459 RECEIVED & FILED COMMONWEALTH 5 MASSACHUSETTS SUPERIOR COURT DEPARTMENT NO. 2282-CR-O0L17 NORFOLK, SS. CLERK “NORFOLK COL COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS, Plaintiff V. KAREN READ, Defendant (OMMONWEALTH Now comes the defendant, Karen Read (“Ms. Read”), and respectfully moves this Honorable Court to order that the travel costs and related expenses associated with defense expert Matthew Erickson’s December 2024 trip to Massachusetts be paid for by the ‘Commonwealth, Those costs—which include travel expenses, lodging and other accommodations, and expert fees associated with the trip to the Canton Police Department— were incurred after the Commonwealth agreed to allow Mr. Erickson to visit the Canton Police Department (“CPD”) so that he could perform an independent analysis of the CPD ExacqVision DVR system and any video footage it contained from January 29, 2022, between 12:00 a.m. and 11:59 p.m, When Mr. Erickson arrived at the Canton Police Department, all original DVR. footage from the relevant date had been destroyed, at best, due to improper preservation by the Commonwealth. Because the Commonwealth failed to preserve the original video evidence, Mr. Erickson’s trip to Massachusetts was futile. The costs associated with his travel to the Canton Police Department would not have been incurred but for the Commonwealth’s representations that the evidence existed, and that Mr. Erickson would be able to obtain an original copy of thevideo surveillance footage at issue. Accordingly, in the interests of justice, this Court should order that the Commonwealth, not Ms. Read, pay the cost of having her expert travel out-of-state to obtain a copy of the video surveillance footage, which the Canton Police Department (an agent of the Commonwealth) failed to adequately preserve.! FACTUAL BACKGROUND Ms, Read is accused of the following crimes arising out of the death of Officer John O'Keefe: Murder in the Second Degree in violation of M.G.L. c. 265, s. 1 (Count One); Manslaughter while under the Influence of Alcohol in violation of M.G.L. c. 265, s. 13 % (Count ‘Two); and Leaving the Scene of Personal Injury and Death in violation of M.G.L. c. 90, s 24(2)(a %4)(2) (Count Three). In preparation for trial, the defense requested access to the Canton Police Department (“CPD”) DVR system and drives that hold recordings from the CPD security camera system so that defense expert, Mr. Erickson, could obtain video files (in their native file format with all available metadata) from January 29, 2022, between 12:00 a.m. and 11:59 p.m. In order to ensure the accuracy and a complete download of all available data and metadata, the defense requested that their expert be allowed to make a mirror image of the DVR system’s drive. This video footage is of critical importance to the defense. The Commonwealth has provided the defense with CPD video footage on three occasions. On April 4, 2024, shortly ' A Motion to Dismiss for Extraordinary Governmental Misconduct based on the destruction of this, and other, exculpatory evidence is forthcoming. This motion should not be deemed a waiver of any such claims or issues. 2 Notably, when Mr. Erickson arrived at the CPD to extract video from the DVR System, the security camera system was set to overwrite older video surveillance footage with new video surveillance footage after approximately 30 days. Notably, however, each of the three instances in which the Commonwealth produced CPD footage to the defense was far outside the 30-day 2the Commonwealth produced footage from the CPD Main before the first tril in this matter. Driveway and CPD Sallyport Front Wall for the very first time. See NOD XXXV. The Sallyport Front Wall footage provided by the Commonwealth omitted a 42-minute interval during which the SUV arrived at the CPD Sallyport Garage. Trial Transcript, vol. 28 at 31:9-31:22. This missing footage could have been used to show the condition of the SUV’s right taillight upon arrival at the sallyport, and to date, would be the only footage that serves this purpose. Trial ‘Transcript, vol. 28 at 32:10-33:4. The condition of the right rear taillight of the Lexus SUV at the time it entered law enforcement custody is perhaps one of the most critical and highly- contested issues in this case. Mid-trial, on April 23, 2024, vie a share link entitled “Additional Sally Port Video Download Link,” the Commonwealth produced additional footage from the CPD Sallyport Back ation that the footage of Ms. Wall. At trial, Trooper Yuriy Bukhenik testified on direct exat Read’s vehicle from this interior sallyport camera was an accurate depiction of the sallyport and the SUV—and that, as seen in the video, no law enforcement officer approached the right rear taillight. Trial Transcript, vol. 26 at 166:15~167:8; Trial Transcript, vol. 27 at 93:3-93:11. On cross examination, however, it became apparent that the video surveillance footage displayed on direct examination was inverted and a mirror image of reality, despite neither the ‘Commonwealth nor Trooper Bukhenik having mentioned it on direct examination. Trial window after which the CPD DVR system was set to overwrite older video recordings. See, infra, pp. 5-7. Thus, an agent of the Commonwealth must have saved all of the aforementioned footage in playable format at some point before the end of the 30-day period, which ended in February 2022, The Commonwealth therefore had care, custody, or control of all of the footage produced to date during the discovery phase of the initial trial and chose not to turn it over to defense in a timely manner.Transcript, vol. 27 at 95:8-95:17, 99:8-99:14. Therefore, when the video appeared to show a person standing near the left rear taillight of the vehicle, in actuality, that person was in fact standing near the right rear taillight (ie, the taillight at issue). Trial Transcript, vol. 27 at 99:21— 99:24, It remains unclear why this inverted video was withheld by the Commonwealth and produced to the defense in the middle of trial after the initial CPD surveillance footage was tured over by the Commonwealth, Most recently, post-trial, on October 10, 2024, the Commonwealth again provided new video surveillance footage, this time from the CPD church side exterior, first floor corridor, rear Jot main side, and rear lot cruiser side angles. See NOD XLVI. This footage shows Brian Higgins arrive in the parking lot of the Canton Police Department at 1:26 a.m., enter the Canton Police Department, and speak to some unidentified individual(s) on the phone as he is leaving the Canton Police Department between 1:34:52 and 1:34:56 a.m. Significantly, this material and relevant evidence, which establishes Brian Higgins was on the phone with some unidentified individual at 1:34 a.m., as he left the Canton Police Department shortly after O°Keefe’s death, ‘was withheld from the defense at the first trial. The video surveillance footage at issue was a major point of contention at trial—in no small part because the Commonwealth was utterly unable to establish any chain of eustody for the various clips of video produced to the defense from the CPD. The footage produced by the Commonwealth is rife with issues that call into question its accuracy and forensic viability— including the presence of the inverted video and the large-scale gap missing from the feed at the precise time at which Ms. Read’s Lexus should have been shown entering the CPD sallyport ‘garage, in spite of the fact that the Commonwealth claims the video surveillance feed is motion- activated. The fact that the Canton Police Department produced video surveillance with aninverted video and a gap in the footage at the critical moment (i.e. at the precise time Ms. Read’s SUV arrived at the CPD garage) is not trivial—it goes to the heart of Ms. Read’s defense. In response to the defense’s request, Special Assistant District Attomey Hank Brennan agreed to allow defense access to this critical information and to make the arrangements necessary for Mr. Erickson to extract video from the DVR system. Accordingly, Mr. Erickson traveled from Phoenix, Arizona to Boston, Massachusetts on December 11, 2024, and after making the arranged visit to the Canton Police Department, returned to Phoenix on December 12, 2024, The work Mr. Erickson did in connection with this trip, as well as the flights, hotel stay, Uber rides, and other accommodations associated with his travel to Massachusetts, cost Ms. Read a total of $12,229.57. (Affidavit of Matthew Erickson, at 17.) As planned, Mr. Erickson visited the CPD on the morning of December 12, 2024, to extract video from the DVR system. He arrived around 9:00 AM and was met by Coleen Crawford, a multimedia director and certified forensic video technician from the Norfolk District ‘Attomey’s Office, as well as three others. Ms. Crawford expressed surprise that Mr. Erickson ‘was there to extract video from the DVR and, relatedly, skepticism that the footage would still exist. Mr. Erickson subsequently asked whether anyone had accessed the system to determine whether the rélevant video footage was even present. They answered “no”, Notably, before Mr. Erickson made this trip to Massachusetts, counsel for the defense team spoke directly with Ms. Crawford, who was made aware of the footage the parties had agreed would be extracted by the defense, After photographing the relevant equipment, Mr, Erickson began recording and then accessed the system. Initially, it appeared to him that there were only 30 days of video history and, consequently, that the relevant footage had not been preserved. That impression wasn of the DVR system, where a search by confirmed when he navigated to the appropriate se day and time could be performed, and ran a search for January 29, 2022, between 12:00 a.m. and 11:59 p.m. That search returned zero results, Based on the size of the drives, the percent usage, and the remaining usable drive space, Mr. Erickson concluded that there was mathematically no possible way for the videos from January 29, 2022, to be present in December of 2024, when he performed this search, unless they were manually saved and/or properly preserved via standard forensic protocols. Next, Mr. Erickson began the process of generating any activity logs for the date of interest. This request ran for an abnormal amount of time without showing results. When asked whether the system had ever behaved this way and whether it could be expected to complete the request, the person on site who was most familiar with the system shrugged and said he didn’t know. After investing approximately 10 minutes into this and similar actions with no results, Mr. Erickson determined that the relevant activity logs were also’ gone. Mr. Erickson asked the individuals whether they had done a forensic extraction of the drives to get the original data, to which they answered “no”. He asked how they preserved video when they needed to, and they responded that they simply manually save the video from the DVR. Finally, he asked if they had a written protocol, in January 2022 or now, for saving video. They responded that they did not. The individuals refused to provide Mr. Erickson with a copy of the original video files that they pulled from the DVR system, stating that it had already been provided to defense counsel. When asked how they produced the footage to the court and/or the defense, they looked confused. Mr. Erickson clarified by asking whether it was provided on a USB drive, disc, or share link. They could not tell him for sure, but eventually said it was probably a share link.The way CPD technicians extracted the video data from their DVR system is insufficient for forensic purposes and has resulted in the permanent loss of the original surveillance video data, The CPD DVR system, like most, stores videos in a proprietary format, CPD uses the DVR interface to pick and choose which videos to save and then that data is converted by the system into a playable format. The resulting file is almost always of lesser quality than the original, and because it exists in a different format, the resulting file will not hash verify to the original. As such, forensic experts cannot properly test the authenticity and integrity of the video footage, Due to the Commonwealth’s failure to preserve the original surveillance footage, Mr. Erickson was unable to extract video from the DVR system footage from January 29th, 2022, to obtain relevant footage between 12:00 a.m. and 11:59 p.m., as previously arranged and agreed upon by all parties. Thus, the Commonwealth's failure to adequately preserve evidence has resulted in the destruction of (1) a forensically sound image or hash-verified copies of the video surveillance footage from CPD on January 29, 2022; and (2) logs establishing the individual(s) who accessed, manipulated, copied, and/or deleted the footage from January 29, 2022, from the CPD DVR System. Mr. Erickson left only with the audio and video recording of his work and photographs that he captured from the DVR menus, which demonstrate that the Canton Police Department and Norfolk County District Attomney’s Office failed to preserve all video surveillance footage and associated logs, both of which ate material and relevant to this case. " WARGUMENT I THE COMMONWEALTH HAD AN OBLIGATION TO PRESERVE THE, ORIGINAL DVR SURVEILLANCE FOOTAGE FROM JANUARY 29, 2022. In Massachusetts, “the Commonwealth has a duty to preserve exculpatory evidence for the defendant to inspect, examine, or perform tests on.” Commonwealth v. Harwood, 432 Mass. 290, 295 (2000) (quoting Commonwealth vy. Neal, 392 Mass. 1, 11-12 (1984) (citing Commonwealth v. Woodward, 427 Mass. 659, 678 (1998)). State courts “have repeatedly stressed the need for prosecutors. .. to do their utmost to preserve and present exculpatory evidence which is available to the prosecution.” Harwood, 432 Mass. at 295 (quoting Commonwealth v. Charles, 397 Mass. 1, 13-14 (1986)). Evidence is considered exculpatory if it merely “tends to diminish (a defendant's] culpability.” Graham v. Dist. Attorney for Hampden Dist., 493 Mass. 348, 361 (2024); Matter of a Grand Jury Investigation, 485 Mass. 641, 647-649 (2020). Any evidence which “tend{s] to impeach the credibility ofa key prosecution witness,” such as evidence showing that footage of the defendant's vehicle—the alleged murder weapon— has been tampered with or altered, “is clearly exculpatory.” Harwood, 432 Mass. at 296 (quoting Neal, 392 Mass. at 11). I _ FOR THE LOSS OF THE ORIGINAL DVR SURVEILLANCE FOOTAGE, MS. READ IS ENTITLED, AT MINIMUM, TO RECOVERY OF EXPERT- RELATED EXPENSES. “{WJhen potentially exculpatory evidence is lost or destroyed,” as here, “a balancing test tenes and extent of remedial action. The courts must is employed to determine the appro} weigh the culpability of the Commonwealth, the materiality of the evidence and the potential prejudice to the defendant.” Commonwealth v. DiBenedetto, 427 Mass. 414, 419 (1998) (quotations and citation omitted). See also Harwood, 432 Mass. at 295 (same) (citing Commonwealth v. Hunter, 426 Mass. 715, 718 (1998); Commonwealth v. Olszewski, 401 Mass.749, 757 (1988); Commonwealth v. Heath, 89 Mass. App. Ct. 328, 333 (2016) (same); Commonwealth v. Kee, 449 Mass. $50, $54 (2007) (same). Here, the balancing test indicates that the Commonwealth is culpable for the loss of the original footage, the footage was material evidence, and its loss prejudiced Ms. Read. a. The Commonwealth is culpable for the loss of the original DVR footage. Critically, for purposes of this balancing test, the Commonwealth is culpable for the conduct of its agents, and “culpable” conduct includes actions ranging from intentional to negligent and inadvertent, See Harwood, 432 Mass. at 295 (citing Olszewski, 401 Mass..at 757 1n.7). Therefore, the failure of Canton Police Department to preserve the footage—whether intentional, reckless, negligent, or inadvertent—is attributable to the Commonwealth. See Harwood, 432 Mass. at 298 (“The prosecutor's obligations for proper handling of exculpatory evidence extend to material in the possession or control of members of the prosecutor's staff and ‘any others who have participated in the investigation or evaluation of the case and who either regularly report or with reference to the particular case have reported to his office.’") (quoting ‘Woodward, 427 Mass. at 679 (internal citation omitted)) (citing Commonwealth v. Martin, 427 Mass. 816, 824 (1998). Here, the Canton Police Department was in possession of the footage, knew that it was potentially exculpatory before it was lost,? and failed to preserve it. Relevant members of the Norfolk County District Attomey’s Office also failed to take steps to have the data preserved. 2 The relevant footage was from January 29, 2022. Ms, Read was arrested just three days later, on February 1, 2022, and arraigned on February 2, 2022, by Assistant District Attomey Adam Lally. The Commonwealth was thus on notice about the potential use of the footage with ample time to properly preserve it, even if footage was normally set to delete after 30 days. 9See Harwood, 432 Mass. at 298-99 (upholding lower court decision that “the Commonwealth ‘was responsible for the inadvertent loss of the evidence, and was culpable for its failure to preserve exculpatory evidence,” given “the failure of the assistant attorney general to be sure that the file was preserved, and [ ] the negligence on the part of [the allegedly defrauded company, which was working with the prosecution] in misplacing the file.”) (internal quotations omitted), b. The original DVR footage was material. “Evidence is material if, in considering the entire record, it creates a reasonable doubt as to the defendant's guilt that would not otherwise exist.” Harwood, 432 Mass. at 295-96 (reasoning that the Commonwealth’s failure to preserve the original letter prejudiced the defendant because the original was necessary to know whether the signature was forged, and because if it was not, “the Commonwealth's principal witness may be impeached and the defendant's case substantially advanced”) (citing Commonwealth v. Otsuki, 411 Mass, 218, 231 (1991); Commonwealth v. Phoenix, 409 Mass. 408, 414 (1991)). Here, the relevant video evidence speaks to the state of Ms, Read’s vehicle immediately after John O’Keefe’s death, as well as the handling of that vehicle by CPD, both of which are key issues in this case. In some cases, itis important for the Commonwealth to maintain and preserve the original piece of evidence, rather than a copy. Compare Harwood, 432 Mass. at 297 (finding that loss of original letter prejudiced defendant because defense expert could not determine authorship based on photocopy, where authorship was relevant to fraud claim) with Commonwealth v. Buckley, 410 Mass. 209, 218-19 (1991) (finding that loss of original paper bag with handwriting found at homicide scene did not prejudice defendant because handwriting expert stated that photograph of the bag was adequate for his analysis and testimony was based on the photograph, which defendant had access to). This is one such case. First, the original DVR. data and footage was necessary for proper analysis of the authenticity and integrity of the 10video—both of which are actually at issue here. That is especially concerning in this case, where there is substantial evidence suggesting that the videos have, in fact, been altered, despite claims to the contrary by the Commonwealth and its agents.* Second, because of the methods used by CPD to access a playable format of the surveillance footage, the videos ultimately produced by the Commonwealth are of lesser quality than the original footage. For these reasons, the fact that the videos are available in some form is not sufficient. The videos, in their original format, were ‘material and should have been preserved. c. The loss of the original DVR footage prejudices Ms. Read. As detailed above, there is significant evidence that the DVR footage provided to defense and shown at trial was altered. The fact that the original DVR footage is now permanently unavailable hinders Ms. Read’s ability to demonstrate the differences between the original footage and the footage provided to defense and shown at trial—differences suggesting the footage was tampered with or otherwise altered—and deprives her of critical evidence about how those differences came to be. Contra Phoenix, 409 Mass. at 414 (defendant was not prejudiced by loss of original bloody fingerprint where both experts testified that inconsistencies between the original and photograph could be identified and fully explained, without the original, by the different conditions under which each print was obtained, and where no evidence suggested the blood contained in the original could be used for DNA testing). Ultimately, the loss of this, evidence in its original format, which resulted directly from the actions and inactions of the Commonwealth and its agents, hinders Ms. Reads ability to put on an adequate defense. « Specifically, the surveillance footage produced by CPD included an inverted video and footage with significant ‘gaps, including gaps at the precise time Ms. Read’s Lexus entered the CPD sallyportg arage. n‘The loss of the DVR footage, in combination with the Commonwealth's misrepresentations, further prejudices Ms. Read by burdening her with a significant and unnecessary financial expense. The Commonwealth, by agreeing to and arranging the CPD visit, led Ms, Read and her team to believe that the relevant footage existed and that the defense’s forensic expert would be able to forensically extract the relevant footage iffhe flew to Massachusetts to visit CPD. Because of the Commonwealth’ representations, defense expert Mr. Erickson did fly from Arizona to Massachusetts, stayed overnight in a hotel, and traveled to the Canton Police Department for the agreed-upon imaging. Yet he was never able to perform the imaging, as the Commonwealth had failed to preserve the information. The Commonwealth failed to take any steps to determine whether the footage still existed before prompting the defense to send its expert to Massachusetts, despite an apparent understanding by CPD technicians that such footage did not exist. For the services rendered on December 12, 2024, and associated travel costs, Ms. Read paid defense expert Mr. Brickson’s employer, USA Forensic, LLC, a total of $12,229.57. This expense is significant and draws on the financial resources needed by Ms. Read to defend herself at trial in this matter. d. The appropriate remedy for the loss of this evidence is, at minimum, recovery of these expert-related expenses from the Commonwealth. Given the materiality of the lost evidence, the prejudice to Ms. Read, and the culpability \ of the Commonwealth, Ms. Read is entitled to a remedy. There is no particular remedy for the loss of evidence. Instead, “[oJur courts have fashioned or upheld various judicial remedies . . from allowing the defendant to bring to the jury's attention the Commonwealth's negligent handling of the evidence. . . to dismissal of the indictment.” Harwood, 432 Mass, at 302 (internal citations omitted). These decisions are within the sound discretion of the trial judge and are reviewed for abuse of discretion, Id. (citing Commonwealth v. Chase, 42 Mass. App. Ct. 12749, 759 (1997)); see also Kee, 449 Mass. at 558, Because the travel expenses and expert fees associated with this trip were the direct result of the Commonwealth’s representations to defense, and because the Commonwealth’s failure to fulfill its obligations of preserving the video made the defense expert’s trip to Massachusetts futile, Ms. Read is entitled, at minimum, to recover these costs from the Commonwealth. Il, ALLOWING MS. READ TO RECOVER THESE EXPERT-RELATED EXPENSES FROM THE COMMONWEALTH IS IN THE INTERESTS OF JUSTICE ‘Ms, Read is not indigent and therefore would typically be responsible for her own expert costs and fees, See Mass. R. Crim. P. 17 (providing for coverage of an indigent defendant's witness expenses by the Commonwealth, but not for coverage of such expenses for non-indigent defendants), However, the Commonwealth’s actions have caused significant unnecessary travel expenses for defense expert Mr. Erickson, and thus for Ms, Read. Accordingly, Ms. Read now seeks to recover these travel costs from the Commonwealth, To order the Commonwealth to pay these fees is within this Court’s discretion and is in the interests of justice. The interests of justice require the Commonwealth to bear the cost of having Ms. Read’s expert travel out-of-state to the Canton Police Department to copy files which the Commonwealth knew had already been deleted. To force Ms. Read to pay the expenses out-of pocket, when she is already prejudiced by the loss of evidence itself, would be a complete miscarriage of justice, Defense expert Mr. Erickson traveled to Massachusetts as part of an arrangement made between defense and the Commonwealth in which the Commonwealth represented to the defense that Mr. Erickson could visit CPD and extract the relevant footage. At the time the Commonwealth made that representation, it knew or had reason to know—via its agents, who were responsible for properly preserving the footage but did not, and via Assistant District Attorney Lally and Special Assistant District Attomey Brennan, who did not take the Bactions necessary to ensure the evidence was preserved by those agents—that the footage was not properly preserved and thus was non-existent, The Commonwealth induced the defense expert to fly to Massachusetts anyway, wasting Mr. Erickson’s and the defense’s time and causing the defense great expense, Ms. Read should not be forced to shoulder this unnecessary financial burden. The travel expenses and other costs associated with Mr. Erickson’s December 2024 trip to Massachusetts were incurred as a direct result of the Commonwealth’s failure to ‘meet its obligation of properly preserving material evidence. This misrepresentation came at significant expense to Ms. Read, who paid in total $12,229.57 for these expert services and the related travel. Because the Commonwealth arranged for the defense expert to travel to Massachusetts to inspect evidence that the Commonwealth had not properly preserved, itis in the interests of justice that Ms. Read be allowed to recover the related costs. 4CONCLUSION For the above reasons, Ms. Read respectfully requests that this Honorable Court grant her ‘motion to recover expert-related expenses related to defense expert Matthew Brickson’s December 2024 trip to Massachusetts. Dated: January 22, 2025 Respectfully Submitted, For the Defendant, Karen Read By her attorneys, ‘Alan J. Jackson, Esq, Pro Hac Vice Elizabeth S, Little, Esq., Pro Hac Vice Werksman Jackson & Quinn LLP 888 West Sixth Street, Fourth Floor Los Angeles, CA 90017 T. (213) 688-0460 F, (213) 624-1942 David R--Yarinetti, Esq. BBO #555713 Ian F. Henchy BBO #707284 44 School St. Suite 1000A Boston, MA 02108 (617) 338-6006 [email protected] [email protected] 1sCERTIFICATE OF SERVICE I, Attomey Elizabeth Little, do hereby certify that I served the “Defendant Karen Read’s Motion to Recover Expert-Related Expenses from the Commonwealth ” upon the Commonwealth by emailing a copy on January 22, 2025, to Norfolk County Special Assistant District Attorney Hank Brennan at [email protected]. Date 22, 2025 Elizabeth S. Little, Esq., Pro Hac Vice Werksman Jackson & Quinn LLP 888 West Sixth Street, Fourth Floor Los Angeles, CA 90017 T. (213) 688-0460 F. (213) 624-1942COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS NORFOLK, SS. SUPERIOR COURT DEPARTMENT NO, 2282-CR-O0117 COMMONWEALTH OF MASSACHUSETTS, v. KAREN READ, Plaintiff Defendant ee) AFEIDAVIT OF DEFENSE EXPERT MATTHEW ERICKSON IN IN SUPPORT OF MOTION TO RECOVER EXPERT-RELATED EXPENSES FROM THE COMMONWEALTH 1, Matthew Erickson, do hereby depose and state that the following is true to the best of my knowledge and belief: 1. Lam a Computer, {T & Mobile Device Forensic Analyst at USAForensic, LLC. I was retained as an expert witness by defendant, Karen Read, in the above-captioned ‘matter for the purpose of analyzing the current DVR configuration and obtaining forensic video surveillance evidence from the Canton Police Department. 2. On December 11, 2024, | traveled from Phoenix, Arizona to Boston, Massachusetts by plane to render expert witness services in the above-captioned matter. I stayed in a hotel for one night and returned to Phoenix by plane on December 12, 2024. 3. The purpose of my trip was to allow me to extract surveillance video from the Canton Police Department's ExacqVision DVR system in a forensically-sound manner which aligns with methods accepted and commonly used in the digital forensic community, as well as review any video footage preserved within the system from January 29, 2022, between 12:00 a.m. and 11:59 p.m. I visited the Canton Police Department on December 12, 2024, to do so. 4, Lartived at CPD on the morning of December 12, 2024, to begin my review of the DVR system around 9:00 a.m,, and was met by Coleen Crawford, who L was informed is a multimedia director and certified forensic video technician from the Norfolk District Attorney's Office, as well as three other individuals. Ms. Crawford expressed surprise that I was there to do this work, relatedly, skepticism that the footage would still exist. [ asked whether anyone had accessed the system to ”determine whether the relevant video footage was even present. They answered “no’ Notably, before I made this trip to Massachusetts, the defense team spoke with Ms. Crawford and she was made aware of the footage the parties had agreed would be extracted by the defense, specifically relating to the accepted date and time parameters that would be used for these processes. . After photographing the relevant DVR equipment, I began recording audio and video and then accessed the system. Initially, it appeared to that there were only 30 days of video history and, consequently, that the relevant footage had not been preserved. ‘That impression was confirmed when I navigated to the appropriate section of the DVR system, where a search by day and time could be performed, and ran a search for January 29, 2022, 12:00 a.m. to 11:59 p.m. That search returned zero results, Based on the size of the drives, the percentage used, and the remaining usable drive space, | concluded that there was mathematically no possible way for the videos from January 29, 2022, to be present in December of 2024, when I performed this search, unless they were manually saved and/or properly preserved via standard forensic protocols. . Next, I began the process of generating any activity logs for the date of interest. This request ran for an abnormal amount of time without showing results. When asked whether the system had ever behaved this way and whether it could be expected to complete the request, the person on site who Was most familiar with the system shrugged and said he didn’t know. After investing approximately 10 minutes into this and similar actions with no results, I determined that the relevant activity logs were also gone. . While there, I asked the individuals whether they had done a forensic extraction of the drives to get the original data, to which they answered “no”. | asked how they preserved video when they needed to, and they responded that they simply manually save the video from the DVR. Finally, I asked if they had a written protocol, in January 2022 or now, for saving video. They responded that they did not, . The individuals refused to provide me with a copy of the original video files that they originally pulled from the DVR system, stating that the information had already been provided to defense counsel. When asked how they produced the footage to the court and/or the defense, they seemed confused. I clarified by asking whether it was provided on a USB drive, dise, or share link. They could not tell me for sure, but eventually said it was probably a share link. I explained that getting a copy of the video files directly from them would help us ensure that we are working with the same hash-verified data that was disclosed to defense. They continued to advise that I me with any of the original video The way CPD technicians extracted the video data from their DVR system is insufficient for forensic purposes and has resulted in the permanent loss of the 18original surveillance video data, The CPD DVR system, like most, stores videos in a proprietary format. CPD uses the DVR interface to pick and choose which videos to save and then that data is converted by the system into a playable format, The resulting file is almost always of lesser quality than the original, and because it exists in a different format, the resulting file will not hash verify to the original. As such, forensic experts cannot properly test the authenticity and integrity of the video footage. 10. Due to the Commonwealth's failure to preserve the original surveillance footage, 1 was unable to extract the DVR system footage from January 29, 2022, to obtain relevant footage between 12:00 a.m. and 11:59 p.m., as previously arranged and agreed upon by all parties. 11, The plane fare, in total, cost $2,202.96, 12. The one-night hotel-stay, in total, cost $233.77. 13. Uber trips to and from the airports, hotel, and Canton Police Department, in total, cost $314.72. ‘ 14, Other expenses—snacks and beverages at each airport and WiFi on the December 11, 2024, flight to Massachusetts—totaled $103.12. 15. The fee associated with the 10-hour December I1, 2024, travel day was $375 per hour, or $3,750.00 in total. 16, The fee associated with the 15 hours of work performed—at the Canton Police Department on December 12, 2024, and in Phoenix both before and after the trip— was $375 per hour, or $5,625.00 in total. 17. In sum, the travel expenses, expert fees, and related costs associated with my December 11-12, 2024, trip to Massachusetts totaled $12,229.57, SIGNED and SWORN to under the pains and penalties of perjury this Z 2 day of January, 2025. Efe Matthew Erickson