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Comment by pengaru | Hacker News Reader

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...

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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.

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?

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.

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