Like fingerprints, a firearm’s discarded shell casings have unique markings. This allows forensic experts to compare casings from a crime scene with those from a suspect’s gun. Finding and reporting a mismatch can help free the innocent, just as a match can incriminate the guilty.
But a new study from Iowa State University researchers reveals mismatches are more likely than matches to be reported as “inconclusive” in cartridge-case comparisons.
“Firearms experts are failing to report evidence that’s favorable to the defense, and it has to be addressed and corrected. This is a terrible injustice to innocent people who are counting on expert examiners to issue a report showing that their gun was not involved but instead are left defenseless by a report that says the result was inconclusive,” says Gary Wells, an internationally recognized pioneer and scholar in eyewitness memory research.
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