Taurus Judge
Special-Purpose Home Defense
Awkward when deployed as a two-handed .45 Colt revolver,
Frank believes the Taurus Judge Home Defender comes into
its own loaded out with .410 shotgun ammunition.
Is there a perfect gun for self-defense in the home? Possibly, but the choice of gun depends on a lot of variables unique to each defender and their home. How much confidence and experience handling and shooting firearms do you have? How good is your eyesight? Are you recoil sensitive? Are you strong enough to rack a slide or hold up a standard handgun, shotgun or rifle? Do you have children in your home? How close are your neighbors? Do you live in an urban or rural area? Is your home a standalone suburban house or city apartment? What are your walls and doors actually made of? Where do your children or roommates sleep? What’s the most likely range for you to have a dangerous encounter in your home?
These questions, and many more, should be considered along with the inevitable compromises, when deciding what home-defense firearm is the best choice for you and your circumstances. With that in mind, indulge me in an experiment in making a case for the Taurus Judge Home Defender.
The Judge Home Defender is an ideal gun for the less experienced
or smaller-stature shooters. Those with grip-strength problems
appreciate the revolver-based action.
The Right Fit
I suspected the Judge Home Defender might be practically employed in the hands of a less-than-ideal home defender. For my test case, I wanted a person capable of operating a firearm safely but with no formal instruction and little, if any, experience handling or shooting firearms. I chose these criteria because I suspect they describe the majority of people who rushed to buy their first gun during the height of social chaos in 2019–20.
Additionally, I wanted a test subject whose physical characteristics offered them no advantages in using the gun. I chose a small-statured, middle-aged woman in good health but neither an athlete or unusually strong for her size and age. In short, a person who could easily be overpowered physically by a larger opponent, but possessing the minimum strength and dexterity to operate a firearm safely.
My test subject was a petite woman, 5’ 2″, with basic firearm safety knowledge but absolutely minimal shooting experience due to a complete lack of recreational interest in shooting sports. She was shown the basic operation of the gun, fitted with a green targeting laser/tactical light on the fore-end, which also serves as a stop for the supporting hand. A red dot optic was installed on the top rail. For familiarization, she fired one round, double-action, from the hip, at a gallon jug of water 10 feet away, aiming with the targeting laser. She hit it squarely.
Immediately afterward, she loaded the cylinder with five rounds to shoot a course of fire — three life-size silhouette target threats positioned 5, 10 and 15 feet away in a 20-degree arc in front of her. She was instructed to engage the targets as fast as she could, firing double-action with the gun’s pistol grip held tight against her body and aiming with the laser. The drill began by firing two shots into the five-foot threat on her right, then two into the 10-foot threat on her left and finally sweeping back to the center to fire her last shot into the 15-foot distant threat. She completed the exercise without a hiccup in 2.51 seconds scoring solid hits on all targets. For comparison, my first try at the drill was 1.61 seconds and I improved little over the next three attempts. However, hitting three targets at three distances in 2.5 seconds is decent for a novice and realistically, this is all many first-time self-defense gun buyers will ever be.
Part of the reason the Judge Home Defender did so well in untrained hands is its fore-end allows the shooter to better support the gun, aim it (especially with the laser in short range hip shooting), control it during recoil and retain if an assailant tries to wrestle it away. The targeting laser also aided novice shooters in placing shots quickly and accurately.
In terms of physical strength and dexterity requirements, revolvers as a class require less strength and mechanical finesse than autoloading pistols and long guns. The revolver is also more reliable. In subsequent tests with a pump shotgun, my novice shooter inadvertently induced malfunction through improper manipulation. This highlights what might be the Judge Home Defender’s greatest strength — it offers the point-and-pull the trigger simplicity of a double-action revolver with the firepower of a shotgun.
I’d venture that a typical novice would have missed some of the test targets shooting a Judge .45 Colt double-action revolver with a 3″ barrel. The Judge Home Defender is better as a little shotgun than as a .45 Colt revolver. With the right ammunition, a shotgun armed home defender can significantly increase the likelihood of hitting the threat through the pattern spread as well as the lethality of each shot through multi pellet hits.
At 20 feet from Frank’s simulated wall, all four lead discs, 16 BB
pellets and even the wad of the Winchester 3" PDX1 completely
penetrated both sides!
Choices
The long cylinder of the Judge series allows the versatility of shooting a wide variety of 2.5″ and 3″ .410 shells. Loads range from a ½ oz. of #9 birdshot that at 15 feet barely penetrate the backside of a typical residential wall sheathed in two layers of ½” sheetrock, up to devastating four-pellet 000 buckshot loads capable of penetrating the target and the wall behind it.
Testing showed Winchester’s .410 PDX1 Defender “Stop The Threat” 2.5″ shells fired through the 13″ barrel of the Judge Home Defender averaged 1,035 fps velocity. This is 285 fps faster than the 750 fps advertised from the standard length Judge revolver it was developed for. The load consists of three lead discs backed by 12 BB pellets.
While the discs remained clustered at all ranges under 20 feet, the pellets pattern opened up more significantly, improving hit probability. At five feet I measured a pattern of 2.36″, at 10 feet it was 6.3″ and at 15 and 20 feet, I got 14.5″ and 13.6″ patterns respectively — illustrating results aren’t always predictable.
For comparison, the Winchester’s 2.5″ SUPER-X, 000 buckshot load of three pellets averaged a velocity of 1,252 fps, a little less than the 1,300 advertised on the box. The big pellets penetrated the aforementioned typical residential wall completely up to 20 feet away. The patterns were rather tight, offering less risk from wayward pellets but still increasing hit probability. At five feet, my pattern measured 0.76″ and at 20 it expanded to 3.48″.
The Judge Home Defender’s long cylinder accommodates all .410
ammunition types and many impressive loads are available, allowing
you to rain a storm of lead on your target.
Staying Safe
In circumstances where the primary concern is a missed shot will penetrate the wall and endanger innocent life, the 2.5″ Remington STS Target #9 shot load might be considered. With approximately 290 tiny pellets in the half-ounce payload, it throws big, dense patterns that improve hit probability. The problem is, even at the 1,209 fps velocity, the pellets have such little mass penetration into tissue is limited. Ballistic gel tests I’ve studied suggest penetration of 3″ to 4″ was possible with a load chronographed 150 fps slower. This isn’t much and heavy clothing or bone would present serious obstacles to the pellets. However, there’s a lot of them and they spread out fast improving hit probability overall and the chances that some pellets will find a major blood vessel or a path into the internal organs.
The pattern at five feet measured 3.88″, at 10 feet it was 11.1″ at 15 feet it grew to 16.37″ and at 20″ it became a near-doorway-spanning 23″! The gruesome close-range wounds caused by the shredding effect of so many tiny pellets are generally shallow and less likely to be immediately lethal compared to the PDX1 and 000 buckshot loads. However, a #9 birdshot load may be the best option when the concern over injuring someone in another room with an errant shot is your main concern.
MSRP: $757.99
