LASD phones and drives containing Kobe Bryant crash photos were wiped clean, according to forensic analysis

Kobe Bryant and his daughter Gianna Bryant. (AP Photo/Michael Owen Baker) A tech expert addressed the court on the sixth day of Vanessa Bryant’s trial against LA County. When county staff deleted photos, it became impossible to track their spread, David Freskos said.

When LASD staff turned in phones for analysis after the crash, 10 of 11 were new or wiped clean. A tech expert hired by Vanessa Bryant’s attorneys testified that Los Angeles Sheriff’s Deputies “violated fundamental forensic policies” when they deleted gruesome helicopter crash site photos and turned in brand new phones to independent forensic investigators. On the sixth day of Vanessa Bryant’s trial against LA County first responders who took and shared crash site photos of Kobe Bryant, Gianna Bryant, and others aboard the tragic January 26, 2020 helicopter crash, jurors heard from forensic expert David Freskos.

 Freskos explained that key data was deleted from the 28 devices belonging to LASD and LA County Fire Department staff who took and shared the photos, according to a forensic analysis conducted by tech firm Kroll Inc. The analysis, which happened in September 2021, showed that nine of 11 phones turned in by LASD staff were new phones from the time of the crash, and another – the phone that Deputy Joey Cruz used to show crash site photos at a bar – was reset to factory settings. “Upon Kroll’s powering on the device to extract the data, the ‘Hello’ screen appeared,” Kroll investigators wrote, adding that the phone’s data was “forensically unrecoverable.

“Freskos told the court that there was “no other way to determine” the spread of the photos other than to preserve the data and metadata on the phones, or at the very least to make a forensic copy, which none of the staff did, according to testimonies. “They did the opposite,” Freskos testified, adding that “metadata about dissemination was also lost. “Freskos testified that preserving the metadata from the devices would have enabled investigators to detail who sent the photos, when they were sent, and the date and time they were taken – all key elements in determining exactly how far the photos spread.

 Vanessa Bryant filed a lawsuit against the county and other defendants over allegations that LA sheriff’s deputies and Los Angeles County Fire Department captains took and shared photos of the helicopter crash site in late January 2020. “Information was destroyed that would have allowed us to understand the scope” of the dissemination, Freskos added. Kroll’s report added that retired LACFD captain Brian Jordan – who had shared crash site photos and stormed out of the courtroom 3 times while testifying – turned in a laptop with a missing hard drive.

 Attorneys for the County argued that “deletion was effective,” as it has prevented the public dissemination of the crash photos, and added that the deputies who brought in new phones did so independently in the nearly two years between the time of the crash and the forensic examination. Kroll concluded in its analysis of the devices that no photos or videos related to the crash were found on the phones, and there was no evidence of the photos being copied or transferred. Over the course of the last week, jurors have heard different reasoning from LASD staff as to why they turned in new phones.

Deputy Doug Johnson, the first agency member to take crash site photos, said he lost his cell phone in Las Vegas in January 2021. Deputy Raul Versales said that he got a new phone unrelated to litigation because he is an avid motorcycle rider and his camera lens broke while riding. Deputy Cruz, whose phone was reset to factory settings, said that when his “phone was breaking, malfunctioning,” he wiped it.

Deputy Michael Russell said that he had dropped his cell phone so many times that his screen malfunctioned in that time frame and Deputy Rafael Mejia said that he upgraded his phone in March 2021 and no one told him to keep his old phone. All of the deputies told the court that they had deleted the photos from their phones by the end of January 2020, per Sheriff Alex Villanueva’s deletion order. Read the original article on Insider.