[CHICAGO, IL] – In a speech to the Illinois Municipal League today, U.S. Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) called on Illinois mayors to join him in his efforts to fight gun violence by tracing every gun recovered in the course of a criminal investigation in the state.   

Durbin is an enthusiastic supporter of eTrace, an Internet-based crime gun tracing program run by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) that is made available free of charge to law enforcement agencies. 

The crime gun trace data collected by ATF and aggregated through eTrace provides leads in criminal investigations and helps identify crime gun trafficking patterns and potential gun traffickers.  In Illinois, the large amount of crime gun trace data collected through eTrace has allowed law enforcement to identify numerous gun trafficking routes that supply criminals in Illinois.

“If we can reach the point where we trace every recovered crime gun, Illinois law enforcement will benefit from an invaluable crime-fighting tool,” said Durbin.  “My goal is to have every one of Illinois’ 1,200 law enforcement agencies signed up and actively using the eTrace system.” 

Durbin began calling for 100 percent crime gun tracing in Illinois a decade ago.  In 2006, after learning about ATF’s newly-created eTrace program, Durbin sent letters to Illinois sheriff offices and police departments encouraging their participation.  At the time the letter was sent, approximately 150 Illinois law enforcement agencies were participating in the eTrace program.  Within a few months, eTrace participation in the state increased by approximately 30 percent.  Today, 264 law enforcement agencies across the state participate in eTrace, including most urban sheriff’s offices and police departments. 

As compared to other states, Illinois has an excellent record on crime gun trace requests, ranking third in the nation behind only the more populous states of California and Florida.  In 2007, nearly 12,000 crime guns were traced in Illinois. 

ATF maintains a National Tracing Center that tracks information on recovered crime guns. The National Tracing Center database includes details on a crime gun's serial number, manufacturer, model, and chain of custody from manufacturer to first legal purchaser. The database also includes information on the type of crime the gun was used to commit, the recovery location and data, and the name of the criminal found in possession of the gun. The eTrace application provides law enforcement agencies with the ability to electronically submit these trace requests, to monitor progress of traces, and to retrieve completed trace results in a real-time environment.

Before eTrace was created, law enforcement agencies could only submit crime gun trace requests to ATF over the phone, on handwritten forms, or with special software.  These processes were slow, and miscommunications often led to failed traces.  The eTrace process is faster and more accurate, leading to a higher percentage of successful traces.  This helps law enforcement agencies link suspects to crime guns in criminal investigations.   

eTrace is also a powerful analytical tool for law enforcement.  For example, eTrace provides each law enforcement agency with a searchable database of all crime gun trace requests submitted by that agency.  This enables agencies to perform customized analyses within their jurisdiction to determine, for example, whether particular individuals have repeatedly purchased guns that were later used in gang crimes.