by Georgia’s deputy attorney general said in court that he didn’t think police in the state were using Signal to communicate about the law enforcement training center colloquially known as “Cop City” — despite being presented, in a motion by defense attorneys, with testimony from the law enforcement leadership Guardian ordered officers to download the encrypted phone app last year for that purpose.
Defense attorneys have been seeking Signal messages from Atlanta police and other law enforcement agencies that may be relevant to their clients’ cases from deputy attorney general John Fowler since February, according to his March 15 motion.
Fowler did not respond, indicating that “Signal’s messages were not in the state’s possession,” the motion said. He made the claim in court again this week, saying that he thought that only federal agencies that cooperated with the Georgia prosecution used Signal.
It is not clear if the officer is not telling the truth, or if he does not know how the arresting agencies in the effort of his office 61 people who are involved in opposition to Cop City communicate with each other.
“We are unable to comment due to pending prosecution,” attorney general spokeswoman Kara Murray wrote in response to inquiries from the Guardian.
Related: Exclusive: groups call for US inquiry into police killing of ‘Cop City’ protester
The revelation came in a Fulton county superior court conference for prosecuting and defense attorneys to extract details in Rico’s pending case — or criminal conspiracy — aimed at Cop City. It is the biggest case in Rico for a protest movement ever, experts told the Guardian.
The fight against Cop City has drawn national and global headlines, especially since January 18 of last year, when state soldiers killed Manuel Paez Terán, known as “Tortuguita”, who was camping in protest at a public park in near the site of Cop City kill and kill. – the first such incident in US history. The project has been opposed by a wide range of local and national supporters, who have concerns such as the unchecked militarization of the police and the clearing of forests in an era of climate crisis. Atlanta police say the center is needed for “excellent” training.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Kimberly M Esmond Adams said Tuesday that she planned to begin trials in Rico’s case before the end of the year, with five defendants at the time. Her job in court included making sure the state finishes releasing its evidence to the dozens of defense attorneys involved in the case as soon as possible — after the state announced in November it had five terabytes of evidentiary data, which they represent approximately 400m pages of text, or 800,000 digital photographs. On Tuesday, the state said it may have up to a terabyte more data.
At one point, Judge Adams seemed to lose patience with the state, saying: “You’ve indicted all 61 people, so you can’t come and tell me you’re having trouble getting evidence” – and gave until May 17 throughout the state to file all discovery materials.
Those details should include Signal messages, defense attorney David Gastley asserted in his motion on March 15 and, again, in court Tuesday. He named the Guardian’s report of 4 December 2023 as the main exhibit supporting the application. Based on emails obtained through open records requests, that story showed how top police officers in Atlanta began forming Signal groups in early 2023 to discuss Cop City.
In one email described in the Guardian’s report, on Jan. 23 Maj. Jessica Bruce of the Atlanta police told a dozen agencies: “As we approach the construction of the Acadamy [sic] I want to keep everyone informed in a timely manner” – and that she would send everyone who receives the email to the Signal group. Cop City is the “Academy”.
Related: Georgia uses ‘political fear mongering’ in efforts to crack down on City Cop protesters
That email was sent to police departments in Atlanta and Cobb and DeKalb counties – part of the Atlanta metro area – as well as the Georgia bureau of investigation, the FBI and the ATF. Cops were also copied from the Norfolk Southern railroad.
Gastley in a Feb. 13 email to the attorney general’s office requested the “preservation and production” of “[a]ll messages related to the ‘Stop Cop City’/’Protect the Atlantic Forest’ investigation and prosecution exchanged by law enforcement on … encrypted messaging apps such as Signal and WhatsApp”.
He named every police officer and agency mentioned in the Guardian’s report, requesting communication between them. It also requested all communications about the decision to use the app, and about any policies governing the use of the app.
“It is unbelievable that there are no relevant witness statements on these large-scale interagency Signal group threads designed to communicate about the Cop City protests,” the March 15 motion reads.
Despite five emails and a personal visit, the attorney asserts, Fowler did not respond – except to say that he did not think the state had any such messages, but that he was “willing to consider complying with the request”, according to the offer.
The defense attorney summarizes these events in the motion, raising the possibility that messages have been deleted: “[C]Communications with the Attorney General’s Office indicate that no diligent inquiry was conducted to determine the extent of discoverable content contained within the tranche of law enforcement Signal messages (to the extent these messages were not deleted).
With Signal, users can set the app to automatically delete messages, at which point they’re not even available for retrieval on computer servers, like standard texts. First amendment and digital transparency experts told the Guardian in December that police or other government officials using encrypted apps like Signal to communicate about official business raise serious concerns about the ability to access information afterward. , according to “freedom of information” and open records. laws – and now, perhaps, in response to discovery requests in state prosecutions.
The defense attorney’s motion also notes in a footnote how the state’s own 109-page Ricci indictment refers to the use of Signal by activists against Cop City. “Their communications often involve secrecy, using sophisticated technology aimed at preventing law enforcement from viewing their communications and preventing the retrieval of the information”, the indictment says.
“In the indictment of this case, the State itself chose to include the use of the Signal messaging platform as alleged evidence against the defendants’ purported ‘enterprise,'” the resolution reads. “Certainly, the extent to which law enforcement itself intentionally transferred its own communications to this same platform will be relevant evidence to the jury … particularly if a significant amount of law enforcement material is in fact unpreserved.”
