CENTRAL LAKE, Mich. — Richard Davis invented a flexible, concealable type of body armor after taking a bullet while delivering a pizza. He vouched for his products by donning them and shooting himself with a gun — nearly 200 times over three decades.
The company he founded in 1972, Second Chance Body Armor Inc., became the nation's biggest supplier of bulletproof vests to law enforcement agencies. It claims to have saved more than 920 wearers from death or serious injury.
Now, Second Chance is drawing fire of a different sort: allegations that its vests are defective.
The accusations raise questions about the reliability of body armor worn by thousands of police officers around the nation.
The controversy has generated at least six lawsuits, federal and state investigations, and finger-pointing between Second Chance and the producer of Zylon, a high-tech synthetic fiber woven into many of Second Chance's vests.
One lawsuit blames Second Chance armor in the shooting death of a California police officer last July. The latest case was filed last week by the state of Arkansas, demanding a $454,000 refund for 557 vests bought for officers there.
Cases have also been brought on behalf of vest buyers in Massachusetts, Georgia, Illinois and Connecticut, where the state attorney general accused the company of causing police to play "real-life Russian roulette."
Second Chance, whose slogan is "we save lives," denies it has acted irresponsibly. Second Chance went public with concerns about Zylon in September and stopped making two vests containing the fabric.
The company has offered to replace defective vests worn by Utah law enforcement officers with a cheaper version.
"We've been in business for 32 years, and officer safety has always been our mission," said Paul Banducci, president of the company based in this town 200 miles north of Detroit.
Also under scrutiny is Toyobo Co., the manufacturer of Zylon, the anti-ballistic fiber widely hailed as a technological breakthrough because of its strength and light weight. About 200,000 of the nation's 700,000 police officers are believed to wear vests made with Zylon, said Jim Pasco, executive director of the Fraternal Order of Police.
Toyobo, a Japanese company, acknowledges tests show Zylon loses 10 percent to 20 percent of its durability within two years of manufacture. Yet spokesman Kent Jarrell insists it works well in body armor that is properly constructed.
"We stand by Zylon. We don't believe it is a defective product," Jarrell said.
Toyobo is a co-defendant in four of the lawsuits against Second Chance. The U.S. Justice Department last month began investigating the reliability of Zylon, which is also used by seven other body armor manufacturers in the United States and Canada. Toyobo and the FOP's Pasco said they know of no complaints about vests made by the other companies.
Second Chance also supplies vests to the U.S. military, but they are made exclusively of a different fiber, Kevlar, and have pockets into which ceramic plates are inserted to stop high-velocity bullets from assault rifles. The lawsuits do not involve the military-issue vests.
Zylon sounded like a dream when Toyobo began developing it in the 1990s, Banducci said. It had tremendous strength and heat resistance, yet was much lighter than other fibers used in anti-ballistic vests. And it is well-known that the bulkier and hotter a bulletproof vest is, the less likely police are to wear it.
Second Chance took the Ultima, a 100-percent Zylon vest weighing around 2 1/2 to 3 pounds, to market in 1999. Later came the Ultimax, a blend of Zylon and other fibers. The two thin, light vests eventually accounted for 40 percent of the company's sales.
But in July 2001, Toyobo notified armor manufacturers that Zylon fiber gradually degrades under prolonged exposure to high heat and humidity.
Second Chance was not worried at first because Toyobo's initial estimate of the deterioration rate was 10 percent over a decade, while the vests are under warranty for five years, Banducci said.
But starting in 2002, he said, the company began testing its used vests for durability. Some wore out more quickly than expected.
Then came the June 13 shooting of Tony Zeppetella, 27, of the Oceanside, Calif., police department. Three bullets from a 9 mm pistol penetrated his vest — an upgraded Ultima — and two entered his body, Capt. David Heering said.
Second Chance contends Zeppetella's Ultima II performed to federal standards. The fatal bullets struck about an inch from the vest's edge. For certification tests, bullets are fired no closer than 3 inches from the edge so the destructive energy can dissipate, company spokesman Gregg Smith said.
"This is a defective product and they knew it," countered Gregory Emerson, spokesman for the Zeppetella family.
Also in June, a .40-caliber bullet punched through the Ultima vest worn by officer Edward Limbacher of Forest Hills, Pa. He survived, but the bullet remains in his abdomen.
The investigation is incomplete, but Smith acknowledged this may be the first time one of the company's vests failed to stop a bullet it was designed and certified to block.
Second Chance discontinued the Ultima and Ultimax in September. It offered to upgrade those in circulation by supplying extra padding, or a steep discount on new vests with different fibers.
In the meantime, police organizations are begging street cops not to give up on bulletproof vests.
"We've heard anecdotally that some police executives have suggested that officers not wear them," Pasco said. "That is the height of irresponsibility. A vest that's possibly deficient is far better than no vest at all."