The issues cycling certain brands of hollow point ammunition makes slightly cautious me to recommend this as a defensive firearm, but its ability to perform with ball ammo has never faltered, making it excellent for range or match use on a budget. Overall, I have been very pleased with the EAA Witness Polymer. Magazines are reasonably priced at around $30 a piece and are made by Mec-Gar, ensuring that any issue you may have is probably not magazine related. The Witness does have limited compatibility with CZ holsters, but aftermarket support is sparse due to the lower popularity of EAA’s polymer line. This makes racking the slide a breeze for even the feeblest of shooters, especially if the hammer has been pre-staged. The action is surprisingly smooth, the only polymer guns I’ve fired being smoother are the SIG Sauer P320 and the Steyr L9-A1. This has been consistent across all the ammunition I tested, and no other accuracy issues have appeared.
One thing of note, my example prints several inches low in comparison to my other handguns, roughly three inches at seven yards. The sights are a typical 3 dot affair, with nothing especially good or bad about them. If it weren’t for the lack of a Glock-like dingus on the trigger, I would almost recommend carrying cocked with no safety, but paranoia/reason gets the best of me. This is a huge problem on a defensive gun, and I would suggest the end-user find some way to modify the safety with an extension, or potentially smoothing out the internals to make deactivation a less intense process. The lever is far enough forward that my medium size hands had difficulty getting a solid purchase without adjusting my firing grip, and the force required to deactivate the safety would frequently cause me to either use both thumbs or break my grip to get more leverage. Built by Tanfoglio in Italy, the Witness is a close copy of the excellent CZ 75 design, modernized a bit and chambered for some pretty powerful cartridges, such as the 45 ACP and the 10mm Auto. Unfortunately, EAA made no effort to improve the safety of the original CZ-75, and in my case, actually made it worse. The EAA Witness pistols have been around for several years now, and have gained a lot of respect from knowledgeable shooters. Since this pistol has no decocker, my recommendation would be to carry cocked and locked, much like a 1911. Despite the horrendous double action pull, the single action trigger was surprisingly pleasant the pull feels similar in weight to my Glock 19 or S&W Shield, but with less sponginess. It is incredibly heavy, inconsistent, with no clear indication of an imminent break. The double action trigger on the Witness Polymer is atrocious, the second worst I have ever used (first place held by the Walther PP). Running various timed drills from 3 to 10 yards Trigger & Safety If you choose this pistol for defensive purposes, be sure to test out your preferred load before putting it into your carry rotation. However, the HST and Critical Defense cycled flawlessly. I used three different magazines, tried mixing ball and the Gold Dot, and still had no luck.
I was unable to get a single round of the Gold Dot to feed.