Rebels Up North; Firearms Farce GunFax by William Miller Rebels Up North Officials in six of Canada’s ten provinces have vowed that they will refuse to enforce or prosecute citizens under that country‘s gun registration regime. Many pro-gun activists are applauding the stance against the measure, which carries a sentence of ten years imprisonment. Some pro-gunners think it would be better to clog the courts with a slew of prosecutions, while others are sure the law would be killed by a constitutional challenge. So the momentum continues to go our way, even among leaders in Canada. Imagine the uproar if thirty U.S. States rebelled against Washington’s humorous infringements. Forensic Farce? Hundreds or even thousands of gun-related plea bargains and convictions stand to be challenged with many overturned – as bullet matching (actually lead matching) proves to be far less certain and scientific than firearms examiners have claimed. Lead matching involves the detailed chemical analysis of batches of lead used to manufacture ammunition. The metal can contain over a dozen trace metals in varying amounts, theoretically allowing investigators to tell if two or more bullets came from the same batch during manufacturing. But theory is bumping up against hard science, with alarming results. When William Tobin retired in 1998 as an FBI lab metallurgist, he had seen lead matching presented countless times as if it were a certainty. Tobin chafed at the number of innocents he assumed had been condemned by this cavalier process over the last few decades. He decided to carefully and scientifically investigate lead matching. Until then this kind double-check had not been done. Tobin sought out Erik Randich, a metallurgist with Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, and together they studied the detailed records of two of the largest lead suppliers in the US. These companies supply lead for ammunition manufactures Remington, Winchester, and Federal Cartridge, and they also supply lead to the battery industry. Lead for batteries must meet precise standards for levels and types of trace metals, so records are faithfully kept. Tobin, Randich, and two others began examining these records, which covered a span of over two years. Perhaps sensing the heat, the FBI soon arranged for a statistician from the University of Iowa to determine the statistical probability that bullet matching was valid. In May of 2000, her report was delivered to the bureau: It is theoretically possible, but the FBI has insufficient data to do so. Strike one. Strike two came in 2002 when Tobin and Randich released their peer- reviewed study and submitted it to the journal Forensic Science International. To sum it up, New Scientist magazine announced that the report demonstrates that any assumption that lead matching works is “plain wrong”. In many cases, it was impossible to distinguish batches processed months apart, yet there were also notable differences in some samples studied at the beginning and end of a single batch. Also it is quite common for batches to be split and recombined. Randich has no quarrel with the FBI’s capability for analysis, but “their interpretation is totally illogical.” Former FBI agent Tobin speaks more sharply, saying bureau practice “offends me as a scientist.” More to the point, he states, “I just want this garbage out of the courtroom.” Randich relates that one FBI analyst says he has personally vouched for the reliability of lead matching hundreds of times in court cases. At least one FBI scientist involved in such analysis has plead guilty to deliberately giving false testimony. Indeed, this whole controversy evokes memories of rampant fabrication and twisting of evidence at the FBI’s national lab, which was finally exposed in the 1990’s. On the heels of the Tobin-Randich critique, the FBI lab itself asked the National Academy of Sciences to study the bureau’s techniques early last year. The academy, through its National Research Council, has just issued its final draft report. (The final, full report was not yet released at the press time and the FBI will not comment until it is.) In short, this report is another blow to the FBI. The study confirms the work of Randich and Tobin, condemning the bureau’s techniques as having numerous flaws and recommending a handful of changes. FBI standards are so flawed that they allow the data chaining, which lets their scientists claim a match among bullets which are significantly unlike each other! With lives and lifetimes depending on such testimony, defense attorneys are becoming relentless in attacking its credibility. Lawyers are grilling the examiners, who are being caught flat-footed, not knowing how to factually answer or even address the credibility of their conclusions. So far, their reply has seemed to be that they “know it when they see it”. That’s far beyond reasonable doubt. Barry Scheck, nationally famous for his Innocence Project, which has freed prisoners through DNA and other forensic analysis, is also set to become president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. The group now urges its members to aggressively seek new appeals in such cases. Scheck says the FBI must open any and all cases which utilized lead matching analysis, which another spokesman calls “junk science”. In the hands of tough attorneys, this report could be strike three for bullet matching through lead analysis, and it – along with many wrongly convicted – could soon be out.