Officer: police seized Smith & Wesson 9mm from Jaylen Bell; lab examiner says scene casing did not match that weapon

DALLAS — Police testimony and forensic analysis presented in the 187th District Court showed investigators seized a Smith & Wesson 9mm from Jaylen Bell but that the laboratory later excluded that gun as the source of a shell casing recovered at the scene.

Officer Jose Bernal of the Dallas Police Department testified that on May 7, 2017, he and a partner responded to an early-morning welfare check and encountered a rear occupant in a taxi. Bernal said a pat search revealed a handgun in the individual—eltline. The officer identified the weapon at trial as a black Smith & Wesson 9mm and confirmed the serial number stamped on the firearm was LEJ9244. He said the weapon, a magazine and related packaging were placed into property (entered at trial as State's Exhibit 135).

David Pendleton, a firearms examiner at the Bexar County Criminal Investigation Laboratory, described laboratory procedures and reported he tested that Smith & Wesson by firing the weapon to generate known sample cartridge casings. Pendleton testified he compared those test casings to the fired cartridge case recovered from the scene (State's Exhibit 35) and concluded that the two were not fired in the…