Hypothetical question for ya'lls

[Knave]

I've been thinking alot lately about a certain "gun control" method that gets brought up from time to time. I put it in quotes because it's really not quite gun control, but typically gets lumped into that category.

Every so often, I hear the idea thrown around requiring that all gun manufacturers, importers, etc. put a micro-brand of sorts on either the firing pin, the breech face, or both, so that spent casings could be more easily matched to the exact gun. As I understand it, Hi-Point already does a crude version of this by supposedly putting a belt sander to each gun's breech face, causing each gun to put a unique impression on casings.

Set aside the issue of how it would be done, since it would require alot of changes to gun laws to be effective. But let's pretend we could wake up tomorrow and every single gun in the U.S. magically had unique firing pin/breech face characteristics, and pretend that the secondary market was all in compliance and that there were harsh penalties for non-compliance or illegal altering similar to illegally modifying a gun into being full auto or obliterating the serial number, etc. etc. And pretend as well that there was no increased cost to the consumer.

Would you be for or against it?

 

[chad]

I'm pretty sure firing pins all do leave a slightly different impression, which is why when brass casings are collected from crime scenes they can be used to match if a gun is recovered. LSP972 will chime in because he does this sort of stuff for a living.

 

[mpl006]

Putting the logistical part aside, last weekend I was at the range and picked up some brass off the ground. What's to keep me from committing a crime and picking up my brass and throwing down the brass I picked up or just throw it down without picking mine up to add more "suspects." The other issue I see is just like with all other gun laws, the criminals don't care. So if you have a law that makes it illegal to alter the firing pin by filing off the serial number or whatever other mark, what's to keep the criminal from doing it anyway?

The first time I heard about the idea, I didn't see an issue other than the cost involved, but after I thought about it, I could see these two things being an issue.

 

[Cat]

I'm not sure if we should fix something that isn't broken. As Chad mentioned, there is already successful firearms forensics science.

 

[Knave]

I'm pretty sure firing pins all do leave a slightly different impression, which is why when brass casings are collected from crime scenes they can be used to match if a gun is recovered.

They do, but AFAIK some guns are ALOT easier to match than others, and some have a very high chance of being inconclusive or not easy/exact matches.

What's to keep me from committing a crime and picking up my brass and throwing down the brass I picked up or just throw it down without picking mine up to add more "suspects." The other issue I see is just like with all other gun laws, the criminals don't care. So if you have a law that makes it illegal to alter the firing pin by filing off the serial number or whatever other mark, what's to keep the criminal from doing it anyway?

Well, filing the firing pin or breech face would also give that gun a distinct character. Of course, you could file the gun, shoot someone, then file the gun again, but you could also throw the gun in the middle of the Pacific, or melt it, or bury it in the middle of nowhere, etc etc.

You could also pick up your brass, or use a revolver, and throw down dummy brass, or use garrote wire instead of a gun altogether..But that starts getting into things that can't really be controlled and require different investigatory leads.

But the firing pin serial number thing seems to get shot down alot on gun forums as being a method of gun control, and I don't know if that's really the case.

 

[SpeedRacer]

As long as it still pops off my primers, IDGAF. As a law abiding citizen, there's not a single instance I can think of in which I would be affected by it. On the flip side, in the big picture I don't think it would do much to lower crime or increase conviction rates of criminals either.

Therefore, my official answer is "meh".

 

[Knave]

I'm not sure if we should fix something that isn't broken. As Chad mentioned, there is already successful firearms forensics science.

But that's the thing...IMO it is broken, relatively speaking. NIBIN for example is successful considering how difficult of a prospect it is in the first place. The firing pin/breech face serial number thing would probably help NIBIN out considerably.

 

[Cat]

http://apps.americanbar.org/abastore/products/books/abstracts/5450051chap1_abs.pdf


That's an interesting glance-over I found. I skipped the science for the most part, and scrolled towards the bottom. Interested to hear LSP comment on this subject.

 

[Cat]

But that's the thing...IMO it is broken, relatively speaking. NIBIN for example is successful considering how difficult of a prospect it is in the first place. The firing pin/breech face serial number thing would probably help NIBIN out considerably.

*shrugs* I honestly don't know enough to say if NIBIN is broken or not. To me, and I'm only half knowledgable here, but when you start tweaking with something, and altering machinery, considering the multitudes of methods that easily allows a person to circumvent identification… It creates more issues than it corrects.

 

[Knave]

I also am interested in what LSP thinks about the subject. Don't get me wrong, NIBIN works very well I think. It's just that whatever the percentages are, they'd surely be higher if all individual guns had extremely distinct markings that were easily seen and matched by the examiners.

Typical attempts to circumvent or make alterations would in and of themselves also make the individual gun distinct from others of its make and model. I think you would have to somehow have a pin and slide/bolt that were perfectly machined to have no toolmarks under magnification, if such a thing is even practical or possible. But then that starts getting pretty far out of what the intended effect of making casing-to-gun matches easier and more common.

I just don't know if there would be unintended consequences. Most of the common gun control suggestions seem like they would have fairly major side effects, both intended and unintended. As I've said, I've seen this particular thing brought up around the web from time to time, and have always seen it dismissed. But after thinking about it, I'm wondering if it wouldn't have the potential to be useful for law enforcement if it were actually implementable and didn't have detrimental side effects. Although I think the problem with the idea is that it wouldn't bear much fruit for decades, if ever, unless existing guns were all brought into compliance, which ultimately I think can't be done and shouldn't be done.

 

[Bill Baldwin]

On the face of it, the concept of microstamping may sound like a good idea, however, it would cause more problems than solve. Let's assume for a moment, Knave, that you sold handgun that you've had for a few years to a friend and that friend, later, sold that firearm to someone at the local range, and then bullet casings are found at a crime scene that match the serial number of your former handgun. Going on your assumptions that everything works perfectly, the police would come knocking on your door. You'd explain to them that you sold the firearm. You friend would then tell the police that he sold the firearm as well and the third owner of the firearm can't be found. In order for the microstamping system to work, firearms would have to be registered to their owners and the owners would have to be licensed, both of which are against the law.

As mpl006 pointed out, Microstamping could possibly lead to a new criminal enterprise. What's to stop a criminal from going to a public gun range and picking up the used brass and selling that off to his criminal conspirators who then drop the brass off at crime scene?

The average time to crime for a gun in the US is about 11.20 years. If microstamping were mandatory, the taxpayers would be supporting a system, at a cost of billions of dollars, and the benefits (if any) wouldn't be realized for more than 11 years. Earlier this year, New York abandoned the Combined Ballistics Identification System (CoBIS) after 10 years because it didn't help solve one crime. The system cost $40M to set up and $1.2M per year for 10 years until it was shut down.

Nearly 1/4 of crime guns are under three years old, this would suggest that the majority of firearms used in crimes are stolen. Even if the system worked flawlessly, it still wouldn't be a benefit in the investigation process.

If you were looking for a simple answer to your question, the answer would be no, I would not support microstamping.

 

[Ritten]

Against it. It would solve nothing and become a way to database the firearms in America. That is information that has no need being collected, even in the name of crime prevention.