Department: Institute of Forensic Sciences
Department Head/Elected Official: Luis A. Sanchez, M.D., Executive Director & Chief Medical Examiner
Regular or Supplemental RCA: Regular RCA
Type of Request: Grant
Project ID (if applicable): CJD #4691301
Vendor/Entity Legal Name (if applicable): N/A
MWDBE Contracted Goal (if applicable): N/A
MWDBE Current Participation (if applicable): N/A
Justification for 0% MWDBE Participation Goal: N/A - Goal not applicable to request
Request Summary (Agenda Caption):
title
Request by the Institute of Forensic Sciences for approval to submit an application to the Office of the Governor/Criminal Justice Division for grant funds in the amount of $128,787, with no required match, for the FY 2024 Criminal Justice Grant Program.
end
Background and Discussion:
Our Firearms Identification laboratory provides service to over 30 law enforcement agencies in Harris County. The laboratory processes predominantly two types of cases. The first are "comparison cases," where fired evidence items such as bullets and/or cartridge cases are microscopically compared to each other to determine if they were fired from the same unknown weapon or to test fired items to determine if they were fired from a particular weapon. The second case type are guns recovered with no fired evidence for comparison. The National Integrated Ballistic Information Network (NIBIN) is a national database of digital images of cartridge cases that were found at crime scenes and test-fired from confiscated weapons. These images can be searched against each other for possible matches, potentially linking one gun to multiple crimes. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) manages this system and provides the Integrated Ballistic Identification System (IBIS) imaging equipment to crime labs around the country. Guns collected for this purpose are test-fired and the resulting cartridge cases are imaged using the IBIS equipment for entry into...
Click here for full text