The trial of a Dutch man accused of harassing and extorting B.C. teen Amanda Todd before she took her own life heard more evidence related to computer equipment police seized from his bungalow in the Netherlands on Wednesday.
Dutch citizen Aydin Coban, 43, has pleaded not guilty to five criminal charges, including possession of child pornography, communication with a young person to commit a sexual offence and criminal harassment in the high-profile Todd case.
Coban was arrested in a holiday home in a bungalow park in Oisterwijk in January 2014. Police subsequently conducted a pair of searches of the property on Jan. 13 and Jan. 14.
Sabrina Hendry, a special investigative officer with the Dutch National Police’s child protection team who was flown to Canada to testify, told the 12-member jury about the computers and related devices seized from the home.
Hendry, who was in charge of cataloguing evidence seized during the search, said police collected a 1,500 GB hard drive, a 250 GB hard drive, a 160 GB hard drive, a laptop, a Cooler Master computer system, two Samsung smartphones and multiple CDs and USB drives.
The court also heard from two digital forensic experts with the Netherlands Forensic Institute, who described making a forensic “image” — essentially a backup — of a Hitachi hard drive.
Appearing by video link, Reinier Martijn Kieft told the court he was asked to do the work because police had not been able to image the drive themselves, and believed there could be something physically defective with the unit, which was making a ticking sound.
Keift explained to the jury that he was able to repair the drive to make it readable.
The drive was dirty on the outside, and some of its electronic components were also dirty and sticky, he testified.
He explained how the drive was cleaned with ultrasonic cleaner, its electronic components were tested to ensure they were working, then was reassembled.
When the work was done, he said more than 99 per cent of the hard drive — all but 84 of 600 million sectors — was readable.
Under cross examination, Keift agreed that the drive had come into contact with humidity, and that there were traces of corrosion and sticky dirt on the unit.
Keift agreed it was possible that the 84 sectors of the drive that were inaccessible could have contained no data.
Technical information is expected to play a major part in the Crown’s case against Coban.
Crown alleges Coban obtained explicit images of Todd, then used a network of 22 fake social media profiles to try and extort her into performing sexual “shows” via webcam between 2009 and 2012. It alleges he also sent explicit images of her to friends, family and her school community.
The case hinges on the identity of Todd’s tormentor.
Defence has said there is no question Todd was the victim of crimes, but that there is no link between Coban and whoever sent the messages.
Information can be manipulated on the Internet, the defence has argued, and there must be proof beyond a reasonable doubt about who sent the offending messages to Todd.
Todd took her own life in 2012 shortly after posting an online video that eventually went viral, in which she silently holds up flashcards describing incidents of harassment and bullying. She was 15.
Comments