Ballistics experts can’t testify that recovered bullets match firearms, Md. high court rules
The field of firearms identification is not reliable enough to allow expert testimony linking crime scene bullets to specific guns, Maryland’s top court ruled this week.
Using a new, stricter admissibility standard for scientific testimony, a split Maryland Supreme Court concluded that ballistics experts can only say whether the markings on a bullet are “consistent” or “inconsistent” with bullets fired from a particular gun.
“We do not question that firearms identification is generally reliable, and can be helpful to a jury, in identifying whether patterns and markings on ‘unknown’ bullets or cartridges are consistent or inconsistent with those on bullets or cartridges known to have been fired from a particular firearm,” Chief Justice Matthew Fader wrote in a 59-page majority opinion.
That a bullet could not have been fired from a particular gun seems easy enough to establish. If the striations don't match.
But if the striations do match a certain firearm, how certain can you be that there is no other firearm that would also match?