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Originally Posted by blondemoments  I don't know if that is tampering or not, but...
if they replaced the bolt and fired the gun to get the rifling, (and unless I'm mistaken) you would still need to match up the indention from the original firing pin which would be in the bolt that is missing.
oh boy, I can't wait to get jumped on because what the heck would a girl know about guns. |
You’re correct about needing the original bolt and pin to match it with the shell casing. But why would you need to? From everything that I’ve read the spent casings were not found at the crime scene but in the defendant’s dwelling and/or trash. If a spent case was found at the scene you would want to link it to the defendant’s weapon but that’s not the case here.
The friends of the defendant are charging that ballistics on the bullet weren’t done and I’m wondering if it was possible. We know a new bolt could be fitted to test fire the weapon for a sample bullet. I’ve ask if fitting a new bolt would be allowed under rules of evidence and Spike believes it would be. It was said that the bullet that was recovered from the victim was in two large fragments. The next question to ask is if there is enough rifling intact on those fragments to find the necessary number of points to match it with a test bullet.
If I was a defense attorney I would want to know if a test could have been done at all. If it could have and wasn’t I probably wouldn’t want it done now. A positive match could sink the appeal. I would attempt to argue negligence on the part of the prosecutor for failing to attempt to gather all of the evidence. If a test could not have been done it takes the issue off of the table.