A new bargaining chip for Ryan Bundy: Shrapnel in his shoulder

A half-inch piece of metal lodged in the shoulder of Oregon refuge occupier Ryan Bundy could become central to the federal government’s prosecution of an FBI agent accused of lying about firing two shots as police tried to arrest the 2016 takeover’s leaders.

When Bundy was arrested, emergency medics found him bleeding and wrapped his wound in a dressing.

He was taken to Harney District Hospital, where an X-ray revealed a metal fragment next to his right shoulder bone, presumably from a gunshot.

“There’s a bullet in there,” Ryan Bundy told The Oregonian/oregonlive. “I can see what it is. It’s shaped like a bullet.”

Bundy was in the back passenger seat on Jan. 26, 2016, as occupation spokesman Robert “Lavoy” Finicum swerved his pickup into a snowbank to avoid hitting a roadblock on the highway after driving off from a police stop. Oregon State Police and the FBI had moved in to arrest the key figures in the armed takeover Ryan Bundy, talking about the shrapnel in his shoulder that is coveted by federal authorities

of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge as they drove off the federal bird sanctuary.

W. Joseph Astarita, a member of the FBI’S Hostage Rescue Team, is accused of lying to FBI supervisors and Oregon detectives about firing two shots at Finicum’s truck. One hit the roof of the pickup and another apparently missed altogether, investigators said.

They haven’t found any casings or bullets tied to Astarita’s rifle, so the suspected bullet in Bundy’s shoulder could prove crucial.

The U.S. Attorney’s Office also has copies of the X-ray and a federal prosecutor said in court last August that talks were underway with Bundy’s lawyer to recover the object so government experts could analyze it as potential evidence in the case.

But Bundy, who represented himself at trial in both the Oregon occupation case and the 2014 standoff in Nevada near his father’s ranch, said prosecutors needed to deal directly with him. He said he had no lawyer representing him.

“If they want it, they can buy it from me,” he said. “I might work with them.”

If the metal is removed, forensic experts likely would be able to determine whether it’s from Astarita’s rifle.

That’s because each time a bullet is fired through the barrel of a gun, it becomes imprinted with grooves and microscopic imperfections, markings specific to a particular gun, said forensic consultant Ronald Scott, retired commanding officer of the ballistics lab for Massachusetts State Police.

Investigators would fire the same cal-

“If they want it, they can buy it from me. I might work with them.”