Being in the Navy, I never handled an M16 (or 14 for that matter) but with the .45 M1911s we did carry while on guard, you betcha we inserted a finger into the just visually inspected chamber to ensure it did not come up against a cartridge head. One time it did. :eek: Made a believer out of me.
I just became one.
So are you saying he may have actually checked the chamber? If so it doesn’t sound like he did anything wrong.
Whenever I begin a shift I take the AR out of the squad, remove the magazine and check the chamber, then reinsert the mag and secure it in the squad without charging the chamber. We do this to insure the rifle is squad ready. We do something similar if there is a shotgun in the squad. When checking the chamber this “cocks” the weapon, so pulling the trigger on an empty chamber decocks it. If he was able to pull the trigger that means at some point the charging handle was pulled back, which makes me think he did check the chamber and you just didn’t see it. Even if I’ve observed another officer do this when I take over the squad I do it again. The officer you saw have just received that weapon so what he did was proper.
Unlike sidearms rifles are not carried with a round in the chamber unless at a situation where we may actually use it. There are times we have a rifle, such as the event you described, but it’s low odds we’re going to use it. In that case the chamber would not be charged. This is a trained protocol and part of department SOP.