The big problem is that bullets are soft. When they hit anything solid (like bone) they deform. Bullet matching is fine when the bullet is undamaged, but that generally isn’t the case, unless it missed and hit something soft and non-ablatative.
Trying to match damaged bullets is very unreliable.
Apparently CSI had lawyers on both sides cursing it 20+ years ago (when I did a uni module on forensics). Juries expected concise, absolute results. Instead they get probabilities, maybes, and shades of grey.
When the gun is coming down and found and being handed over to police they may find out that the ballistic signature of gun and bullet match.
Thank them later.
Apparently matching guns to bullets is mostly pseudoscience. They can match caliber and firearm type quite reliably but that’s about it.
The big problem is that bullets are soft. When they hit anything solid (like bone) they deform. Bullet matching is fine when the bullet is undamaged, but that generally isn’t the case, unless it missed and hit something soft and non-ablatative.
Trying to match damaged bullets is very unreliable.
Gasp! American cop apologia media had been lying to me?
Apparently CSI had lawyers on both sides cursing it 20+ years ago (when I did a uni module on forensics). Juries expected concise, absolute results. Instead they get probabilities, maybes, and shades of grey.
I dread to think what it is like now.