Officials of several pension funds with stakes in the Freedom Group said that in keeping with the usual practice in private equities, they were not told in advance that their money would finance a firearms business.

The private equity company that owns the Freedom Group, Cerberus Capital Management, has already said it would sell the gun business and return to investors the money they had put into it. Cerberus said this would protect the investors’ financial interests while keeping them out of the gun-control debate, which it said in December was “more properly pursued by those with the formal charter and public responsibility to do so.” It added, “That is the job of our federal and state legislators.”

But one trustee of the teachers’ fund, California Treasurer Bill Lockyer, said state laws and the fund’s own investment rules necessitated a formal divestiture. He made the motion to design and execute a plan to divest of all companies that make guns that are illegal in California. When he was state attorney general from 1998 to 2006 he clashed with the National Rifle Association over the enforcement of California’s gun laws, which are widely seen as the most strict of any state.

The state teachers’ fund also requires its investment analysts to consider if a company makes a product so detrimental to human health “that it draws significant product liability lawsuits” and “avoidance by other institutional investors.” The rule was added in 2008, when the fund was divesting of tobacco interests. Mr. Lockyer said it was applicable to makers of large-capacity ammunition clips and assault weapons, which “pose extreme dangers to public health and safety.”

Mr. Lockyer also sits on the board of Calpers, California’s pension fund for state and municipal workers. He is expected to make a similar motion when that $243 billion fund holds an investment meeting next week.

An official of the Los Angeles pension fund for police and fire fighters said one of its trustees had also sought an evaluation of how its investment in the Freedom Group comported with its investment policies. The Los Angeles Police Department is also a customer of the company.