Court admits third phone allegedly used to record gangsters
Published:Friday | February 4, 2022 | 12:12 AMTanesha Mundle/Staff Reporter
The last of three phones reportedly used by a former Clansman-One Don Gang lieutenant to secretly record conversations with his ex-cronies was finally entered into evidence yesterday after three prior unsuccessful attempts.
The prosecution was yesterday able to get the Alcatel phone and an accompanying compact disc containing the audio recordings and other data smoothly admitted following the testimony of a cyber incident response specialist, who had extracted the data from the three phones in 2019 and had placed the extracted data, which included deleted and hidden audio files, on a compact disc.
The prosecution’s second witness – one of two ex-gang members testifying for the Crown – had disclosed that he had secretly recorded conversations with key alleged gangsters, including the reputed One Don Gang leader, Andre ‘Blackman’ Bryan, and the lone alleged female accused in the case, Stephanie Christie, and had handed the phones over to the police.
The ex-gangster, who was one of Blackman’s drivers, told the court that two of the phones were provided by the police while Bryan had sponsored the third after he convinced the alleged don that his phone was not working well.
During his testimony, the expert witness said that he had used two different tools to extract the data from the phones and their SIM cards before placing the data from the phones on three different compact discs, which he then handed over to the investigator.
The call log, phone contacts, and factory applications were among the data that was pulled, the court heard.
The witness further testified that he had not changed the extracted data “in any way” and that the data placed on the compact discs could not be modified.
“The only way it could have been changed is if it was damaged, which would have made it unreadable,” he said.
Prior to now, the Alcatel device had only been marked for identification after being rejected by the court three times due to hiccups with identification by the lead investigator.
In one instance, the investigator was unable to open the phone to match the phone’s unique identification number that is located inside the back of the phone with the number he had recorded in his notebook, and when he tried to access the number in the phone’s settings, he realised that he did not have the phone’s password.
Hence, the third phone was blocked.
The Crown had also faced similar challenges when it tried to get two of three transcripts of the recordings admitted into evidence.
Chief Justice Bryan Sykes had only allowed the challenged transcripts to be marked for identity after accepting the defence’s objections regarding the lack of evidence establishing the chain of custody for the compact discs and the safekeeping and integrity of the recordings.
Bryan and 32 other alleged gang members are being tried on an indictment with 25 counts under the Criminal Justice (Suppression of Criminal Organizations) Act and the Firearms Act.
The One Don Gang is a breakaway faction of the Clansman Gang.
The trial will resume on Monday in the Home Circuit Court.