The Guyana Police Force is refuting a report carried on Capitol News on Thursday last in which statements were made discrediting the results of the ballistics tests done by the force on spent shells and warheads.
The police said its ballistics section has qualified staff, who have been deemed as experts by the courts for the purpose of giving expert opinions on ballistics, and asserted that a spent shell can be used to positively identify any weapon from which it was fired and do comparisons.
According to a police press statement issued on Saturday, the Capitol News report aired the views of Alphonso Martin, reportedly a former first sergeant in the US Army who specialised in weaponry. He reportedly said that there was no way that it was scientifically possible to use spent shells to do ballistics to positively identify any weapon (that it was fired from); and until the pathologist or whoever retrieves the bullet and compares it against another bullet, one cannot tell which gun fired that bullet.
The release said Martin went on to discredit the results of ballistics tests done by the police ballistics section, whose ranks have been using spent shells, in addition to warheads, to conduct ballistics examinations.
The police said examination of a fired cartridge case may make possible the identification of a weapon in terms of type, make, and model, noting that the presence of magazine markings, the type of breech block mark, and the size, shape, and location of ejector and extractor marks are important in making such identification.
Further, the release stated that the size, shape, and location of the firing pin on fired rim fire cartridge cases can also be used to determine the make of the weapon. Identification of a weapon as having fired a particular cartridge case can be made by comparing markings on test cartridges with those on the evidence cartridge, the police added.
Currently the system of ballistics examinations in the Police Force is done manually. However, the police are expecting to acquire an Integrated Ballistics Identification System, which is a computerized system that matches all components of ammunition and stores the results.
The release also stated that the ballistics section has staffers whose qualifications include training in Basic Firearm Identification in Barbados, the Advanced Firearm Identification Course, the Internship Firearm Identification Course and the Certificate of Instruc-tion of Firearm Identification Course in Iowa, USA.
