"Low velocity bullet" = "ricochet around in skull" stupid myth

[Godfather]

A while ago, I saw a Kojak (new) episode, where there was this serial sniper who was using a .308 . According to the show, he used a silencer so that the supersonic crack would come from "90 degrees in the wrong direction". They also said he was handloading the bullets with less powder, not to make his silencer actually work, but so the lower velocity bullet would "bounce around" in the guy's skull "turning his brains to soup".

I thought that this was just localized stupidity till I picked up the TV Guide this week. Flipping through, trying desperately to find that actual TV listings (and noticing the chick with the Beretta on page 18), I spotted a photo of a .22 LR bullet, up close. The caption read ".22 Caliber. The hit man's ammo of choice, according to CSI medical examiner... The bullet's low weight allows slugs to ricochet around in the skull, thereby inflicting maximum tissue damage."

Am I wrong, or is this all asinine? A headshot is a headshot, right?

 

[armoredman]

Hollywood, the home of the 15 shot revolver, the silenced revolver, the 150 yard one shot stop head shot with a snub 32, etc. Hollywood is entertainment, nothing more....sometimes pretty vapid entertainment, at that.

 

[Preacherman]

It only works on TV scriptwriters and directors. They have incredibly thick skulls and minimal brain tissue, so the bullet can bounce around inside their heads ad infinitum.

 

[bogie]

FWIW, slower small-caliber bullets have been known to hit a head, and then travel completely _around_ the skull, under the skin, and later get dug out.

 

[Kurush]

According to the show, he used a silencer so that the supersonic crack would come from "90 degrees in the wrong direction".

Wow a ventriliquist silencer, I gotta get me one of those

 

[k_dawg]

lol.. as if a full-load .308 to the head wouldn't kill the person outright...

 

[mete]

The 22LR is notorious for being deflected in the body. The Pres Reagan shooting is an example the 22 bullet entered the chest , bounced off a rib and punctured a lung. I had a 22 deflect 45* in a woodchuck. ...In a suicide attempt with a 380 , a man in this area had the bullet go through the skin and go around between the skin and muscle wall.This type of thing has happened with dangerous game such as elephants where the bullet [things like a 458 Mag ] go between the skin and skull !And many a man was saved because the bullet was deflected by the hard rounded skull .

 

[BOBE]

Let's not forget that TV and Movies by their very definition is fiction.
Some are more blatant than others in their content. I don't watch all the alphabet named crime shows because I can't keep the plot in mind for all the technical inaccuracies.

 

[nfl1990]

The caption read ".22 Caliber. The hit man's ammo of choice, according to CSI medical examiner... The bullet's low weight allows slugs to ricochet around in the skull, thereby inflicting maximum tissue damage."

I have heard that a .22lr will bounce around in someone's chest, this was from a Secret Service agent who had been on Pres. Reagan's detail, and was talking about the shooting, and why the shooter used a .22 instead of something larger.

 

[XLMiguel]

It only works on TV scriptwriters and directors. They have incredibly thick skulls and minimal brain tissue, so the bullet can bounce around inside their heads ad infinitum.

And furthermore, since there's "minimal brain tissue" to be damaged, it's hard to measure, let alone percieve, any actual brain damage or after-effects of shooting a TV scriptwriter/director in the head . . . this explains alot

 

[carebear]

John Hinckley Jr. exited a bus in Washington, D.C. and checked into the Park Central Hotel on March 29, 1981. On March 30, 1981, President Ronald gave a luncheon speech to 3,500 AFL-CIO union delegates at a Washington, D.C. Hilton. Hinckley, standing among a crowd of onlookers outside the hotel, fired six shoots, exploding Devastator bullets, at President Reagan as he left the hotel surrounded by staff, Secret Service agents, and police officers. The gunfire hit President Reagan, police officer Tom Delahanty, Secret Service agent Tim McCarthy, and Press Secretary James Brady. The bullet that struck President Reagan malfunctioned, failing to explode on contact.

This from the police report in the archives. Anybody familiar with the "Devastator"?

 

[LaEscopeta]

I’ve heard the deal with hit men using small caliber, low power handguns is the round enters the skull but there is a good chance it won’t exit. Apparently this is important if you are shooting a guy in your own car, or in the back of your “social club.” No exit wound means less mess (also known as evidence) to clean up. Also the report is less likely to be heard, especially if it is fired inside. I’ve never heard or believe the bounce-around-inside-the-skull bit.

If I recall correctly, the round that hit James Brady (Reagan’s Press Secretary, shot when Reagan was shot, along with 2 L.E.O.s) in the head was a .25 caliber revolver round, and it did not exit. I guess if you get head shot, and are rushed to a hospital by the secret service, you can survive. If are Unlucky Luciano, and you get head shot in the back of the Ravanite Social Club, you get wrapped in plastic and driven in the trunk of a Lincoln to a construction site in Jersey, where you get buried in the foundation, weather you survive the head shot to not.

I’ve also heard Canada has outlawed small caliber handguns, because of their constant use by good fellas up on “fishing trips” from Chicago.

 

[carebear]

Sorry, I didn't paste in that part of the report. The revolver Hinckley used was an RG .22 LR revolver.

 

[mbs357]

the silenced revolver

http://world.guns.ru/handguns/hg102-e.htm

On the other hand, M1895 had some unusual and interesting features, one of which was gas sealed cylinder, which made the Nagant a rare example of revolver suitable for mounting a silencer.

;D

Not saying that every revolver that's supressed in movies are the Nagant, but it is possible to silence one...maybe just this one, though.

 

[armoredman]

The Devastator was a goofy trick bullet I fell for, when I first started carrying - JHP ammo with primers pressed in the cavity, and powder in the cavity under the reversed primer. Theory was, impact would fire the primer, cause the powder to explode, thus spreading the JHP to instant ful expansion. truth, very faulty, about 50% failure rate, and the ones that worked, (that I tried), did not impress me with expansion, in the wet phone books we tried them in. I haven't seen those things for 20 years or so.
I carried 10 of them in an Astra A-80...first10, then 5 JHP. Good thing I never used them in a SD shooting!

 

[carebear]

Primers in bullets? Yargh!

I'll stick with my standard JHP's.

 

[Hkmp5sd]

Wow a ventriliquist silencer, I gotta get me one of those

That is the purpose of a suppressor on a rilfe that shoots a supersonic bullet. The suppressor masks the sound of the bullet being fired. The only sound heard is the sonic crack of the bullet, which tends to make the bullet appear to be fired 90 degrees from the actual shooter's location.

 

[mbs357]

Which is the purpose of subsonic ammo, right?
(To prevent the mini sonic boom?)

 

[444]

The thing I always found amusing about these "bullets bouncing around" statements is the fact that a round like a .22 has very marginal penetration to begin with. Yet, we are expected to believe that it not only penetrates but it has enough horse power left to bounce around (more penetration). Now we are hearing about bullets "bouncing around" in the chest: what are they bouncing off of ? The ribs ? So, a .22 has enough penetration to penetrate the chest completely then richochet off the ribs on the opposite side of the chest, bounce off and continue to travel with the implication that this happens more than once ?

There are several "purposes" of suppressors on a rifle that shoots a supersonic bullet. One of them is that the rifle is about as loud as a .22LR when using it.

I wouldn't laugh too hard at the stuff you see on TV. I read stuff on this board on a daily basis that is just as ridiculous. Some of it is repeated over and over and I see it ever few days.

 

[El Tejon]

Inside the skull? Have never seen it.

Ricocheting around the outside of the skull? Have seen it a few times. All pistol bullets of minor caliber--a .32, a .25 and a .380 [the .380 creased the guy's skull in a straight line though].

Happens like this: Ray-ray and Ice Dawg doing bidness in parking lot. Both are nervous and bouncing up and down and throwing their heads side to side as they speak with their hands [thus usually drawing attention from witnesses--always a real good idea].

"Yo, yo, yo, dog, we gonna do this thang."
"Yo, yo, yo, dog, I gots what you needs here [produces pistol sideways and empties gun blindly]."

As the target's head is usually in motion and the pistol itself is being waved about [in a flicking manner as witnesses describe it], bullets have not penetrated but "bounced off" at angle.

 

[kentucky_smith]

We had a lady come in to the high school I teach at to talk about a high school shooting incident in Paducah, Ky. 10 shots with a .22 pistol killed 3 people, wounded 5 more including this girl, making this girl a paraplegic. Supposedly the single .22 bullet she was shot with ricocheted around her rib cage, puncturing a lung and lodged in her spine.

A member of my community was killed when I was about 16 with a .22 in an attempted robbery.

 

[wingnutx]

Hollywood, the home of the 15 shot revolver, the silenced revolver,

Ever see "The Villian"?

Ahnuld carries a "seven shot six-shooter". '

 

[R.H. Lee]

Talk to a doctor who has done autopsies, or a mortician who has attended autopsies and see if you still think it's a joke. A .22lr will/can do the same thing inside a ribcage.

 

[R.W.Dale]

I think that you guys are over thinking this. I can believe that something such as low powered as a handgun round COULD fail to penatrate in rare cases.After all the human skull is basically a hard sphere so an off center "hit" to that sphere could deflect the bullet. I've seen high powered rifle bullets hit all kinds of things and yet fail to penatrate ( Most cases involving a combination Hillbillies,Bush beer' Whitetail deer and various pieces of automotive sheetmetal.)

 

[History Nut]

Some Experience

Regarding bullets 'bouncing around inside the skull' I have seen a lot of X-Ray films with a bullet intact or fragmented inside a skull. Most of the time, they were approximately opposite the point of entry. Whether they 'bounced around' could only be determined by autopsy. Since I wasn't involved in the cases at that point, I don't know what might have been determined. A bullet cracking through the front of a skull (somewhat thicker than some other areas) will shed a fair amount of energy. It might shed enough to not be able to exit the opposite wall but have enough left over for a kind of rebound. Kind of like when a bullet bounces back at a shooter off a metal plate target. It would be shedding energy quickly as it is trying to make way in a fairly thick fluid-like medium. So a 'bouncing bullet' is a possibility. If anyone has access to autopsy reports of head wounds, they could enlighten us all with facts instead of suppositions.

Since there is at least an 'urban myth' regarding .22LR bullets in the head, they might be preferred based on that alone and not actual established fact.

I agree that TV is not a medium that is reliable for facts especially regarding firearms. Writers don't worry about facts if they get in the way of the 'drama'. My personal opinion is that they don't respect the audience to know anything so don't even try to get it right.