Maryland scraps gun "fingerprint" database after 15 failed years

[alp227]

Millions of dollars later, Maryland has officially decided that its 15-year effort to store and catalog the "fingerprints" of thousands of handguns was a failure.

Since 2000, the state required that gun manufacturers fire every handgun to be sold here and send the spent bullet casing to authorities. The idea was to build a database of "ballistic fingerprints" to help solve future crimes.

But the system — plagued by technological problems — never solved a single case. Now the hundreds of thousands of accumulated casings could be sold for scrap.

"Obviously, I'm disappointed," said former Gov. Parris N. Glendening, a Democrat whose administration pushed for the database to fulfill a campaign promise. "It's a little unfortunate, in that logic and common sense suggest that it would be a good crime-fighting tool."

Full: http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/maryland/bs-md-bullet-casings-20151107-story.html

[GGJohn]

1. Another failed gun control law that cost millions of dollars and never

solved one single crime.

[virginia mountainman]

2. Well, when you pass crap into law,

The outcome is a forgone conclusion. I remember when they did it, I and many other folks said it would never work and we were right..

Notice how they still call it "common sense"...ROLFMAO!

[krispos42]

3. We've been saying for years it wouldn't work.

But that was just gun nutz sprouting NRA talking points, amIright?

Tsk tsk tsk.

[Straw Man]

4. New York scrapped theirs several years ago.

It too had failed to solve a single crime.

But just when it seemed that the powers-that-be were finally getting some sense, they went and passed the SAFE Act, with its "background check for ammo" provision and the need for a database for same. They spent close to $7 million to find out that it would have cost at least $100 million to make that system fully operational. Suddenly, the need for "safety" didn't feel quite so urgent.

[Kang Colby]

5. Good riddance...

If you wanted to buy a handgun without a spent shell casing from the manufacturer, you had to pay an FFL 07 $20-$30 to fire your gun once for you to generate one. After about 2004, Maryland State Police stopped doing anything with the casings other than dropping them into 55 gallon drums with thousands of other casings. Totally useless. But rather than discontinue the program in 2004, they kept it going 11 more years for the sake of appearances.

[pablo_marmol]

6. And yet California has demonstrated support for this nonsense.

Don't know where the issue currently stands, but it wouldn't surprise me if the PTB try to ram in through.

Because it's not about saving lives, it's about control. Specifically......"redneck" control.

[ileus]

7. Logic and common sense.....Bloomie talking points.

I suppose things never work out like on TV...

[Eleanors38]

8. Millions spent to prove in some way someones bona fides, somehow....

One of the halmarks of a prohibitionist movement is to never see a restriction one doesn't like; in this case, it took 15 yrs to discover the expense and waste of symbolism.

[DonP]

9. The Canadians figured it out much faster

It didn't take them 15 years to scrap their useless registry, but Quebec is still trying to keep it going, for some odd Franco/Anglo reason.