That’s about where we are right now with “ballistic fingerprinting,” except that adoption of this new system for catching criminals is far from a sure thing, thanks to the warped politics of guns. President Bush, not wanting to look insensitive while a sniper stalks the Maryland and Virginia suburbs, has reversed course and now says he’ll “explore” the idea with the FBI and ATF, which have long supported it. But there’s every reason to believe that the president and his rural “red state” pro-gun supporters in both parties in Congress are just finessing the issue until the sniper story passes. When it does, both the NRA and the gun-control folks on the other side can go back to their old game of bashing each other in direct mail to raise money and perpetuate themselves in Washington.
Is there a way out of this tiresome dance? Probably not. But ballistic fingerprinting offers at least some chance to redefine the issue from “gun control” (a political loser) to “law enforcement” (a political winner). “I believe this can be a bridge issue in the gun debate,” says Rep. Rob Andrews of New Jersey, sponsor of a bill to establish a national ballistics database. If his fellow Democrats could locate their cojones, he might even be proved right.
Predictably, the NRA says any national registry of ballistic fingerprinting would simply be a form of gun registration, which it rejects (as opposed to car registration, which it ostensibly supports). But Andrews points out that in its promotional materials, the NRA has long insisted that it wants to help police catch bad guys, as long as law-abiding gun owners aren’t hassled. The gun lobby even sponsors initiatives (like Project Exile in Richmond, Va.) devoted to improving efforts to prosecute gun-related crimes.
As it happens, this is precisely what ballistic fingerprinting is designed to accomplish. A registry entails no paperwork for gun owners or restrictions on gun purchases, just better detective work. Does this mean their lobby is onboard? Please. The NRA is working overtime to shoot holes in the new technology.
Here’s how the idea works: Every gun barrel has grooves to help the bullet spin, and each pattern of grooves is unique thanks to variations in the tools used in gun making. A Canadian technology called IBIS (Integrated Ballistics Identification System), now in use in 233 local law-enforcement sites around the United States, produces a 360-degree photographic image of the bullet or shell casing, then translates the picture into a digital signature, which can then be compared with other crime-scene evidence. If a national database were begun, bullets or casings recovered from a crime scene could then be traced to the point of purchase, giving detectives new leads.
This is obviously no silver bullet. And because only two states–Maryland and New York–require handgun manufacturers to fire the weapons and record the signature, the databases are still relatively small. That’s why the NRA’s point that the system hasn’t solved many crimes yet (and is unlikely to solve the tarot-card sniper case) is irrelevant. Eventually the system would unquestionably help crack some cases, as it already has abroad.
Other objections are equally specious. Opponents say that filing the inside of the barrel would wreck the signature. Actually, that’s hard to do (the scanning system has more than one marking to chose from). And the filing would either mess up the gun or create its own, more discernible signature on the bullet, making it easier to connect to other crimes. Critics also point out that many guns used in crimes are stolen. True, and that reality would limit the matches with buyers at gun shops (not to mention all the unregulated guns sold through the now-infamous “gun-show loophole”). But law-enforcement authorities agree that the database would still be helpful in tracking the flow of illegal guns and establishing probable cause for surveillance of illegal gun dealers.
I’ll lay odds that Bush drops this idea when the heat is off. His administration has shown no willingness to quibble with the NRA, as his father occasionally did. But if the Democrats pushed it, the president might go along. The problem is that key Democrats from Bill Clinton on down firmly believe they lost the 2000 election because of gun control, which cost them key rural counties in West Virginia and Tennessee. (Clinton believes the 1994 loss of Congress was also a partial result of his confronting the NRA.) Ballistic fingerprinting is thus a new test of whether the party has any principles any more. Don’t hold your breath.
