Summary of tweets for Tuesday, April 25th -
State witness:
FBI Special Agent Steve Daniels, Evidence Response Team (ERT) /
Part 1
Nate Eaton
@NateNewsNow
·
9h
The next witness is Steve Daniels. Daniels is a special agent with the FBI. Wood is questioning Daniels, who has worked for the FBI for 25 years.
Daniels works on the FBI Evidence Response Team - the ERT. The group gets 80 hours of training in Quantico, Virginia on how to process crime scenes and execute search warrants. Advanced trainings are offered and Daniels has participated in the human remains recovery course.
The ERT was asked to help come up with a search strategy to execute a search warrant on June 9 and 10, 2020 at Chad Daybell's property. They were looking for human remains and other evidence of crime.
Police arrived at Daybell's property on June 9, 2020. They prepared for about a week and eight ERT members were tasked with a role before they got to the house. For example, one was a photographer and one created a crime-scene login sheet.
Daniels did an initial walk-thru of the scene and priority areas were noted.
Two ERT members were assigned to assess the firepit area. Based on the cell phone data, the team has mapped out areas to look on the property including the pet cemetery.
Another area of interest was the pond. Daniels said they wanted to look at the entire 3-4 acres - sheds, outbuildings - everything needed to be searched.
Daniels says 500-700 photos were taken on Chad Daybell's property the day they served the search warrant.
Daniels says a FARO scanner was used at the scene. This is a high-tech laser scanner. A total station tool was also on the scene. Many of the jurors are taking notes as Daniels speaks.
Daniels says a drone was also used during the search.
Wood asks to admit an exhibit Daniels compiled of photos and evidence. Thomas has some questions for Daniels before the exhibit it admitted.
Thomas has no objection to the exhibit. We are now shown a satellite map image showing the Rexburg/St. Anthony area. Key locations are marked - Lori's apartment, Chad's property, the Salem Church (where police staged), Walmart, BYU-Idaho.
We now see an overhead image of Chad Daybell's property. Daniels points out the firepit, burial sites of the children, outbuildings and other key spots on the property.
A photo of the front of Chad's house is now shown. The next picture is an image from an upper-bedroom window where you can see JJ's burial site. From the same window, another photo shows that you can also see the area where Tylee was buried.
The next photo shows the view from another window inside the house looking out onto the property.
We now see a photo showing some impressions or changes to the ground of the pet cemetery. Daniels says once he noticed the changes, he had a team start processing the area.
A photo of the firepit is on the screen. The next photo shows progress as crews begin to process the firepit area. Dirt is sifted through with rakes and shovels.
Sifters with mesh screens are also brought in to catch any potential evidence piece - "potential bones, jewelry, or anything else that could be significant," Daniels says.
Daniels says bone fragments, organic material and miscellaneous pieces of cloth and fabric were collected from the fire pit. The next image shows the fire pit as it's getting "cleaned up."
Daniels says the smell was "overpowering" and a soil sample was taken from the fire pit for testing later.
Daniels says a necklace chain was found inside the firepit and processed as evidence. A silver charm was also found near the firepit.
The total station tool mapped out sites where the bodies were buried. The information was used to measure distances on the property. Boyce calls for an afternoon recess. Be back in 15-20 minutes.
We are back in session. Boyce is on the bench and jurors are being brought in.
Daniels shows an image of the pet cemetery. In front of a dog statue were some "disturbed areas" where Daniels thought human remains could be. Handtools were used before a backhoe and tractor were brought in to help dig.
We now see an image of a piece of bone found in the dirt. "With the size of the bone being found...I could also smell an odor I could associate with human remains decomposing so between this bone being found and a second bone being found...
the decision was then made not to use the tractor anymore," Daniels says. Police then switched back to hand tools.
The next image shows some bricks uncovered by the tractor. This ends up being Tylee's gravesite. At the time, police were not aware this was where she was buried but the odor continually got stronger and stronger.
We now see a photo showing "the first pieces of Tylee" that officers uncovered. At this point, they were unsure what they had found but it was a "bigger bone."
On the screen is a photo of the bigger white bone found at the burial site. "At this point, we didn't know if this was animal or human. We were trying to excavate it and get it out of the ground," Daniels says. An anthropologist was on the scene.
The next photo shows pieces of Tylee's remains recovered from the ground at the end of the day on June 9. "At that point, we established a new perimeter around her burial site and came up with a better excavation plan," Daniels says.
The remains were placed on a blue tarp. Summer Shiflet is wiping tears from her eyes as these photos are shown. She is looking down and her eyes are closed. Lori is looking down.
The next photo is a close-up view of the pieces identified as Tylee. "You can see the bigger bones sticking out of the ground," Daniels says. He says her remains were "melted together" in the ground.
The remains were placed in a body bag, given to the coroner and removed from the scene. We now see a photo of what the burial site looked like after the remains were out of the ground.
Crews continued their search on June 10. Blue tarps were placed on the ground and a "sifting operation" was set up to find more possible remains in the ground, Daniels says.
We now see a photo of "a mass of a human - dismembered, melted" and a green bucket with part of a skull. "It took a while for us as investigators to figure out what happened here - what is this," Daniels says.
"We want to show how these remains were buried so we can show the story of what happened here," Daniels says. Lori continues to look down while taking notes on a yellow pad.
The next photo is Tylee's skull next to a melted bucket.
Daniels says the team tried to lift the remains out of the ground but they all fell apart. They were able to collect them and put them in a body bag. The anthropologist and coroner separated the remains so an inventory could be done on what parts they had.
"How many pieces are we still looking for or do we think we have everything we need to take?" Daniels says.
Now we see the body pieces placed on the coroner's body bag. Daniels was unsure if this was one person or two so he asked for an inventory on the parts.
Daniels says after all the human remains were collected, a backhoe dug deeper and wider into the burial sites. "This was especially important on JJ's burial. His was the first burial we found and we wanted to make sure Tylee's remains weren't in the same area."
Wood asks Daniels if police searched the shed and barn on Chad's property. Daniels says yes. We now see a photo of the garage door open on the shed. Next image is the interior of the shed.
"Knowing that we are dealing with a burial, one of the things we are interested in is tools," Daniels says. There were some tools hanging or leaning on the wall in the shed.
We now see an image of a pick-ax and some shovels that were seized as evidence. They are leaning aginst the wall next to a green bucket and two white buckets. We see a close up photo of the pick-ax and there is some material on the blade portion.
A close up image of two shovels shows "how dirty they were - could potentially be ash or other things on the shovel," Daniels says.
Other items, including bush clippers, some saws and an ax, were seized from the garage. We see a photo of these items.
Some bricks found on the side of the shed were also seized. The bricks were similar to those found at Tylee's burial site.
We are now being shown photos of the pond area where JJ was found. There is taller grass around the burial site and Daniels observed a raised berm with less grass and vegetation than the surrounding area.
Daniels is describing how police went layer by layer to remove the ground near the pond. "At this point we honestly didn't know if this was a burial or not," Daniels says.
We now see a photo showing three big rocks that were found once officers removed some of the soil. "This is screaming to me as a team leader that something is odd. Something shouldn't be here," Daniels says. Boyce calls for a brief sidebar.
I have not seen Lori look up for the past hour. She continues to write in a yellow notepad with her back toward the gallery.
Boyce says we will conclude with testimony for today and continue tomorrow. I'll break everything down tonight on 'Courtroom Insider' at 7:30 p.m. MT. Join me on my Facebook page or the
East Idaho News YouTube channel.
It was mentioned in court today that Alex's license plate was "C Quint." He apparently signed into the shooting range using this name. Captain Quint is a character from Jaws.
I've learned it was one of Alex's favorite movies and he often did an impersonation of Cpt. I'm told Alex knew every line of the movie by heart.
Sketches from court today. FBI agent Steve Daniels, Lori Vallow Daybell, Rexburg Det. Rick Schmitt and FBI analyst Nick Ballance
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