KANSAS CITY, Mo. -- It's going to be tougher for gangs to get away with violence in Kansas City, because officers have new weapons on their side, police said.

A bullet has a fingerprint when it is released from a gun, and the new technology in the Kansas City crime lab will make finding those fingerprints and the person who fired the gun easier.

When authorities collect bullet casings from a crime scene, they enter information about them into the National Integrated Ballistics Information Network. Their hope is that network can tell them which gun the bullets came from, which can help them track down the shooter.

The crime lab received a federal grant to hire a full time network case worker and another grant to purchase two new DNA robots. The robots collect and analyze DNA evidence more effectively.

Since the crime lab has had the network system, they have been able to generate almost twice as many hits in the past six months.

The U.S. Department of Justice provided the grants.