Germany's Gun Laws for Polizi

[me again]

Originally posted by tklammer:
If anyone has any questions about Germany or German police, feel free to ask me.
Can German Polizi carry firearms when they are off-duty? What are the laws in this area?

[tklammer]

German police officers can carry their guns, when they are off duty. It is allowed by the law about firearms and as far as I know allowed by most of our State Police agencies.
But you must be, what you in the US call a sworn officer.

Most of us usually do not carry, when they are off duty, because we are not used to it.
Laws abouts firearms here are very rigid. Most of the citizens are not allowed even to own a gun. Nearly nobody is allowed to carry one.
So we had nearly no problems with firearms up to about 1990. After the opening of the eastern European countries, thousands of illegal firearms were brought in here. With the increasing numbers of firearms, the "criminal cutlure" has changed and the job becomes more and more dangerous.

This year 8 officers were killed in the line of duty, 7 with firearms. In the last 20 years we had an average of 3 or 4 officers killed every year.

I hope, I gave a small overlook about the firearm situation in Germany. if anyone wants to know more... please ask!!!

Stay safe
Thomas

[me again]

I'm so sorry to hear about the increased death rate for officers in your country. Germany is very small, so proportionally, that is a very large number of casualities.

Thank you very much for answering the question. In Britain, the police aren't allowed to carry their guns when off-duty, so I wondered if it would be the same in Germany. Do you know the laws for the countries that surround Germany???

I'm sure you'll get a lot more questions about the German polizi!