PEORIA COUNTY, Ill. – Thanks to a $372,000 grant, the Peoria County Sheriff’s Office now has advanced ballistic testing equipment of its own.
The National Integrated Ballistic Information Network (NIBIN) system became fully operational last week. The funding, awarded last June, came from the Illinois Law Enforcement Training and Standards Board.
Peoria County Sheriff Chris Watkins says their Crime Scene Unit can now process evidence in-house, allowing them to solve gun-related homicides and crimes faster.
“If we stop a car, and there’s a felon with a firearm, when we take that firearm, we do the test shots in our bullet trap box, we shoot it in there. That collects the bullet, but also provides that unique ‘finger print’ that the gun puts on that shell casing,” Watkins says.
With the new NIBIN equipment and software, the Peoria County Sheriff’s Office is no longer dependent on the Peoria Police Department to run ballistic evidence, as it has done for the past five years.
Watkins says the investment in NIBIN technology strengthens the PCSO’s ability to protect the community and quality of crime scene investigations.
“Especially with homicides, when every hour counts, we can get this uploaded in a couple of hours in the database. It can help tremendously in solving these cases quickly,” Watkins says.
How the NIBIN system works:
Shell casings from crime scenes or test fired guns are collected.
The IBIS system captures high resolution 3D images of the unique markings left by each firearm.
The images are uploaded to the national NIBIN database.
The system searches for matches to other shootings across the region or country.
When a match is found, investigators receive an immediate investigative lead that can be followed up on.
The Peoria County Sheriff’s Office is the first of its kind in Illinois to operate its own NIBIN system. The equipment was purchased and installed using grant money, with the IBIS system paid over a seven year period as outlined in the county’s budget documents.
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