Designer of controversial smart gun quits manufacturing firm

[ScarTissue]

'No compromises': Designer of controversial smart gun quits manufacturing firm

The smart gun, which would only allow its registered owner to fire it, had been touted as response to the moral challenges of the industry.

PUBLISHED : Friday, 15 May, 2015, 1:06am
UPDATED : Friday, 15 May, 2015, 1:06am

The Washington Post

A man holds a prototype of the iP1 smart gun manufactured by Armatix at a German trade show. The gun can only be fired by its owner, who must wear the accompanying watch for it to function.Photo: Reuters

A legendary weapons engineer behind some of the world's most lethal firearms has abruptly left the German company where he developed a controversial smart gun introduced in the US last year, triggering outrage among many pro-gun Americans.

The smart gun, which would only allow its registered owner to fire it, had been touted by Ernst Mauch as his response to the moral challenges of the industry - but was viewed as an affront by some US gun advocates.

In his first interview since he left Armatix several weeks ago Mauch declined to give a reason for his departure, but he hinted at company disagreements.

"I am a man making no compromises," he said from his home in Dunningen, Germany. "I want to walk through my life with a straight and honest backbone."

Executives from the company, which is based near Munich, would not comment on the circumstances of Mauch's departure. Financial records reported to German authorities show Armatix has lost more than €14 million since 2011.

Mauch's separation from the company could present Armatix with a significant setback in its effort to market the world's first smart gun, which has been met with fierce resistance in the United States by gun rights advocates who fear the technology will be mandated. Stores in California and Maryland both cancelled plans to sell the gun after vehement protests.

Mauch, 59, is the designer of several famous high-powered weapons, including the rifle reportedly used by US Special Forces to kill Osama bin Laden. He was seen by Armatix executives and smart gun proponents as a crucial front man for the effort because of his career in arms.

"The idea of a smart gun maker who has lots of experience making guns is intriguing because he's not just some fly-by-night guy trying to do this," Rabbi Joel Mosbacher, a member of a community group pushing manufacturers for better gun safety, told The Washington Post .

In an interview on Wednesday, Mosbacher said: "Certainly we're concerned. But I don't know that it bodes a death knell for the industry. I hope it doesn't."

His group, the Metro Industrial Areas Foundation, is holding a smart gun fair in New York later this month that he said Armatix still planned to attend.

Mauch began developing smart guns late in his career after feeling a sense of guilt that arms he designed had been used in crimes and by children to accidentally kill each other.

"It hurts my heart," he said last year. "It's life. It's the lives of people who never thought they'd get killed by a gun. You have a nice family at home, and then you get killed. It's crazy."

Mauch's solution, the iP1, can be personalised so it only fires if the gun's rightful owner is wearing a special watch connected wirelessly to the weapon.

This was his way of bringing what he called "dumb guns" into the digital age.

"This is the beginning of a new generation of weapons, which makes people think I am crazy," Mauch said.

"Anyone can make a gun or a pistol. But if the potential is here to make it safer, we have to do it. We absolutely must."

However, many in the industry in the US branded him a traitor for pushing the technology.