ComputerForensicsDigest.com

A 57-year-old Ohio attorney, Donald J. Guernsey, was convicted in the Seneca County Common Pleas Court for two counts of tampering with evidence. According to a report by the Fostoria Review Times, an employee of Guernsey's law firm discovered a digital camera hidden in a roll of paper towels in an upstairs bathroom.

The employee brought the camera to Guernsey, who dismantled the device to show her how it worked. An hour later, Guernsey and the employee took the camera to the Fostoria police. While testifying in his own defense, Guernsey said that he dismantled the camera because his female employees were so upset.

The police asked for and received consent to search the law offices. During the search, one officer discovered a 9-volt battery in the bathroom wastebasket. Since the battery is the same size as the one used to power the camera, Fostoria police officer Shilo Frankart allegedly told Guernsey to leave it alone so that it could be collected for evidence. 

Frankart testified at trial that Guernsey ignored him and picked up the battery from the wastebasket. That claim was disputed by Guernsey's sister and law partner, Carol Reffner, who said that Guernsey took the battery from Frankart's hand, and that Frankart immediately took it back from him.

A computer forensic investigation of three hard drives seized from the law firm was inconclusive. According to Diamond Boggs, an investigator with the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Identification and Investigation, Guernsey's computer contained evidence that it had been used by someone to browse voyeur Web sites. 

However, Boggs testified, she did not find any photographs or movies taken in the bathroom. When questioned by Crawford County Judge Russell Wiseman, Boggs conceded that there is no way to tell if images were streamed from the camera to Guernsey's computer and viewed, since the streaming process would not leave any trace on the computer hard drive.

Media reports do not offer much information about the type of camera that was found, and in particular, do not state whether the camera was a stand-alone digital unit, or one of the myriad wireless "spy" cameras that can be purchased for less than $150. One would expect that investigators would have reported discovering either a receiver attached to an office computer, or some type of software for viewing the camera's streaming content.

If more information is available as to the specifics of the set-up and its impact on the forensics investigation, I'll update this post.