Going Ballistics
January 31, 2005
BARELY A YEAR after singing the praises of a law requiring gun makers to submit ballistics data on every handgun sold in Maryland, state police have declared it a dud and want it repealed. At first glance their reasoning appears sound: Since the law took effect in 2000, the information gathered has not significantly aided a single criminal investigation. The cost so far, much of it for setting up the system: $2.6 million over the four years. That's not a lot of bang for the buck, nor does it reinforce the state police's own report in 2003 that called the ballistics database "a powerful weapon in law enforcement's arsenal against crime."
New York is the only other state with a law establishing a database on ballistic "fingerprints," the markings left on shell casings when a gun is fired; there, too, the system has yet to solve a crime. The idea behind the laws is that the markings on the casings can be traced to a specific gun, but -- here's the rub -- finding a match remains a crapshoot. In each state the files contain data on only those guns sold in that state since the law took effect. Most of the weapons used in crimes are older and probably were first sold in other states.
Still, New York is not scrapping its system. Unlike Maryland, New York officials are working on arrangements to coordinate local inquiries with state and federal ballistics networks. One of the problems has been that federal law enforcement officials run a different kind of database, with information on guns used in crimes, as opposed to new guns. The federal network has come up with thousands of "hits," many of them producing helpful investigative information. But thanks to the lobbying handiwork of the National Rifle Association and other gun groups, federal regulations bar information on new guns from being entered into that system. A spokeswoman for the state Division of Criminal Justice Systems told the Associated Press last June that the administration of Gov. George E. Pataki (R) was confident that a federal partnership would help realize the "tremendous potential" of the state system.
In Maryland, there's little evidence of effort in the past year to improve technology, link up local authorities, or take advantage of FBI and other training. State police deny any administration pressures to kill the program, but the lack of interest on the part of Gov. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. (R) is contagious and does not inspire great effort by state police leaders to give the program time to become effective.
It has taken time for other government databanks to yield significant results, including Brady-law background checks on handgun purchasers. And without a federal network, Maryland and New York are limited, just as the District of Columbia's handgun ban is handicapped by gun-running marketeers from nearby states.
A broader national database would be the best approach. In Maryland, the relative handful of inquiries by state police to a still young database may not produce significant results for some time. Still, police can and should make better use of the system. It may yet prove to be a flop. But at this point, collecting the data ought not to stop.
