October 01 2011
In a recent case, the defendant was charged with handling stolen goods. It was alleged she had been using a laptop computer which was stolen during a burglary in February 2011. The laptop was identified by the victim of the burglary and returned, however it appeared that the laptop had been reformatted and a new version of Windows installed.
The defendant denied the offence and claimed that she and her family had been using the computer legitimately since late 2010. It was recovered for examination at the request of the defendant’s solicitors.
Steve Guest from Keith Borer Consultants examined the laptop and found evidence of mobile telephone online account usage and several Facebook emails consistent with the defendant’s account of events. Furthermore he found evidence of a previous owner, unconnected to the burgled house. The prosecution dropped the case.
