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Comment by giantg2 | Hacker News Reader

"She suspects that given Paul’s military training, he would never have chosen the .22 caliber pistol, meant for small game, Zodiac used at Lake Herman Road"

Sure, smart people aren't choosing .22s for combat, but as a purely offensive weapon it can be an option. The military has used supressed Ruger .22s for sentry elimination.

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I was going to make a similar comment. The .22 pistol is a very traditional weapon for killing someone with a minimum of noise.

While people have the impression that it is for small game, a surprising number of people are in fact murdered with .22. It is effective in the hands of someone that knows how to use it.

Does that imply it was used by someone who knows how to use it?

Not necessarily. She implied that a military person wouldn't use it because they would know it isn't effective due to a preconceived notion that it is ineffective against a person. That part is flatly false, since some military personnel would be familiar with its effective military use. As other people have mentioned, a suppressed .22 (Beretta, Buckmark, et al) were standard military weapons for covert ops for a long time. Even without suppression, they are pretty quiet as firearms go.

That isn't to say this guy knew how to use it, just that there are some people who could use a .22 pistol to great effect. The use of a .22 doesn't preclude competency with firearms.

The theory in this article is that the guy was about to abuse his daughter to death over an argument about drug use/dating, then changed his mind last minute and went to kill some random youths in a local dating spot instead. If it was an impulsive thing, presumably he didn't necessarily have time to choose the gun-enthusiast optimal weapon.

From the profile, he seems like the type of guy who would have stewed on what gun he would use to kill clandestinely in his free time. I mean he carried a pistol in each pocket on a daily basis.

> I mean he carried a pistol in each pocket on a daily basis.

And weren't they supposedly .22s?

I think it implies the killer either knew what he was doing, and chose the .22 because it would be quieter, or the killer did not know what he was doing, because the smaller bullet would be less lethal.

.22 is a great choice too if you want to remain quiet. Subsconic .22 rounds + something as simple as an oil filter can make for a ridiculously quiet gun.

Also small. Story notes he carried a pistol in each pocket.

Also her argument abt bow and arrow being a challenge could extend to a small caliber pistol.

Why would a bow even be a challenge at a shorter range? The whole line of reasoning makes no sense to me.

I thought the primary reason .22s were undesirable was because rim-fire is unreliable [0], and center-fire necessitates a larger caliber shell simply for packaging reasons.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centerfire_ammunition#Advantag...

While generally true, it's mostly a QA issue with mass produced rounds. Even high quality mass produced rounds rarely have this issue (see the Olympics, etc). Even if you did have the issue, it wouldn't be catastrophic since you're using it by surprise and against unarmed targets. As someone else mentioned, they may have carried more than one gun.

.22 rimfire has roughly 20-35% of the energy of 9mm, even at the muzzle.

I don't even know the terminal ballistics, got to be even worse.

Rimfire is also less reliable, although not nearly as unreliable as some people act like.

I wouldn't want to bet my life on it, but I would definitely consider it a viable choice in a scenario where a person is murdering unarmed civilians.

They are also unreliable for use in semiautomatic weapons, because they lack consistency in the force needed to eject the casing and chamber a new round.

You don't care much about that if you use ie 10-shot .22 revolver. You can't suppress it that well though.

The other thing is, revolver doesn't leave empty shell around (unless you intentionally throw it away at that place when reloading). Which is good for assassins, but if in this case shell was found (not familiar with the case) then its probably not this.

This is not usually the case. They can be more finicky, but they can also be reliable when properly set up. Any unreliability would be improper ammo selection or a maintenance issue. For example, competition shooter rarely have this issue (High Standards, 10-22, etc).

Can you name a .22 semi-automatic handgun that doesn't jam?

I can't recall seeing a jam in an ISSF world cup or Olympic rapid fire pistol match. It has probably happened, but definitely not often enough to be a regular appearance. Most competitors are using Pardini SP pistols.

But they are also not shooting Remington Bucket o' Bullets ammo from Wal-Mart. Premium .22 ammo like Eley, SK, or Lapua is far more consistent.

I have a ISSC M22 that doesn't jam if I use the right ammunition for it. Maybe only 1 in 1000 rounds?

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