By Peter Weiss
During the sniper shootings of 13 people in the Washington, D.C., area last October, police initially uncovered only a sparse trail of evidence–often just the bullet itself. As tension mounted over several weeks, newscasts repeatedly reported that examinations of bullet fragments were linking the shootings. That coverage brought the science and technology of bullet identification onto center stage. It also drew attention to a system still under development, in which images of bullets, bullet fragments, and bullet cases collected from crime scenes are matched against a database of previously recorded images.
Known as the National Integrated Ballistic Information Network (NIBIN), the system is already giving police a new way to ferret out links between crimes. Law enforcement officers have used the system many times to establish connections. However, officials won’t say whether it served this purpose in the Washington sniper case.