Summary of tweets for Monday, May 1st - Day 14
State witness:
Rick Wright, Contract special investigator for the FBI. Was case manager for JJ's case /
Part 1
Nate Eaton
@NateNewsNow
·
42m
NEW THREAD: Boyce is back on the bench and the jurors are being brought in.
Rick Wright is the next witness called by the state. Wright is a contract special investigator for the FBI. Lindsey Blake is questioning him.
Wright worked as an FBI special agent for 24 years before becoming a contract special investigator.
Wright was the Violent Crimes Against Children coordinator in Denver from 2007-2018 and he investigated crimes involving missing, abducted and trafficked kids.
In 2018, Wright was transferred to the Salt Lake City field office and assigned to the resident agency in Pocatello. He was one of five special agents in Pocatello at the time.
Wright began investigating JJ Vallow on Nov. 27, 2019. He was contacted by Rexburg Police and under the federal kidnapping act, the FBI was able to get involved because the missing child was under 12.
Initially police were only aware that JJ was missing. The FBI began an investigation and Wright was the case manager.
"Fairly early on, we determined JJ's sibling Tylee Ryan could not be located," Wright says. Wright details two police departments in Arizona, the Fremont County Sheriff's Office and the Rexburg Police Department were all involved in the investigation.
Fremont was probing the death of Tammy Daybell and Chandler Police were looking into the death of Charles Vallow. Gilbert Police were looking into the shooting of Brandon Boudreaux.
Blake asks Wright if he met with Ian Pawlowski. He says yes, he spoke with Ian at the Rexburg Police Department on Dec. 5, 2019. After the conversation, Wright says his concern for the childrens' safety increased.
"He was asked to consensually record conversations he was a party to," Wright says. Ian agreed and recorded some conversations he had with Melani P., his wife, and Lori, Alex and Chad.
The recording device belonged to the Rexburg Police Department and they have copies of the conversations.
Wright says other FBI agents were brought in to assist with the case including Agent Nick Ballance, who testified earlier in the trial.
"When the records would come in from various phones that we requested from the carriers, they would go to him for analysis and he was feeding information to us to give us potential avenues of investigation."
Wright requested that Ballance provide all data he retrieved from September 2019. Ballance later gave Wright everything from October too. We are about to see a Powerpoint presentation about what was obtained.
Thomas asks Wright when he completed the Powerpoint. Wright says he worked with prosecutors last night on the presentation. "This was put together to help me with the information I had," Wright says.
The first slide says Alex Cox -
Homerjmaximus@gmail.com with his phone number.
Wright says it appears Alex started residing in Idaho the evening of Sept. 1 based on his cell phone data. Alex's phone moved from St. George, Utah to Rexburg the evening of 1st and the device began to spend its evenings at the Pioneer Road apartment.
Beginning Sept. 5, the device began to go to another unit in the complex.
The next slide shows Alex's travel activity data points based on his cell phone as he went to and from Yellowstone on Sunday, Sept. 8, 2019.
The data points come from GPS, Wifi and cell tower data, according to Wright. "This information was all compiled together so each data point was looked at individually."
Wright says Alex's device left a Rexburg Maverik at 11:32 a.m. on 9/8. "We begin to see this data trail - bread crumbs - as it goes to the West Yellowstone entrance," Wright says. The device goes to Old Faithful then further into the park & eventually leaves the park at 6:40 p.m
There were stops at Old Faithful and the nearby cafeteria around 3 p.m. Wright says photos of Tylee, Alex and JJ were taken on a boardwalk at Old Faithful at 3:49 p.m. The pictures were recovered on Lori's iCloud account. These photos were the last known images of Tylee.
Wright continues to explain the movements of Alex's device throughout the park as a map is displayed on the screen. He says the data points were "very frequent" and Wright "tried to identify potential areas of investigation.
He says Alex's vehicle did not stop for any long duration until it got to West Yellowstone after it left the park.
Wright says there didn't seem to be any unusual stopping or deviations while Alex was at the park.
There was a stop at (or very close to) a BBQ restaurant in West Yellowstone. The vehicle arrived back at Lori's Rexburg at 8:37 p.m.
Wright says he could not identify much of anything to investigate with the Yellowstone trip - everything seemed normal and Wright is confidence Tylee returned to the apartment.
After Alex's device returns to Lori's apartment, it goes to a Maverik gas station for ten minutes around 9:43 p.m. It then goes back to Lori's apartment from and then to Alex's apartment.
There are several data points on Alex's device in Lori's apartment early on Sept. 9 - from 2:42 a.m. until 8:49 a.m.
Wright says he observed all the activity on Alex's device for the month of September. Alex was often in Lori's apartment from around 8 - midnight and then the device would go into Alex's apartment. It would stay there until morning or sometimes at late as noon.
"This was the only time I observed it go to apartment 175 between the hours of midnight and 6 a.m."
An overhead map is now shown of the apartment complex and Wright points out the distance between Alex and Lori's apartments - around 80 meters.
Other data points were recorded on Alex's phone at 4:37 a.m., 4:39 a.m., 4:41 a.m., 5:14 a.m., 6:47 a.m. and 8:49 a.m.
On Monday, Sept. 9, the device departs Alex's apartment at 9 a.m. It travels north to Chad Daybell's house - eight miles north of the apartment - and arrives around 9:15 a.m.
Numerous data points were recorded between 9:15 a.m. - 9:45 a.m. at the Daybell residence, Wright says. Lori is taking notes as Wright speaks. Some of the jurors are too. By 11:45 a.m., the device is traveling southbound and returns to Rexburg.
At 11:52 a.m., it stops at Del Taco for ten minutes.
There were four major data points Wright observed during the time period Alex was at the Daybell property. A data point appears at the shed at 9:21 a.m. with a 6-meter radius margin of error.
At 9:22 a.m., there is a data point at a gate into the property (you can drive onto the property at this gate). No quality data points are received until 9:39 a.m. and another data point is received at 10:57 a.m.
Wright agains mentions the gate allowed a vehicle to drive onto the back part of the property.
We now see the raccoon text Chad sent to Tammy on Monday, Sept. 9 at 11:53 a.m. telling her he had been burning limb debris when he saw a raccoon and had to kill and bury it in the family pet cemetery.
Coupled with the text and data points by the fire pit, "this certainly set up some red flags for us."
A warrant was then obtained by the Rexburg Police Department to search the property. Wright says human remains were found buried near the data points - the remains of Tylee Ryan.
We now see a slide showing the activity from Alex's device on Sept. 22 - the last time JJ was seen alive. "There was some traffic with the device," Wright says. Alex went back and forth between Lori's apartment and his apartment between 4:29 p.m. and 12:11 a.m.
Alex's device doesn't move from his apartment between 12:11 a.m. and 9:41 a.m. on Sept. 23. At 9:41 a.m., the device travels from the apartments to Chad Daybell's home where it arrives at 9:55 a.m.
By 10:12 a.m., Alex's device departs the residence southbound until Rexburg and goes to Lori's apartment at 10:22 a.m. It stays there until 11:14 a.m.
Two data points were found near the pond on Chad's property between 9:55 a.m. and 10:02 a.m. Other data points were recorded at the house's front door.
Wright points out on a Google Earth image where Alex's data points were recorded on Chad's property.
JJ's remains were ultimately found by the pond and Tylee's were found buried by the firepit.
Wright says Alex's phone was at or near the Daybell residence four times in September 2019. On Sept. 6, Sept. 9, Sept. 23 and Sept. 25.
Alex Cox visited Dan's Window Tinting in Rexburg on Sept. 23 for about five minutes. He visited the store twice on Sept. 25.
We now see the image of the Jeep used in Brandon Boudreaux's Arizona shooting. It has tinted windows. Police searched the vehicle after it was seized and two receipts were found inside. One was from a Mexican Restaurant on Oct. 1, 2019 at 1:12 p.m.
The shooting of Brandon took place on Oct. 2. The other receipt is from Chick-fil-A in Ammon on Oct. 18, 2019 at 8:05 p.m.
Tammy Daybell died the night of Oct. 18 until Oct. 19, Wright says. The receipt date was significant to law enforcement.
On Sept. 25, Alex visited Walmart in Idaho Falls and bought a cell phone with cash at 7:10 p.m. His other cell phone shows he was in the vicinity of the Walmart at this time, Wright says. On Oct. 8, Alex visited Walmart in Rexburg from 3:01 - 3:37 p.m.
After Alex and Lori abandoned their Rexburg apartments, the property managers found two cell phones in Alex's unit. The phones were turned over to police. Wright learned the phones were the ones purchased at the Walmart stores.
Blake moves to admit the Walmart phone receipts into evidence.
Thomas objects to having the receipts admitted but Boyce overrules the objection and lets them in.
On Sept. 30, Alex's device is at Lori's apartment. On Oct. 1 and 2, it stays in Alex's apartment the entire time. On Oct. 3, Alex's device is back in Lori's apartment for the first time since Sept. 30.
Data points from Alex's phone were recorded at the Unified Sportmen's Gun Club in Rexburg on Sept. 3. Then it went to Walmart and back to the club. There was another visit to the gun range on Sept. 26 and Sept. 27.
The device was also at the same gun range on Sept. 28 for 2.5 hours.
On Oct. 7, Alex visited multiple gun ranges, according to the data points. He also went to two gun ranges on Oct. 8. Remember - Tammy Daybell was shot at in her driveway on Oct. 9.
Alex also visited a gun range on Oct. 12, where he spent time around the 50-yard range. He went back on Oct. 13 and spent time at the rifle range and pistol range.
On Oct. 15, Alex went to the shooting range twice but between visits, he went to his apartment, Lori's apartment, Walmart and Chad Daybell's house.
That was the last time in October that Alex's device visited a gun range.
Wright says he was looking at gun range data because of gunman incident involving Tammy Daybell, the attempted shooting of Brandon and the fact a lot of guns and ammunition were found inside Lori's garage.
Wright says on Oct. 9, there were a series of data points associated to Alex's phone at Sportman's Warehouse in Ammon. Wright points out on the map where the data points were recorded inside the store.
Wright went to Sportsman's Warehouse and pulled all the receipts during the time period Alex was there. "One particular receipt caught my attention," he says.
There were around 60 receipts and most were paid with credit or debit cards. The one that caught Wright's attention was a cash receipt. There were five items on the receipt - including a pair of Frogg Togg rain pants.
The property manager at Alex's apartment had a pair of Frogg Togg pants in their possession. There was also a ski mask, soft drink and gloves on the receipt.
When Wright was investigating at the store, he learned a camo beanie listed on the receipt was no longer in stock but all of the other items were.
We now see photos on the screen showing the glove Alex purchased (not the exact glove but one that was in the store when Wright visited).
The glove has a mitten portion that you can pull over your fingers or you can keep off. If the mitten portion isn't folded over, you can use your fingers.
e now see an image of the three-hole ski mask Alex purchased (not the actual mask but the same one that was inside the store when Wright investigated).
Now we see the Frogg Togg pants that were purchased - again, not the actual pants but a pair that was inside the store when Wright visited.
Wright says a number of searches were conducted on the HomerJMaximus account on Oct. 9, 2019. One was "Frogg Togg sizing for pants."
On Oct. 9, Alex's device left Sportman's Warehouse at 4:12 p.m. and traveled north from Ammon to the vicinity of Chad's house. It didn't stop but drives by and continues onto Highway 20.
The driver turns around and drives past the Daybell residence again before for returning to Alex's apartment until 5:16 p.m. The device remains at the apartment until 11:28 a.m. the next day.
A map is shown on the big screen and Wright uses a laser pointer to show the spots where data points were recorded by Alex's phone the evening of Oct. 9.
A data point is recorded at a canal behind Chad's house. "The road is fairly narrow and there is no shoulder. I was looking for a possible location where this person could have gone or if there was a vehicle nearby where it might have parked.
There really was no place for a vehicle...but right here near this canal there's a little pull-off that would fit one vehicle."
Back to the cell phones Alex bought at Walmart. He bought one on Oct. 8 but it was not activated until Oct. 9 at 1:20 p.m. Ten messages were sent between this device and Chad Daybell between 7:13 p.m. - 10:30 p.m.
While Alex's other phone was recorded at staying at his apartment that entire night, the new phone was texting Chad.
The cell phone carrier did not keep the text messages and nothing was able to be traced from the new phone. Blake suggests we take a lunch break because she's at a good stopping point. We will be back in about an hour.
link:
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