GIST: "A forensic scientist has deflected blame over failures to keep track of crucial gunshot residue used to link David Eastman to the scene of the ACT police chief's 1989 murder. The questioning of Victorian-based expert Robert Barnes, who worked on the case from the night Assistant Federal Police Commissioner Colin Winchester was shot dead, continued in the Eastman inquiry on Tuesday. The inquiry has already heard evidence critical of Mr Barnes' work, and questions were aired about his independence following his assurances to a senior Operation Peat detective that he was a "police witness".   Counsel assisting the inquiry Liesl Chapman, SC, asked Mr Barnes about his handling of green gunshot residue particles found in Eastman's boot and at the scene. Mr Barnes gave evidence about the particles, which would prove significant to the case, during Eastman's 1995 trial. But some of the records tracking the handling and movements of the evidence are missing. Some of the particles were never recorded as being logged with the Victorian State Forensic Science Laboratory, where Mr Barnes worked, after the expert took them from the Australian Federal Police in Canberra. Other particles are recorded as having come to the Victorian lab, but as never having been taken out by Mr Barnes for testing. The expert was questioned about what he had done with those particles. He responded by saying others at the laboratory must have made a mistake and not recorded their movements properly. Earlier on Tuesday, Mr Barnes said he believed that he was not subject to policies that forensic work should be peer-reviewed by other scientists. He said he was too senior for peer-review to apply to his work. "Simply because it was not possible, as I said your honour, to find people at that level," Mr Barnes said.".........His evidence continues on Tuesday afternoon."