The projectiles recovered from the victim's bodies are likely not to be intact bullets. An FMJ .223 bullet will often fragment inside the body; Soft and hollow-point bullets will deform and may also fragment severely.

The fragments of the very small bullet are usually extremely small, deformed, and mangled. This makes the firearm examiner's work particularly difficult when he or she searches for areas on the fragments that might have identifying striations which can be used to identify the actual firearm used. This is the reason it often takes many hours before each shooting can be confirmed to have been the work of the same shooter (the same firearm, to be more accurate.)

Because of the difficulty inherent in working with deformedfragments, it is likely that the bullet evidence in some of the shooting incidents will not be sufficient to identify to any firearm.

The surgeon who operated on the Ponderosa Steakhouse victim described the bullet's destructive effect on the victim's body. He said some of the damage was done by the bullet fragments " . . after it exploded." The bullet did not explode. There is a dynamic which occurs with many .223 bullet types: After going through a few inches of soft tissue, the bullet will yaw (turn sideways instead of point forward. This causes tremendous drag forces to act upon the small bullet.

The bullet will break up into smaller pieces and some of the fragments will fly off into other areas distant from the initial wound track. Those fragments make small holes in organs and other soft tissue which weakens their structural integrity. A temporary cavity is then formed (like a splash bubble) stretching the weakened tissue which often comes apart. This phenomenon only occurs for a few thousands of a second. While such .223 bullets are not "explosive bullets," their performance can resemble an "explosion."