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Articles » Crime Scene And
Physical Evidence
The Importance of Ballistics
Sang Mi Pak
Throughout the nineteenth century, many developments took place. Ballistics is the study of the functioning of firearms, the flight of the bullet and the effects of different types of ammunition. Ballistics in crime investigation was first formally established in 1923 when Charles Waite and Philip Garavell set up the Bureau of Forensic Ballistics (BFB). Later, Colonel Calvin Goddar joined the team and together they developed their own specialized equipment. At the scene of a crime, police look for bullets and spent cartridge cases. When police find a suspect's weapon, lab technicians take the gun and fire test bullets from the gun into a cotton wall or a water tank. Under a microscope, the technician can compare the striations on the test bullets with the marks on the bullet from the crime scene. He looks for the direction and degree of the twist, the depth of the grooves, and any imperfections. If the two bullets match, they are from the same gun. Ballistic science can also be used to determine whether or not a person was present when a gun crime was committed. When a gun is fired, tiny specks of primer residue and gunpowder remain on the hand of the person who fired it. The police take residue samples from the suspect's hands, and a lab analyzes the samples for traces of the chemicals antimony, barium, and lead. Ballistics is obviously a very important part of forensics science.
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http://library.thinkquest.org
/17049
Warner, Erica. Forensic Science. New York: Houghton Mifflin, 1997.
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