congress largely outlawed them in 1934. But now it’s back, owing to a small device that is easily plugged into certain handguns and rifles, converting semiautomatic firearms into guns capable of firing 20 bullets in one second — with one pull of the trigger.

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“It’s incredibly scary,” said Matthew M. Graves, the District’s U.S. attorney, citing the rising number of conversion devices found in the city in recent years. There were 27 guns recovered with the devices in 2021. The number rose to 119 last year, and, as of late October, the number was more than 150, Graves said. Police often find extended magazines attached to the guns, to hold more than the standard 12 or 13 bullets contained in most magazines, and they have even seized round drum magazines, which can hold 50 or more bullets.

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The devices have many names: Switch. Giggle switch. Sear. Auto sear. Conversion device. Glock switch (some of which have Glock’s logo fraudulently printed on them). Even though they are small — switches for pistols are about the size of a playing die — and don’t themselves contain bullets, the devices are considered machine guns by the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, said Craig B. Kailimai, special agent in charge of ATF’s Washington field division.

“That would be illegal,” he said. “The device itself.”

The devices can be made of metal or plastic, and authorities believe some are imported from China and sold on the streets. But 3D printers also have been used to make both the square-shaped switch for pistols and an S-shaped device that slides into guns such as the AR-15 to convert them to fully automatic, Kailimai said. The printing process takes about 45 minutes.

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Under some circumstances, civilians can legally purchase automatic weapons. The conversion switches for both semiautomatic handguns and rifles also can be purchased legally under certain conditions. Both the American military and law enforcement have uses for automatic weapons, so law enforcement officials cannot approach gun manufacturers and ask them to stop making guns that can be easily converted, Kailimai said. Glock officials have said they cannot change the design of their pistol to foil the switches.

The ATF said it recovered more than 5,400 illegal switches between 2017 and 2021, a 570 percent increase from the preceding five years. In both pistols and rifles, the switch works by blocking the mechanism in the gun that requires a trigger pull before each shot. With a switch in place, one trigger pull can fire the weapon until it is out of ammunition.

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“There is absolutely no reason or no room for our suspects to be armed like this,” Houston Police Chief Troy Finner said at a news conference. He showed body-camera footage of the fatal shooting of Jeffrey. “This is a threat that is here, and it’s a threat to everybody — law enforcement and citizens in every neighborhood in our community.”

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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/other/with-conversion-switch-devices-machine-guns-return-to-u-s-streets/ar-AA1l5j3N

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