Gun jammed. The poor guy probably read a selfdefense thread on the FR and decided to buy an autoloader.
Wheelgun, baby.
... or decided to save a few bucks and bought a .380 Jimenez...
And if it had been determined why it jammed.
One story said it jammed on a spent shell.
So was it a broken extractor, a dirty gun. a short stroke or what?
I believe in revolvers for self defense, but at same time I worry about the fact that where we once were likely to be robbed by one or two bad guys, five or six bad guys have become fairly common recently.
London only had one bad guy at his door and would maybe be alive had he had a revolver, even a 5 shot snubby. But they could have sent five or six guys after him.
I wonder if his weapon was one of the best or a cheap Saturday night special.
The murder weapon is usually presented as evidence so somewhere there is a description of it but I can't find it.