New Technology Can Help Prevent Gun Violence - VOA Story

The U.S. Justice Department says homicides in the United States are most often committed with guns, especially handguns. And the number of shooting deaths has increased steadily over years. But a new technology may help prevent gun violence. It allows investigators to trace the source of the weapon, and perhaps find the shooter, even before they recover the weapon.

A new bullet casing contains critical information that law enforcement officials can use to identify the weapon that fired the bullet. They are aided by a new ballistics technology called "microstamping."

Todd Lizotte is the inventor. He explained how microstamping works at a recent demonstration in Washington D.C. "The technology is pretty straightforward. We understand that under certain pressures the metal will emboss itself even if it is a very fine feature."

Lizotte says if the make, model and serial number of a pistol are etched on the pistol's interior surfaces, those characters are imprinted on each cartridge case when the handgun is fired. So this microstamping technology will allow investigators to link cartridge casings that they find at crime scenes to the weapon used in the crime.

The microstamping technology is hailed by gun control advocates. Josh Horwitz is the executive director of the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence. He says microstamping will enhance an existing gun tracing system.

"We already have a trace system," says Horwitz. "We know how to trace guns. Congress authorized and built a trace center. Microstamping would just allow you to access the trace center, get the data -- which is who purchased the firearm -- without the firearm."

Research by the Coalition to Stop Gun Violence and the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence shows that of the nearly 2400 homicides in California in 2004, more than 60 percent were committed with handguns. The groups estimate microstamping would cost manufacturers only between 50 cents and one dollar per firearm. They say the new technology is a crime-solving promise in the future and will help make America a safer place to live.

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• Gun
• violence
• technology
• weapon
• crime
• Microstamping

[armedtotheteeth1974]

WOW! this guy is a damn genius!!. Now , every criminal must use a "stolen gun" , use a brass catcher, or better yet, take other peoples used brass from the range and dump them at shootings. Or they could just use a file to remove numbers, duh. I Agree, this is a ploy to make firearm ownership a little bit tougher these days. Hey, what if one of those microstamping firing pins where to wear out? How can you get a replacement?? HMMMM DUMBASS???????

[Idontknow134]

What is to prevent the illegal gun traffickers, or the criminals from taking a file to the firing pin, or any other area where the serial numbers are present?

Also, criminals could get their hands on spent shells from a shooting range, and drop them at the crime scene to throw off the police.

This law would exclude revolvers as they don't eject the shells after being fired.

[longfootbuddy]

do you bozos realise how easy it is to make your own gun and bullet? the real goal of the goverments attempts to track guns and bullets of law abiding citizens, is so they can have a registry of them in hopes that some day they can ban them...it would make it much easier for them when they need to confiscate your guns...and in turn, that would make it very easy to enslave us all ...but thankfuly, alot of americans still know our rights...and you dont need goverment permition to exercise them...

[UmmmKayyy]

I dont understand why these dipshits didnt think this through. They are just sooo eager to pass a law that they dont even think about the consequences. Shit even us regular people think more logically than these morons.

[sjr341]

And just think, in microstamping, a criminal could collect just one of your spent cartridges from the range and throw it on the ground at a crime scene shooting. That could possibly hold law-abiding gun owners criminally liable for murder!

[coldsteel762]

This is gun control via ammo control-the mentally ill hoplophobic anti-Constitutional gun grabbers just wont give up-

spend a night watching some true crime dramas-they can already ID crime guns based on TOOL MARK IDENTIFICATION.

What they really hope to do is make ammo so expensive to produce that we wont have any for our Constitutionally Protected guns.

[enemykilla52]

like criminals use registerd guns!

[fortsmith1]

This is a step to start gun registration and on to confiscation.

[allhunting]

wow i better then start to pick up my casings so no one else takes them to a crime scene so i get fucked with that. o and how about reloads?? AND ITS A WONDERFUL PLAN IM SURE ALL THE CRIMINALS WILL TRADE IN THEIR OLD GUNS FOR THESE

DUMB FUCKING LIBERALS

[RabidNinjaPenguins]

Oh and I almost forgot... What about revolvers? They don't leave shell casings behind, and they are a popular choice for self-defense (especially for women who have trouble racking the slide). After the Heller case, the only type of pistol DC allows is the revolver (I guess because it only holds 5 or 6 rounds.) So now for microstamping to work we need to ban revolvers!! And the Brady dance goes on...

[RabidNinjaPenguins]

All of the 3rd party (read NOT BRADY) research I've seen on it shows the stamps can be ruined with a few brushes from a $1 file...

Just because it "sounds cool," doesn't mean it will work. For this to even be standardized, you would have to mandate every existing firearm be retrofitted with a new firing pin- this is financially impossible. Oh, and only law-abiders would comply- I doubt the criminals will hand their guns over for the "upgrade." So much for helping with crimes.

[simsley]

Your empty casings being found at a crime scene you never even attended? Now that's a scary thought.