Montgomery Co. Obtains Special Machine To Trace Bullets Used In Crimes

NORRISTOWN, PA —A special new machine that can analyze bullets recovered from crime scenes and connect them to firearms used in other crimes has been obtained by the Montgomery County District Attorney's Office, they announced Wednesday.

The federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms provided the NIBIN (National Integrated Ballistic Information Network) machine, which has a database of fired cartidges from weapons used in crimes across the country.

"Because each firearm leaves its own signature on bullet casings when a gun is fired — a unique set of scratches, grooves and/or dents — the NIBIN system can quickly compare these individual bullet casing 'fingerprints' against its six million (fired cartridge) database and create a list of high-probability matches," the DA's Office said.

Montgomery County will share the machine with Chester, Delaware, and Bucks counties. It's the seventh such machine in Pennsylvania (Philadelphia has its own), and the 293rd in the nation.

Montgomery County DA Kevin Steele called it a "game changer."

"Montgomery County and the surrounding counties are in position to be able to quickly respond to gun crimes that are linked together in a timely manner and disrupt the shooting cycle by these trigger pullers," he said in a statement.

It takes 48 hours for the machine, located at the Montgomery County Detective Bureau’s Forensic Lab, to return results.

Funding for the machine came from the federally-run Liberty Mid-Atlantic High Intensity Drug Trafficking Area program, which works to help various levels of government and different law enforcement agencies work together to fight drug trafficking.