Commonwealth v. Read — Trial ArchiveMatthew DiSogra - Redirect/Recross
227 linesMR. JACKSON: You were asked a number of questions.
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: Thank you. You were asked a number of questions a few minutes ago by Mr. Brennan concerning your expertise. I'm just going to grab a pen if I could. Specifically you were asked about your expertise regarding mobile devices and their data. Correct.
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: And were you being truthful when you indicated that you were not an expert in that field? Were you being truthful when you indicated that you have a certain expertise in EDR data?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: Were you being truthful when you indicated that you did review Mr. Burgess's data and Dr. Welcher's data as reflected in their reports and PowerPoints?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: Were you being truthful about your credentials?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: Have you ever lied about your credentials?
MR. DISOGRA: No.
MR. JACKSON: You hold a bachelor's degree?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: And you hold a master's degree?
MR. DISOGRA: I do.
MR. JACKSON: You ever lied to anybody about that?
MR. DISOGRA: No.
MR. JACKSON: Mr. DiSogra, what is the only reason you amended your PowerPoint presentation from its original version to the one that you most recently amended it to?
MR. DISOGRA: To include the additional analysis and data points from Mr. Burgess's supplemental report, the May 8th report.
MR. JACKSON: I'm sorry, I interrupted you.
MR. DISOGRA: The May 8th report.
MR. JACKSON: So you amended yours because he amended his.
MR. DISOGRA: Correct.
MR. JACKSON: You were asked just a second ago about all the Techstream events that you noted on Ms. Read's SUV.
MR. DISOGRA: Correct. Yes.
MR. JACKSON: Mr. Brennan asked you about a specific Techstream event at or around 5:07 in the morning and whether you had something like that committed to memory.
MR. DISOGRA: Correct. Yes.
MR. JACKSON: You said, "I don't have them all committed to memory."
MR. DISOGRA: Right. I don't.
MR. JACKSON: What did you say after that? Because there's how many?
MR. DISOGRA: It was 19 events prior to 1162-2.
MR. JACKSON: 19 other events. How about after 1162?
MR. DISOGRA: There were a number after 1162-2. I don't have the exact count in my head.
MR. JACKSON: How about after 1162, just on January 29th going into January 30th?
MR. DISOGRA: There were other events.
MR. JACKSON: How many?
MR. DISOGRA: I don't recall the exact number.
MR. JACKSON: Does 11 sound like that?
MR. DISOGRA: It sounds plausible. I recall seeing — in the chart, I recall seeing a number of events after.
MR. JACKSON: Look at a chart. It would. Thank you. Yeah, there are a lot.
MR. DISOGRA: I would have to really use my finger to count them all.
MR. JACKSON: Okay. More than eight total after 1162-2, only on the 29th? There aren't date stamps on these because this chart is the raw Techstream data, which doesn't have timestamps. Safe to say there are many?
MR. DISOGRA: Correct. Yes.
MR. JACKSON: And again, this goes back to a question that you were asked by Mr. Brennan that I want to follow up on. In no instance were any of those related to a collision, to your knowledge?
MR. DISOGRA: Correct.
MR. BRENNAN: Objection.
JUDGE CANNONE: Sustained.
MR. JACKSON: Were any of those that you reviewed, at any time in the lifetime of the vehicle, related to a collision?
MR. DISOGRA: None of them were triggered by a collision.
MR. JACKSON: Thank you. I want to ask you a hypothetical, if I could, based on questioning by Mr. Brennan surrounding the 12:32:09 lock event. Do you remember him asking you about that event?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: Your analysis was based on the time span. Let me rephrase that. Was your analysis based on Mr. Burgess's and Mr. Welcher's analyses together — of a span of time between the 1162-2 Techstream event or trigger event and the lock event at 12:32:09?
MR. BRENNAN: Objection.
JUDGE CANNONE: So the question is — is that what he's considering?
MR. JACKSON: Correct. In other words, was he basing his opinion or analysis on that time frame, at least in part?
JUDGE CANNONE: So I'll let that question stay.
MR. JACKSON: Thank you.
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: Okay. If you were told that there was another interaction — a phone event — on John O'Keefe's phone at 12:32:16, in the form of steps taken, 36 steps over the course of 83 feet, would that change your analysis or opinion in any way?
MR. BRENNAN: Objection.
JUDGE CANNONE: I'll allow that in that form.
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: In what way?
MR. DISOGRA: If the phone event moves from 12:32:09 to 12:32:16, then of the 30 possibilities I had in the chart, all of them would become positive. That would mean that that interaction occurs after the end of the vehicle event every single time. Instead of 25 for 30 in the original analysis, the hypothetical would change it to 30 for 30. All of them — all 30 of them — would occur at a point in time. Let me rephrase that. All of them would reflect a scenario in which the phone interaction took place after trigger.
MR. JACKSON: That's correct. Thank you. If you were told — let me give you another hypothetical. If you were told that there was a Doppler state event on the phone — a pocket state event — on the phone at 12:33:14, would that impact your opinion in any way?
MR. BRENNAN: Objection.
JUDGE CANNONE: Sustained.
MR. JACKSON: You were asked several questions about what you believed Mr. Burgess may have gotten wrong in terms of his original report, and one of his original analyses dealing with bits and bytes. Do you recall that?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: Did Mr. Burgess —
JUDGE CANNONE: Hold on. Of course — you need to — we have to turn the fans off.
MR. JACKSON: And I'm not speaking loud enough, right? I'm sorry. I'll raise my voice. I just don't want to scream over people, but I will raise my voice. Let's try this for a few minutes. May I start again with that question?
JUDGE CANNONE: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: Thank you. You were asked about whether or not you believed that Mr. Burgess was incorrect in terms of certain analyses he undertook or reflected in his original report back in January of 2025. Correct?
MR. DISOGRA: Correct.
MR. JACKSON: As it relates to the bits and bytes, did you find that Mr. Burgess was incorrect or correct about his analysis concerning the size of the data set collected based on bits versus bytes?
MR. DISOGRA: He was incorrect.
MR. JACKSON: Explain that to the jurors very briefly.
MR. DISOGRA: These are just different units. A bit is a different size than a byte. And so if a size for something is listed in bits, for example, and you look at the data and assume it's in bytes, you will assume it's the wrong size.
MR. JACKSON: Which Mr. Burgess did, based on your review of his report?
MR. DISOGRA: Correct.
MR. JACKSON: I want to change gears and ask a different question, or series of questions, about the Techstream data versus the infotainment system data — specifically the timestamps associated therewith. Is there a timestamp associated with Techstream data?
MR. DISOGRA: In this case, no.
MR. JACKSON: Okay. Is there a timestamp associated with infotainment system data?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: All right — the infotainment system data. Well, let me ask it a different way. Where did the 3-second delay come from? Your analysis — of Mr. Burgess's review of the time of the Techstream data or his review of the infotainment system data?
MR. DISOGRA: The 3 seconds came — well, fundamentally it came from the exemplar testing where he identified — and he was, actually — well, Aperture collectively in that testing identified a difference between when the button was pushed and the time that showed up in the infotainment. But they didn't actually look at — as far as I know, at least it wasn't provided if they did — how that specifically related to the key-on timer itself. But they showed that the button is pushed, there's a 3-second delay, and then the time gets logged.
MR. JACKSON: When that button is pushed for the infotainment system — I'm going to rephrase again so I'm as clear as I can. When that button is pushed for the on event, the key-on event, is that like a stopwatch click that starts a stopwatch running time in the VCH system?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: Okay. Separate and apart from the BCH system, is there an infotainment system that also has a timer or a clock on it?
MR. DISOGRA: Has a clock.
MR. JACKSON: Are those two things independent of one another?
MR. DISOGRA: Completely independent.
MR. JACKSON: What were you doing with regard to the 3-second delay — as it relates to the key-on event and the infotainment system event — to marry those two things together?
MR. DISOGRA: Right. I'm making the adjustment, or proposing that adjustment can be made, because the key-on timer is going to start generally as soon as the vehicle powers on. But the infotainment — when you go and download the data, it will say, "Hey, I think I powered on at this time." And it turns out that time is actually 3 seconds off. So if you're going to then apply the infotainment time anywhere else to VCH data, you've got to realign the two. And that's where the 3 seconds comes from — these are independent data sources.
MR. JACKSON: Did Mr. Burgess — as far as your review of his analysis and his report is concerned — did he align the two, accounting for the 3-second offset?
MR. DISOGRA: No, he did not.
MR. JACKSON: Thank you. With the court's permission, may we have slide 10 of the PowerPoint?
JUDGE CANNONE: Okay.
MR. JACKSON: And that — we've talked a lot about PowerPoints — of Mr. Dogra's PowerPoint. Can you highlight the table on the left, Mr. Woll? Thank you. Did you create this table?
MR. DISOGRA: No.
MR. JACKSON: Was this table — I don't know if you call it cut and paste, or if there's some better engineering term for it — was it basically pulled from Mr. Burgess's report?
MR. DISOGRA: It was — it was a screen — it was a screenshot.
MR. JACKSON: Thank you. Screenshot. Did you type a single word on this?
MR. DISOGRA: I did not. I added a green box.
MR. JACKSON: Put a green box around it?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: You didn't type anything on this?
MR. DISOGRA: I did not.
MR. JACKSON: You were asked a ton of questions just a few minutes ago about whether or not the column on the left and the center column were reflective of an infotainment timestamp versus an iPhone-to-iPhone timestamp. Correct?
MR. DISOGRA: That's right.
MR. JACKSON: Mr. Brennan asked you a bunch of questions about that left column being an iPhone timestamp — at least the top five rows: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 rows. Remember that?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: Read the name that Mr. Burgess labeled that column.
MR. DISOGRA: Infotainment call timestamps.
MR. JACKSON: So what, as an expert, did you presume he — as an expert — was presuming?
MR. BRENNAN: Objection.
JUDGE CANNONE: Sustained.
MR. JACKSON: What did you presume that meant to you — just to you?
MR. DISOGRA: Call timestamps from the infotainment.
MR. JACKSON: So if anything is wrong with your analysis, would it be based on Mr. Burgess being wrong in his analysis?
MR. BRENNAN: Objection.
MR. JACKSON: May I have just a moment, Your Honor?
JUDGE CANNONE: Sure. Do you need the light on?
MR. JACKSON: I don't. And we can pull that down. What was your entire analysis predicated on? What was it based on?
MR. DISOGRA: The foundation of it — as I explained — was your analysis, during the course of the testing by Aperture and the collective reports and PowerPoint presentations by Aperture. That would be an initial report by Mr. Burgess, an initial PowerPoint by Mr. Welcher, and a supplemental report by Mr. Burgess.
MR. JACKSON: Did you change any of their data?
MR. DISOGRA: No.
MR. JACKSON: Did you change any of their analyses?
MR. DISOGRA: No.
MR. JACKSON: Did you explain their analysis?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
JUDGE CANNONE: Sustained.
MR. JACKSON: What were you trying to do in terms of your presentation and your PowerPoint and the presentation for — the jury?
MR. DISOGRA: There were a number of different methodologies presented across all of those reports and PowerPoints and sort of all in different places. So my goal was to bring all of them into one place so we could look at the totality of the data.
MR. JACKSON: You were asked whether the genesis of your analysis relies on knowing the source of the calls. Correct. You remember being asked that by Mr. Brennan?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: The actual genesis of your entire opinion is based on Mr. Burgess's and Mr. Welcher's analyses. Correct.
MR. DISOGRA: That's correct.
MR. JACKSON: You were also asked why you believed Mr. Burgess did a quote unquote more detailed report in May versus January of 2025. Do you remember being asked that just a few minutes ago?
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. JACKSON: When you presented your analysis, your math based on Mr. Burgess's January 2025 report, how many of the scenarios indicated based on his data and his analysis that the lock event occurred after the text?
MR. DISOGRA: All of them.
MR. JACKSON: Thank you. That's all I have.
JUDGE CANNONE: All right, Mr. Brennan.
MR. BRENNAN: So, Mr. DiSogra, this demonstrates the danger — or the difficulty.
JUDGE CANNONE: Hold on. Go ahead, Mr. Brennan.
MR. BRENNAN: This demonstrates the difficulty in giving opinions when you don't actually study the data itself. Isn't that fair to say?
MR. DISOGRA: What are you referring to with this?
MR. BRENNAN: Well, you're giving opinions, but you can't verify any of the data because you're not relying on your study of the data, are you?
MR. DISOGRA: I'm relying on expert reports.
MR. BRENNAN: You're criticizing somebody's report, but you yourself can't defend data that you haven't actually analyzed and broken down yourself.
MR. DISOGRA: I don't think that's true.
MR. BRENNAN: When you're looking at — put on your pen, please. When you're looking at someone's report, you're guessing as to what they thought or presumed if you haven't spoken to them. Fair.
MR. DISOGRA: I would say I'm reading the words that are in front of me and interpreting them for what they say.
MR. BRENNAN: When someone plugs their iPhone into a car after it turns on and the car releases data that's on the iPhone, that data then resides on the infotainment system. Correct.
MR. DISOGRA: There's a transfer of data. Yes.
MR. BRENNAN: And so unless you actually do the study yourself, you had no way of knowing if that information — although on the iPhone, on the infotainment system — you had no idea whether it was from an iPhone or from the infotainment system. Fair?
MR. DISOGRA: That's right. I don't think that's—
MR. BRENNAN: And so when you don't actually do the work yourself and you just presume or you guess, you could get it wrong, couldn't you?
MR. DISOGRA: If I had guessed, yes, but I didn't guess. I used the data in the reports and I referenced the testing that Aperture did. So I did not make a guess.
MR. BRENNAN: One through five. Are you telling me right now to a reasonable degree of data certainty that that information is based on the infotainment clock? Is that what you're saying?
MR. DISOGRA: I don't know.
MR. BRENNAN: You don't know. But if you actually did the analysis yourself rather than just Monday morning quarterback somebody's position — I'm going to strike it. Ask it differently. Mr. DiSogra, if you actually did the analysis yourself, you wouldn't have to make a presumption that would be wrong. Correct.
MR. DISOGRA: I don't think the analysis was possible in this case because the testing wasn't done in this case.
MR. BRENNAN: You don't know if the testing was done or not. You didn't do it.
JUDGE CANNONE: So I need to hear the question.
MR. BRENNAN: You don't know if the testing was done or not, do you?
MR. DISOGRA: I know it's in the reports.
MR. BRENNAN: The testing wasn't in the reports. Did you read it?
MR. DISOGRA: No.
MR. BRENNAN: Did you read Ian Whiffin's?
MR. DISOGRA: No.
MR. BRENNAN: You don't know if that testing was done, do you?
MR. DISOGRA: I don't.
JUDGE CANNONE: I'm going to let that stand.
MR. DISOGRA: I do not, sir.
MR. BRENNAN: And so if you're wrong, your assumptions — and part of my conclusions would change.
MR. DISOGRA: I wouldn't agree that I'm wholesale wrong.
MR. BRENNAN: Well, as a scientist, if they're not accurate, that would be wrong, wouldn't it?
MR. DISOGRA: That might be a nuanced answer. I — that might be a nuanced answer. Frankly, I I'm not sure how to give you a good answer to that question.
MR. BRENNAN: You have the wrong data when you're doing your analysis, then the final analysis is going to be wrong. If you're using the wrong data, it's that simple. You don't have to be a scientist to figure that out.
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. BRENNAN: Okay. If we could have the Welcher Exhibit 33. If you could open that up, please. You were asked about whether the window was within the time frame of 12:32:09, the last user interaction with the phone. When you look at this data, could you go to the top, please? You see on vehicle speed, the car is moving. You see that? Could you enlarge that a little bit, please?
MR. DISOGRA: The beginning of that data capture, the car is already moving. Correct? I see vehicle speeds right in those first couple of lines.
MR. BRENNAN: Yes. Yes. I see vehicle speed. If you go to the bottom, at the end, the car is still moving.
MR. DISOGRA: Yes. I see vehicle speeds there as well. 2361.
MR. BRENNAN: That would indicate, in your experience with Techstream data, the car is still moving.
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. BRENNAN: At the end of the record, there is a vehicle speed. The car is moving.
MR. DISOGRA: That would be my assumption.
MR. BRENNAN: Okay. And so when you're making your conclusions that something's with or without, you're simply talking about the time of the 10 seconds of data.
MR. DISOGRA: Yes. Yeah. Everything that I've done has been referencing the end of event 1162-2, which is exactly how it's been referenced in all of the other reports. That 10-second window.
MR. BRENNAN: Yes.
MR. DISOGRA: Not even the window, just the end. Everything — everything in the Aperture reports talks about the end of event 1162-2. So that's what I used across everything.
MR. BRENNAN: And when you say end of event, you're referring just to data, not the actual real life event.
MR. DISOGRA: Yeah, absolutely. The end of the recording.
MR. BRENNAN: Okay. And so after that window 12:32:04 to 12:32:12, you were asked a question about what might have happened 4 seconds later, 12:32:16. Remember you were asked about that.
MR. DISOGRA: Yes.
MR. BRENNAN: Did you know at 12:32:16 that John O'Keefe's cell phone moved for the last time? Did you know that?
MR. DISOGRA: No.
MR. BRENNAN: And between 12:32:12, which is in the 10-second window, and 12:32:16, do you know what John O'Keefe was doing in that 4-second period?
MR. DISOGRA: No.
MR. BRENNAN: Do you know if he was walking?
MR. DISOGRA: No.
MR. BRENNAN: Do you know if he was crawling?
MR. DISOGRA: No.
MR. BRENNAN: Do you know if he was falling?
MR. DISOGRA: No.
MR. BRENNAN: You don't know?
MR. DISOGRA: I do not know.
MR. BRENNAN: Thank you.
MR. JACKSON: May I, very briefly, your honor?
JUDGE CANNONE: Okay.
MR. BRENNAN: 12:32 wasn't just that Mr' O'Keefe's phone was moving but that steps were being taken, correct?
MR. DISOGRA: I didn't review the phone data, so I don't know.
MR. JACKSON: Did you review anything to indicate that steps were taken?
MR. BRENNAN: Objection.
JUDGE CANNONE: Sustained.
MR. JACKSON: You were asked just a second ago, what about the data? What if it's wrong? Then you'd be wrong. Correct?
MR. DISOGRA: Generally, yes.
MR. JACKSON: Garbage in, garbage out — basic scientific postulate. Correct?
MR. DISOGRA: Generally, yes.
MR. JACKSON: You're relying on whose data?
MR. DISOGRA: Mr. Burgess's data and Dr. Welcher's data.
MR. JACKSON: Thank you.