A SOPHISTICATED ‘bullet beater’ has been hailed for helping to slash gun crime in inner city Birmingham – to zero.

The ShotSpotter Gunshot Location System can alert police to the scene of a shooting within seconds and is used across America to tackle the country’s huge gun crime problem.

Since being installed in December, the system has recorded only one incident of gunfire – and that was the sound from a weapon police used to stop a car which was being pursued.

The bangs it has detected, which residents would previously have mistakenly thought were gunfire, were proved to have had other origins, such as fireworks.

Birmingham is the first city in the UK to use the system.

Under the initiative, acoustic sensors fitted to lampposts and buildings respond to the loud bangs of gunfire.

The system can pinpoint gunfire to within 25 metres, tell where and from what angle a shot was fired, the number of weapons used, their calibre and even if a gunman was moving at speed.

It has so far fired off 3,423 alerts to the police control room after registering a loud impulsive event characterised by gunfire.

The sophisticated software has indicated most of those bangs had innocent explanations and were not gunfire. Officers have been sent to 28 incidents where there were questions over the origin of the sound.