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So if I read that correctly, the same image file was available to both the defense and the prosecution. When Kruidbos' discovery process found information that

So if I read that correctly, the same image file was available to both the defense and the prosecution. When Kruidbos' discovery process found information that the defense hadn't found, he was concerned that he should turn it over to them. Then he sought out a lawyer to parlay with the lawyers involved in the case, avoiding his office's chain of command. Well, I think we'd need a lawyer to say what should have happened here-- Does anyone know whether the state is responsible for turning over everything they pull out of an image? Or is it enough to provide the image to the defense?

ericcumbee 13y ago
the defense is entitled to all forensic reports and findings of lab work etc. which is what this would fall under.
- droopyEyelids 13y ago
  So it seems he was fired for hiring his own lawyer and contacting people involved with the case instead of talking to his boss?
  - shawndumas 13y ago
    FTA: "Kruidbos said he became concerned that lead prosecutor Bernie de la Rionda might not have turned over Kruidbos’ report to defense attorneys. ... [his lawyer] then contacted one of Zimmerman’s attorneys and learned the defense had not received the report generated by Kruidbos. He said he asked [his lawyer] for legal advice because he was concerned he could face “legal exposure” if the cellphone report wasn’t turned over to the defense before the trial started. He said he did not feel comfortable posing that question to anyone within the office because the State Attorney’s Office had just conducted an in-house probe of whether someone was leaking personnel information."
    - tsotha 13y ago
      Bernia de la Rionda is the one who should be fired. Along with the judge.
      - sejje 13y ago
        How does this fall to the judge? (I'm genuinely curious, I have no idea what her role or duties were regarding this.)
        tsotha 13y ago
        Oh, not for this particular instance. Just that she has ruled in such a way that Zimmerman is at more of a disadvantage than he should have been as a defendant.
  - andrewcooke 13y ago
    no, he was fired for making the state attorney look bad.
    - malandrew 13y ago
      ... as well he should be for not sharing information that should be shared with the defense. Making someone look bad when it is deserved and when it is not deserved are two very different circumstances. I would hope that any attorney that acts without ethics should be investigated and removed. If the system is not good enough to self-police itself, then we have a problem. Could he have instead gone to the state bar to raise his concerns? Is there an equivalent of a Dept of Internal Affairs that investigates prosecutorial misconduct?
      - andrewcooke 13y ago
        wut? i think one of us has misunderstood the article. sorry if it's me.
        malandrew 13y ago
        Huh? Now I'm confused. :)
mpyne 13y ago
IANAL but it seems to me the interests of justice would require informing both the prosecution and defense attorneys if a state agency finds evidence of any sort that would be relevant to a given case. Jumping the chain of command is never a good idea. At least send your boss an email (and BCC your gmail) to prove that you tried to go through official channels.
- shawndumas 13y ago
  FTA: As for why he did not approach Corey about his concerns in the Martin case, Kruidbos said Corey has a close relationship with de la Rionda and “any attempt by me to go to them and say I think something wrong has happened would not have been taken seriously, and then ultimately held against me.” “I consulted an attorney, which is my right,” he said. “I had concerns about what I had seen at work, and this was just how it ended up playing out.”
  - mpyne 13y ago
    Yes, it ended up playing out that an employee saw an potential instance of misconduct and did not try to correct it within the organization. By informing his boss (or their boss, etc. on up the line) he could have demonstrated in addition that the boss is corrupt and should be removed from duty. Now because of due process (there's no actual evidence that his boss wouldn't have actually done the right thing, the employee just assumed) the boss will still have her job and be in position to act contrary to the interests of justice in the future. And at this point his management has a reason to remove him from the job. Maybe he can fight it as a wrongful termination, but for now he's out of a job. I hope he gets his job back, but saying that your boss is corrupt is reason enough to give your boss enough rope to hang themselves IMHO.
    - anigbrowl 13y ago
      It's very hard to judge this situation, given that the case it relates to is so divisive. For people who believe George Zimmerman, this guy's actions seem heroic. For people who think Trayvon Martin was murdered, this will seem like an effort to taint the prosecution case.
nugget 13y ago
I watched the entire testimony on YouTube and from what I can tell, it boils down to this: - both sides had an extremely hard to parse, near unintelligible raw source file (data dump from the phone) - the prosecutor's office had purchased a software package that could turn this raw source file into a much more easily readable report - the prosecutor's office didn't think that the defense would pay the several thousands of dollars for the same software, in order to generate the same report - the prosecutor's office provided only the raw source file and declined to provide any of the auto-generated reports which were meant to extract data from, organize and allow for easier analysis of that source file - the IT guy knew this and was afraid that in the future, someone could claim he acted in negligence - unbeknownst to the IT guy, the defense had indeed purchased other 3rd party software and successfully analyzed the entire source file - the prosecutor hinted that the IT guy's testimony is him getting even for being the (unconfirmed) target of a leak investigation earlier in 2012 So does the prosecutor need to turn over the software-generated report to the defense? Or only the raw source files which powered the software? That's the question and I am unqualified to answer. But if it's the former and not the latter then the prosecutor messed up and was caught red handed.
- lawnchair_larry 13y ago
  Did they say which software was used? Was it EnCase? (Edit: Turns out it was cellbrite. They likely had EnCase for general forensics, at $3k, and cellbrite is another $8k, for phone-specific forensics). I find it a little disturbing that the choice of software, and particularly the cost of it, can mean the difference between going to prison or not. In this case, the undiscovered files included someone with a "black hand" holding a gun, text messages related to acquiring a gun, and some kind of marijuana product. None of those are relevant to the case, but do trigger prejudice or emotional responses, so it's probably good that they were left out. In another case, those might be pictures of a murder victim or some other critical evidence (of either guilt or innocence). It seems pretty unfair that accused with a public defender doesn't generally have access to this.
  - sejje 13y ago
    I think it's relevant given how much time the prosecution devoted to painting Trayvon as a child who was merely buying candy and returning from his childish errand back home, when everything occurred. If prosecutors want to paint a personal portrait of someone for the sympathy of the jurors, stuff like this should absolutely be included by the defense. In fact, I'd say it's their legal obligation to do everything in their power to have it presented.
hristov 13y ago
I don't think this is quite correct. The article says "The defense did receive the source file from the cellphone and used its own experts to extract data." So it is very possible, even likely that the defense obtained the same data themselves.

ericcumbee 13y ago

the defense is entitled to all forensic reports and findings of lab work etc. which is what this would fall under.

droopyEyelids 13y ago
So it seems he was fired for hiring his own lawyer and contacting people involved with the case instead of talking to his boss?
- shawndumas 13y ago
  FTA: "Kruidbos said he became concerned that lead prosecutor Bernie de la Rionda might not have turned over Kruidbos’ report to defense attorneys. ... [his lawyer] then contacted one of Zimmerman’s attorneys and learned the defense had not received the report generated by Kruidbos. He said he asked [his lawyer] for legal advice because he was concerned he could face “legal exposure” if the cellphone report wasn’t turned over to the defense before the trial started. He said he did not feel comfortable posing that question to anyone within the office because the State Attorney’s Office had just conducted an in-house probe of whether someone was leaking personnel information."
  - tsotha 13y ago
    Bernia de la Rionda is the one who should be fired. Along with the judge.
    - sejje 13y ago
      How does this fall to the judge? (I'm genuinely curious, I have no idea what her role or duties were regarding this.)
      - tsotha 13y ago
        Oh, not for this particular instance. Just that she has ruled in such a way that Zimmerman is at more of a disadvantage than he should have been as a defendant.
- andrewcooke 13y ago
  no, he was fired for making the state attorney look bad.
  - malandrew 13y ago
    ... as well he should be for not sharing information that should be shared with the defense. Making someone look bad when it is deserved and when it is not deserved are two very different circumstances. I would hope that any attorney that acts without ethics should be investigated and removed. If the system is not good enough to self-police itself, then we have a problem. Could he have instead gone to the state bar to raise his concerns? Is there an equivalent of a Dept of Internal Affairs that investigates prosecutorial misconduct?
    - andrewcooke 13y ago
      wut? i think one of us has misunderstood the article. sorry if it's me.
      - malandrew 13y ago
        Huh? Now I'm confused. :)

mpyne 13y ago

IANAL but it seems to me the interests of justice would require informing both the prosecution and defense attorneys if a state agency finds evidence of any sort that would be relevant to a given case. Jumping the chain of command is never a good idea. At least send your boss an email (and BCC your gmail) to prove that you tried to go through official channels.

shawndumas 13y ago
FTA: As for why he did not approach Corey about his concerns in the Martin case, Kruidbos said Corey has a close relationship with de la Rionda and “any attempt by me to go to them and say I think something wrong has happened would not have been taken seriously, and then ultimately held against me.” “I consulted an attorney, which is my right,” he said. “I had concerns about what I had seen at work, and this was just how it ended up playing out.”
- mpyne 13y ago
  Yes, it ended up playing out that an employee saw an potential instance of misconduct and did not try to correct it within the organization. By informing his boss (or their boss, etc. on up the line) he could have demonstrated in addition that the boss is corrupt and should be removed from duty. Now because of due process (there's no actual evidence that his boss wouldn't have actually done the right thing, the employee just assumed) the boss will still have her job and be in position to act contrary to the interests of justice in the future. And at this point his management has a reason to remove him from the job. Maybe he can fight it as a wrongful termination, but for now he's out of a job. I hope he gets his job back, but saying that your boss is corrupt is reason enough to give your boss enough rope to hang themselves IMHO.
  - anigbrowl 13y ago
    It's very hard to judge this situation, given that the case it relates to is so divisive. For people who believe George Zimmerman, this guy's actions seem heroic. For people who think Trayvon Martin was murdered, this will seem like an effort to taint the prosecution case.

nugget 13y ago

I watched the entire testimony on YouTube and from what I can tell, it boils down to this: - both sides had an extremely hard to parse, near unintelligible raw source file (data dump from the phone) - the prosecutor's office had purchased a software package that could turn this raw source file into a much more easily readable report - the prosecutor's office didn't think that the defense would pay the several thousands of dollars for the same software, in order to generate the same report - the prosecutor's office provided only the raw source file and declined to provide any of the auto-generated reports which were meant to extract data from, organize and allow for easier analysis of that source file - the IT guy knew this and was afraid that in the future, someone could claim he acted in negligence - unbeknownst to the IT guy, the defense had indeed purchased other 3rd party software and successfully analyzed the entire source file - the prosecutor hinted that the IT guy's testimony is him getting even for being the (unconfirmed) target of a leak investigation earlier in 2012 So does the prosecutor need to turn over the software-generated report to the defense? Or only the raw source files which powered the software? That's the question and I am unqualified to answer. But if it's the former and not the latter then the prosecutor messed up and was caught red handed.

lawnchair_larry 13y ago
Did they say which software was used? Was it EnCase? (Edit: Turns out it was cellbrite. They likely had EnCase for general forensics, at $3k, and cellbrite is another $8k, for phone-specific forensics). I find it a little disturbing that the choice of software, and particularly the cost of it, can mean the difference between going to prison or not. In this case, the undiscovered files included someone with a "black hand" holding a gun, text messages related to acquiring a gun, and some kind of marijuana product. None of those are relevant to the case, but do trigger prejudice or emotional responses, so it's probably good that they were left out. In another case, those might be pictures of a murder victim or some other critical evidence (of either guilt or innocence). It seems pretty unfair that accused with a public defender doesn't generally have access to this.
- sejje 13y ago
  I think it's relevant given how much time the prosecution devoted to painting Trayvon as a child who was merely buying candy and returning from his childish errand back home, when everything occurred. If prosecutors want to paint a personal portrait of someone for the sympathy of the jurors, stuff like this should absolutely be included by the defense. In fact, I'd say it's their legal obligation to do everything in their power to have it presented.

hristov 13y ago

I don't think this is quite correct. The article says "The defense did receive the source file from the cellphone and used its own experts to extract data." So it is very possible, even likely that the defense obtained the same data themselves.