An analysis from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosive (ATF) could not conclusively connect a bullet fragment recovered during Charlie Kirk’s autopsy to the rifle found near the scene of the rightwing political activist’s killing – and the FBI is running additional tests, lawyers for Kirk’s accused murderer said in recent court filings.
In the court filings, Tyler Robinson’s defense team also asked for a delay to a preliminary hearing scheduled in May, saying they need time to review the bullet analysis as well as an enormous amount of other material that could contribute to the suspect’s defense.
The ATF’s bullet analysis report has been kept private, but attorneys have cited snippets in other public filings that say the results were inconclusive.
The defense said in its motion that it may try to use the analysis to clear Robinson of blame during the preliminary hearing while prosecutors aim to show they have enough evidence against him to proceed with a trial.
Charlie Kirk’s killing was an inside job. Where was Erika? Where was Trump? Where are the Epstein files?
Erika and J.D. sitting in a tree S.N.I.P.I.N.G.
that made me laugh out loud
I doubt it. It doesn’t make sense to go after him specifically. His reach wasn’t really that big prior to his death. He like many other conservative grifters peaked in 2016, and he’s been declining ever since. It also doesn’t make sense because he’s a big Trump ass licker, and he never really wavered from that. There’s no reason to target him over someone like Tucker Carlson for example.
I think the simplest explanation is often what turns out to be the correct one. I think it’s more likely that some rando who hated him for either being too far right or not far right enough took the opportunity to kill him when they had the chance. Considering how the shooting took place in Utah, there’s definitely no shortage of whackos who would do such a thing.
If you’re going to report on bullet analysis, you need to also report on the evolution of the science. Which is to say, the way we understand bullet analysis from a show like CSI or something is incorrect. Bullets simply can’t be linked to firearms like fingerprints can be linked to people.
The way I understand the science is that bullet analysis tells us if a bullet is from a family of guns, not a specific gun like it was used in the past. Bullet analysis and be used to rule out a weapon, not to directly tie one to a crime. This article doesn’t tell us the gun was eliminated like it suggests.
DJ Trump did Kirk 11.
Can Kirk fuel meld Trumps beam?
This is a nothing statement. It just means that they can’t definitively prove what rifle fired the bullet. It’s something that happens all the time, and there’s plenty of other evidence for them to convinct. Plus that motherfucker is still worm food, so it doesn’t really matter anyway.
It’s not a “this proves Tyler Robinson is innocent” but it casts substantial doubt on the prosecution’s claims. Once they start talking about shot angle and where Robinson supposedly was at the time of the shooting, having this part about the bullet already out of the way will likely clear him… and then we’re going to have proof that someone other than Robinson killed Kirk.
It doesn’t help the state too much that the sheriff responsible for this situation investigation just resigned.
While I’m not deluded enough to dismiss the efficacy of political violence, I’m not keen on having this guy running around out in the wild either. Much like any action, consequences are inevitable, and you l one has to be ready to be on the receiving end of them. That said if he gets off because the cops/prosecution shit the bed, I’m not gonna lose any sleep. ACAB and Charlie Kirk sucked.
There was also the guy the said he did it immediately after it happened. At best they can prove at this point that Tyler Robinson thought he killed Kirk and nobody else nearby had the tools to do it.
I’m sure the autopsy will contain the truly damning evidence because of the shot angle.
They have DNA.
there’s plenty of other evidence for them to convinct
Like confessing to the trans roommate? That was surely planted evidence.
Not surprising. Since high velocity rifle bullets very often get very deformed on impact and some are even specifically designed to fragment on impact. Unlike low velocity pistol rounds which don’t move fast enough to deform a lot.
People need to stop watching CSI reruns.
Here’s the "I don’t read articles " take
Turns out face enlargement surgery has serious side effects.
Can’t wait for the 2nd shooter theories. Didn’t Kirk’s head jerk back, and to the left?
It was spontaneously created by the Almighty. You didn’t need proof of the bullet’s firing. You just need strong enough belief. If God came down and snatched the bullet from Trump’s ear, he also placed this one.
A disturbing number of people seem to be reading this as:
“The bullet does not match the gun.” i.e. that there is ‘proof’ that the bullet didn’t come from his gun
Instead of
“They can’t say if it is or is not from the gun due to being a small fragment and not an entire bullet”
It probably doesn’t help that there are a bunch of communities/subreddits who’ve editorialized the headlines to say ‘bullet does not match gun’ and the tendency of people to only read the headline.
Ballistics analysis is mostly fake science, like a lot of so called “forensic science.”
Arson investigation is almost totally junk science.
Yes, and…
The way I understand the evolution of bullet science is that the days are gone when bullets can be used like finger prints because too many cases have been overturned.
The way we should be thinking about this type of forensics is that it can link a bullet to a family of guns ie “this could have been the weapon or this couldn’t have been the weapon” - it’s almost never definitive, in the affirmative.
The headline here could also be “bullet investigation does not rule out Robinson as the shooter”.
It’s a non-story.
The thing that happened is that the defense asked for more time before the trial. This is incredibly common and will likely happen in every criminal case multiple times.
From a legal point of view, nothing important is happening here. Reporting on this is about as relevant as writing an article stating the the judge called the court in session.
The only reason that it is getting traction is because the headlines can be crafted to attract the conspiratorial-minded people by focusing on one tiny part of that motion that is useless without the context of the full report.
It’s entirely clickbait/conspiracy nonsense.
What’s annoying is that it works. That’s the world we live in.
We have either boomers who are too plugged into crime shows or whathaveoyou eating up this nonsense…or conspiracy nuts all over the place looking for a fix.
Same shit (even if it’s different) is going on in the Luigi case. Just because they dropped the death penalty doesn’t mean he’s going free.
Under the requirement to prove beyond reasonable doubt, “they can’t say if it is or is not from the gun” is huge, having a gun becomes circumstantial, and requires additional evidence, and depending on the strength of additional evidence, a good lawyer maybe able to get him off the hook.
There’s a lot of other evidence, I think you’re substantially grasping at straws with “a good lawyer may be able to get him off the hook.”
OJ’s glove didn’t fit, therefore he’s innocent
Using this metaphor, OJ’s glove is shredded to pieces so determining if it fits or not is not possible.
I have read somewhere that the whole “bullet forensics” process is mostly pseudoscience anyway. A quick search found this article:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-field-of-firearms-forensics-is-flawed/
If a shell casing wasn’t ejected on the scene (like with a bolt-action not cycled) then all they would have to analyze is the what’s-left-of-bullet which is possibly just a mess of lead and copper. May or may not have rifling marks left on it
Yeah, shits not like on TV.
In fact, one of the big reason it’s like that on TV, is just so when cops lie in real life, idiots believe them.
They consistently tell suspects “we know your gun fired the bullet” but they don’t, at most for handguns they can say “a glock fired it” because they use weird octagon rifling.
Matching it to a specific firearm is impossible unless the barrel is real fucked up in a unique way.
A 30-06 will have such massive deformation, I’d be shocked if any rifling is identifiable.
That doesn’t mean the person they claim is the shooter really is tho, all types of shit happened immediately after that only make sense if there was a cover up.
But anyone expecting a bullet to be “matched” to a rifle been watching too much CSI
Which really sucks because the juries are all full of tv forensics knowledge, so when cops lie or bend the truth I bet they eat it up
Yeah, shits not like on TV.
I was so sad when I found out she was a fake Goth Girl.
Not as bad as when I met Elvira at a signing in the '00s and a middle aged blond woman wearing Mom Jeans and a sweater had taken her place.
Now I’m older and realize that Elvira is very busy and can’t be everywhere at once, so that’s why she hires helpers to fill in for her sometimes.
Now I’m older and realize that Elvira is very busy and can’t be everywhere at once, so that’s why she hires helpers to fill in for her sometimes.
🤭
Is that the scene the other fellow ‘helps’ by also typing on the same keyboard?! 🤣
Lovely duet
I’m somewhat of a visual basic GUI expert myself
Yeah, and another guy “solves” it by unplugging the computer.
Yeah the boomer.
Basically CBS is just Boomer Copaganda.
Pick any govt agency with an acronym and CBS probably made a show from it.
It always was, but now that MAGA owns it, it’s getting really bad. They showed up to a murder scene, and it turns out to be some version of law enforcement, and they had to have a forced scene where they all gathered around the body and got emotional about someone they don’t know, simply because he was some cap adjacent person, then got back to work.
Also, all the bad guys are now Muslims and terrorists and immigrants and such. I was expecting that.
I did notice on NCIS that they are still saying Department of Defense and SecDef. Maybe CBS doesn’t approve of Department of War.
The whole CBS line-up is turning into government copaganda - NCIS, FBI, CIA, Marshals, etc.
A 30-06 will have such massive deformation
The article describes a fragment, which is beyond mere deformation. That’s unsurprising with a high-velocity rifle round and would typically be impossible to conclusively match to the weapon that fired it. It could be possible to exclude a particular weapon (wrong caliber, obviously different rifling, etc…).
They don’t seem to be denying fragmentation/massive deformation. In fact, the crux of their comment relies on that fragmentation.
That massive deformation of the bullet comes from massive force, that didn’t happen to kirk’s neck.
The point is that, with the amount of force in applied to fragment this bullet, we do not see a similar amount of force applied to Charlie’s neck. There was no large exit wound, and the projectile did not appear to impact his spine.
That massive deformation of the bullet comes from massive force, that didn’t happen to kirk’s neck.
Have you even looked at the evidence? You people are fucking sheep.
Article says “fragment”. Have you seen otherwise?
Did the bullet stop in some conveniently placed ballistics gel behind Kirk?
That round would have turned his neck into hamburger.
Hunting rifles like that are usually going to make a small entrance wound and larger exit wound. I haven’t seen exactly what happened to kirk because I don’t like to watch people die. But I can say from experience with deer hunting that it’s plausible for that rifle to make a narrow wound channel through a person, while being extremely deadly to them, not making a huge wound outside.
Basically those high powered rounds are made to penetrate well through large animals, tougher than humans. Expanding and deforming of the round is intended to begin well after penetration, unlike the way handgun bullets are designed.
So I think it’s totally possible that Robinson did it even though the bullet isn’t able to be matched
The demonstrations I have seen with this rifle, with all types of ammunition including Old World War One ammunition that is less powerful, there’s a fist sized exit wound and bones in the neck would be broken.
Neat - that in no way answers my question.
Why are you asking me, I am denying it was that gun at all. The story is bs^3.
I’m asking you because you said
That massive deformation of the bullet comes from massive force, that didn’t happen to kirk’s neck.
Have you even looked at the evidence?
It sounds like you’re saying the bullet wouldn’t have been deformed and that you’ve seen some evidence to that end.
Same with fingerprinting and blood spatter analysis. There is very little within the field of forensics that is backed by science.
“We’re 100% certain the one responsible for destroying the eucalyptus bush is either you or this koala. Why don’t you just admit it now and save yourself some trouble?”
*munches on leaves*
It was the koala!
Eats shoots and leaves!
The sinister panda that has been lurking around the scene of the crime chuckles to itself and capers off.
gangster koala
have you not heard what terrible beings koalas are?
not anymore fingerprinting, a study came out recently how fingerprints can be very similar to one or another
There are points of similarity in fingerprinting, and every state has their own number of points to be a match. They all accept them as evidence.
There are points of similarity in fingerprinting, and every state has their own number of points to be a match.
You mean they bring in an “expert” to testify that the fingerprints match… and when you give 2 “experts” the same set of fingerprints to compare, they literally come to disagreeing conclusions in 50% of tests
It is not a scientific or analytical process with scientifically identified “points of similarity”, its just a person who is deemed an “expert”, who looks at 2 fingerprints and says “yeah these look similar, and they look similar in X different places so 👍”
There are the actual standards, then there are prosecutors perverting them. Prosecutors are the least trustworthy people on the planet. Total pieces of shit, no argument here. But fingerprints themselves aren’t junk science as I’ve read, not like past hair analysis, blood spatter, bite mark analysis, 911 voice recording analysis, or any number of other junk sciences. As I understand it.
But don’t let me dismiss your point out of hand, what gave you this opinion, did you read something as such, you have a source on this?
I searched and couldn’t find any information about fingerprints not being admissible in any courts. I’ve found a lot of stories about how they aren’t 100% accurate (closer to 95-99 percent), but not one story about how fingerprints were not admissible.
Where are these “many courts” that don’t accept fingerprints?
Did you try?
fingerprint evidence is not currently permitted to be reported in court unless examiners claim absolute certainty that a mark has been left by a particular suspect. This courtroom certainty is based purely on the opinion of experts
https://science.psu.edu/news/barriers-use-fingerprint-evidence-court-unlocked-statistical-model
Fingeprints are not admissable, just some guy’s opinion, because fingerprint identification has no real basis in science. And no, they aren’t 95-99% accurate (especially because it is just some guy eyeballing it), when tested by giving multiple “experts” the same set of prints, the “experts” come to disagreeing conclusions about if the prints match or not over half the time.
Oh, come on. You’re just being pedantic. Fingerprints are allowed as evidence in probably every court in the world, as long as they have been reviewed by an expert. Yes, technically it is the expert’s testimony that is the evidence, but that is the case with most “evidence.” Prosecutors don’t just show the jurors a medical chart and tell them to interpret that evidence. They have a doctor give testimony on why that medical chart means X, Y, and Z.
(https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4008377/)
8% false negative and 0.1% false positive… so 92% accurate in that study. Just slightly better than your “half the time.”
Computers can achieve 60% accuracy with contact-less scanning and 99.5% with contact scanning. A phone app can get 95% accuracy. Again, somewhat better than your “half the time.”
https://nij.ojp.gov/topics/articles/history-and-legacy-latent-fingerprint-black-box-study
7.5% false negative and 0.1% false positive.
https://www.uclalawreview.org/reliable-application-of-fingerprint-evidence/
FBI study showed 99.7% accuracy, and Miami Police study showed 95% accuracy.
Partial prints are much less accurate than full prints, but to say that fingerprint analysis is so inaccurate that it isn’t allowed in many courts is disingenuous. Expert testimony on fingerprint analysis is allowed in every court, which is what a normal person would mean when they say fingerprints are allowed as evidence.
I seem to recall that the debate is more about partial prints, which are often all that’s found at a scene. A “100% match” of a small part of a print isn’t the same as a 100% match to the whole print. And even full prints can be of varying quality: the print can be smeared to varying degrees, or on a substrate that allows for diffusion of the print once it’s made (e.g, an oily surface).
And even if it does, they’ll be so mangled as to be useless. Like you could say "ok the rifle has four grooves at 1:8” but you’ve got a fraction of a bullet that was squished into an entirely different shape on impact.
They have a sort of computer-aided 3-D reconstruction process, but that’s pretty sketchy, too.
“I asked ChatGPT and it said that gun fired the bullet.”
“I asked ChatGPT and it said that gun fired the bullet.”
“Youre absolutely right!!”
Enhance!
This is NOT Proof of anything at All!
-Pizzagate believers who call Michelle Obama a legitimate Man!
His neck just did that.
The front fell off.
I just want to be clear, that’s NOT supposed to happen.
towed beyond the environment
God must’ve smited him
erika grifting kirk already forgiven tyler.
Nah she forgave the killer (not TR)
I thought Charlie’s medical found lethal doses of fentanyl in his system.
There is no standard lethal amount of fentanyl. Someone who is naive to the medication could die from a very minute amount, while someone with experience and tolerance could do far more.
there’s actually a measure, it’s called the LD50.
I understand that, and thats probably a good rule for those who are naive to the medication. Tolerance does change the lethal amount on an individual basis so its hard to make statements on what would be lethal for a specific person though.
LD50 is based on the adult population as a whole.
You could see how that might be misleading though, to say that George Floyd was over the LD50 for fentanyl?
That’s not unheard of since LD50 literally stands for Lethal Dose for 50% [of a group]. There will always be those that can survive the LD50 as well as those that succumb to doses under it.
Does an ld50 actually take into account the extreme ends or does it just not impact the result much?
That takes no account of tolerance.
What about 220 grains of fent going 2400 fps into your neck?
Fent bullet incoming.
I don’t believe anyone here was saying there was.
You are correct though. It was obvious some conservatives wanted the execution, they just watched, to not be labeled an execution. “Self inflicted overdose” was a convenient excuse for them, so they ran with it.
They tried the same thing with Alex Peretti too. Disgusting behavior.
Source on that?
I’m confused. That’s an article about George Floyd?
Son, You make Molasses in January look swift.
Ok, just to check I’m not being too obcure I put my initial comment into Gemini.I asked it to explain the comment in the context of a post about the bullet that killed Charlie Kirk. It doesn’t know Kirk is dead, it did get the joke though. Now to the article, would you like to read the initial paragraph again please… Perhaps copy it into your next comment.
Prompt:
Explain this comment left under an article about the bullet that killed Charlie Kirk:
“I thought Charlie’s medical found lethal doses of fentanyl in his system.”
Gemini:
To understand that comment, you have to look at it through the lens of internet subcultures and political satire. It is a layered reference to the 2020 death of George Floyd and the subsequent memes that emerged from right-wing and left-wing online spaces. Here is the breakdown of why that comment was made:
- The “Lethal Dose” Trope The specific phrasing—“lethal doses of fentanyl in his system”—is a direct callback to the toxicology report of George Floyd. Following his death, many conservative commentators and social media users argued that Floyd did not die from police restraint, but rather from a drug overdose. By using this exact line in a comment about Charlie Kirk (a prominent conservative figure), the commenter is engaging in “copy-pasta” satire. They are taking a common right-wing talking point and “copy-pasting” it onto a situation involving a conservative to point out what they see as an absurdity or a double standard.
- The Context of the “Bullet” Article If the article mentioned a “bullet that killed Charlie Kirk,” it is likely referring to a viral piece of misinformation or a specific satirical news story. Charlie Kirk is alive; therefore, any article claiming he was killed by a bullet is either: Satire: (e.g., The Onion or The Babylon Bee style content). Misinformation: A hoax designed to trigger a reaction.
- The Irony of the Comment The commenter isn’t actually confused about Kirk’s medical records. Instead, they are using dark irony. The Logic: If a conservative argument suggests that a victim of violence actually died of a drug overdose to absolve the shooter/police, the commenter “flips the script” by suggesting that even if Kirk were shot, his “true” cause of death must have been fentanyl. Summary of Intent Mockery: To mock the arguments used in high-profile police brutality cases. Shitposting: To derail a serious or sensationalist headline with a well-known political meme. Parody: To act as a “mirror,” showing how certain political rhetoric sounds when applied to its own side. In short, it’s a cynical joke aimed at the way political deaths are litigated in the “court of public opinion.”
You used AI to explain a joke to you? Bruh
What’s the problem? It seemed to do a good job explaining it. As a non-American who didn’t get the joke either, it was helpful
They’re going for the ‘AI bad’ vote.
It doesn’t matter that the summary is correct and accurately demonstrates the user’s point.
Because they used AI, the people (who, mind you, responded to the wrong user and also didn’t read the article before responding) immediately jump to the conclusion that it’s bad.
I used AI to explain my own joke to myself? I don’t understand your comment.
Like the person I asked to re-read the initial paragraph of the article I linked, explaining the comment I made. I’ll ask you to re-read the initial paragraph of the comment I made explaining the joke I made.
I’m done with Lemmy for the day until you peeps start to read what you’re replying to.
People just want to comment with their hot take and don’t care to do things like read the article or look at the username of the commenter before responding.
Bolding mine:
If the article mentioned a “bullet that killed Charlie Kirk,” it is likely referring to a viral piece of misinformation or a specific satirical news story. Charlie Kirk is alive; therefore, any article claiming he was killed by a bullet is either: Satire: (e.g., The Onion or The Babylon Bee style content). Misinformation: A hoax designed to trigger a reaction.
Um, does Gemini not know that Charlie Kirk is dead?? (Yes I know AI doesn’t really “know” things)
I guess not. I don’t know if that’s because the training data is old. Or, there’s been so much satire around public figures dying that it was more likely article was satire than not. I didn’t inform Claude that it was a Guardian article, perhaps it would have changed response given that, thinking Guardian doesn’t post satire that often.
It got a lot wrong, LLMs aren’t trained to be factually accurate though. They’re trained on us, and we’re wrong all the time.
Thanks for attempting to explain it.
You seem to have gotten Gemini and Claude mixed up? Your previous comment only mentioned Gemini.
I’ll take the downvotes, but my Autistic ass didn’t get the satire, so I appreciate the explanation.
No worries, I meant it in a “Hurr Durr, even the dumb AI gets it, and it doesn’t even know Kirk is dead”, which was perhaps ablest of me.
Going forwards I don’t really know what I want to do about it. I don’t think I’ll stop making layered satirical comments, but posting the explanation along side feels like it’s taking the “bite” away from the satire.
Posting the explanation, without the snark, when someone obviously doesn’t “get it” is probably best. The person asking for a source for Charlie Kirk’s medical exam obviously “didn’t get it”. I should probably have posted the AI summary there to avoid most of the nonsense that followed.
The person who thought I posted an article about George Floyd obviously wasn’t going to respect my time by considering anything I wrote. The person who said I used AI to explain the joke to myself, also wasn’t going to respect my time by reading anything I wrote, there was no avoiding their nonsense. They deserved all the snark they got.
Going forwards I don’t really know what I want to do about it. I don’t think I’ll stop making layered satirical comments
Definitely don’t do that. I also like to make comments that mix puns and subtle references to niche culture/news wrapped in a dry delivery. But I am also fully aware that almost nobody will get the layered references, and sometimes that results in downvotes. It’s worth it when someone gets all the nuance though.
The person who thought I posted an article about George Floyd obviously wasn’t going to respect my time by considering anything I wrote.
Having not gotten the satire myself (or even recognizing that satire was in play, in which case I might have tried to interpret your comment differently), I took your words literally. That’s totally on me as I often miss the cues. But from that perspective the article was genuinely confusing as it seemed unrelated. I could be wrong, but I assume the other commenter was in the same boat as me and not trying to be inconsiderate of your words or time.
And the assembling the rifle story and the weird video of the kid and the fake text messages…
Links?
All the evidence is right here https://lemmy.zip/comment/25633783
Bullet tracing is mostly a TV fiction. This headline is just the natural state of things.
Especially for 5.56/.223 where one of the major selling points is the cavitation it causes in soft tissue. “cavitation” being a polite term for “makes fucking explode”.
Its why actual footage of mass shootings is so horrifying. Media (and video games that glorify it…) like to paint it as neat little holes when the reality is you have one neat little hole for the entrance wound and a giant fist sized one or larger for the exit.
And all of that does a number on the bullet itself.
… The official story is that Kirk was shot with a 30-06.
A 30-06 is not a 5.56.
The official story is that Robinson shot Kirk with a 30-06, his grandpa’s old bolt-action rifle.
Why are you talking about a 5.56?
That’s nowhere in the article, its not part of the official story / prosecution case.
I don’t think he meant to infer the shooter used a 5.56 or 223. I think he just wanted to flex what he knew about a rifle caliber.
The whole bullet gun fingerprint thing is total bullshit, but it’s not completely impossible to determine caliber depending on the size of the fragment which could rule out a specific firearm.
Gun “finerprinting” is and isn’t bullshit.
The reality is that for a given configuration of a gun, you do get some rather distinct markings on a bullet. It is less “We can 100% determine this bullet was fired by this bigoted dipshit’s gun so let’s hand it to him so he can dramatically show he took the firing pin out” but you can get within a pretty high level of confidence.
Unless… the shooter cleaned their gun. Even just field stripping can often be enough. Let alone if they actually remove the firing pin and reinstall it (not even replacing).
