Street reports

American Handgunner, March-April, 2006 by Massad Ayoob

Velocity measurement is one piece of the puzzle. Shooting ballistic gelatin supplies another piece. The most important piece, many working cops believe, is feedback from the street in actual shootings.

In this dimension, the .357 SIG excels. State police agencies are a bellwether of what cops are using overall. The state police of Connecticut, Delaware, Texas, Rhode Island and Virginia adopted SIG pistols chambered for this cartridge. New Mexico and Tennessee state troopers are issued Glock pistols in this caliber. North Carolina troopers all wear the Beretta Cougar 8357 in .357 SIG. That's over 16 percent of state-police agencies. It's far more than the number still mandating the 9mm cartridge. It's slightly more statepolice departments than standardize on the .45, putting the .357 SIG second behind the ubiquitous .40 S&W cartridge from which it was adapted.

While moderately successful in popularity, the .357 SIG has been hugely successful in actual field actions. The 125gr. Gold Dot has dropped more than a dozen felons in front of the Sig Pro pistols issued by Richmond, Virginia PD. The same load is in use with Virginia State Police, who report delightedly that felons seem to drop even to non-fatal hits from this powerful round. The deep penetration seen in gelatin has not translated into danger to bystanders as feared early on; Richmond PD tells me the expanded bullets are generally found in the perpetrator's body, in his clothing, or on the ground near where he fell.

The early case neck separations with .357 SIG I and other elements of the firearms press reported, were seen primarily with Remington-UMC and StarLine, rarely with Speer or Winchester, and never to my knowledge with Federal. In any case, this problem seems to be a thing of the past as the ammo industry has made itself more familiar with this increasingly popular police cartridge.