ATF testing guns to see if they can be linked to metro Atlanta criminals

DEKALB COUNTY, Ga. — The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms is taking guns off of the streets of metro Atlanta and is testing them to see if they can link weapons to criminals.

Channel 2 Investigative Reporter Mark Winne exclusively learned Thursday that the effort is proving to be a success.

One of those matches has been linked to a murder in metro Atlanta.

Nearly 200 guns recovered by the Georgia State Patrol have been test fired as part of this new program.

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Once fired, investigators can test the shell casings to see if they match casings recovered in other crimes. If they do, the name associated with that gun can then be linked to the matching crime.

So far, they have made matches on eight cases.

“There was a lead that came out of the test fires matching a crime scene casing that was entered under a homicide case with the Atlanta Police Department,” Special Agent Brian Moore explained.

Moore says that twice in recent months, they have pulled a trailer with a ballistic bullet trap to safely fire the guns.

He says the idea is to use the National Integrated Ballistic Information Network, NIBIN, a nationwide database, to see if the guns can be linked to gun crimes that occurred before they were seized.

Many of the guns that were seized were “ghost guns,” with the serial numbers shaved off to make it impossible to track, and guns with switches to effectively turn them into machine guns.

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Moore says the casings were sealed in an envelope and taken back to the ATF lab in DeKalb County for testing.

There, technicians entering the casings into NIBIN to compare it to thousands of others almost instantaneously.

ATF Special Agent in Charge Ben Gibbons told Winne that usually when an agency like GSP gets a gun later linked to a crime, they have the name of the person they got it from.

“It provides law enforcement the opportunity to interview that person and see where they were and how they link to that gun,” Gibbons explained.

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Lt. Michael Burns with GSP says that about 90% of the guns tested were seized during the special crime suppression details they have been leading since April 2021.

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