content: This is incorrect, and an artifact of bad physics in school.  When you learn about the conservation of energy with potential and kinetic energy, you learn that the velocity/speed of the bullet will be the same coming down as it is going up at the same height. What you also learn, that's kind of gleaned over, is that you're assuming no wind resistance.  Once you add wind resistance on a 140 grain bullet, it ends up coasting to the ground with an energy just a FRACTION of it's initial velocity. This means the bullet is FAR from lethal on the way down.  The only way it'll be lethal on the way back down is if it's rotation/spin is conserved PERFECTLY through the apex/height of its flight. This rotation conservation will assure that the wind resistance is as minimal on the way down as it was on the way up. But the chances of getting the bullet to do anything but tumble on the way back down are slim-to-none.