Canadian man acquitted of sending threatening email.
Posted by Steve Burgess at 6/7/2008 9:40 PM 
Categories: threatening email, Email, hotmail, Computer Forensics
Categories: threatening email, Email, hotmail, Computer Forensics
Meteorologist Cindy Day (a great name for a weather woman) talks about the weather on Canadian CTV. Wade Christopher White talks about Cindy Day. He writes to her and sends her gifts as well. Ms. Day may have other infatuated viewers, but when she received a threatening email ostensibly from White, she informed the authorities.
White was held in the East Coast Forensic Hospital (ECFH), in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada. Let us pause a moment to consider that term. To this poor citizen of the United States and denizen of his computer forensic lab, a Forensic Hospital sounds like a place to take a computer - or a dead body. It appears, however, that here in the U.S. of A. we would call it a hospital for the criminally...er...unsettled mind. My Canadian associates are free to correct my ignorance.
Back to our story, still in progress...
Ms. Day received an email from a person who claimed to be her husband (Day is not married), threatening to kill her and a male companion and to make them suffer in the process. The email made certain demands and said that if the demands were not met, the author of the email would go to the studio when she was broadcasting, and kill both her and himself on live TV.
During the trial, evidence was presented that White was indeed infatuated with Day (he kept a photo of her on his bed), had written her letters (he so admitted), had send her gifts (including a decorative crystal piano), and had several Hotmail accounts. The judge thought that White might have been the author, but law enforcement was unable to demonstrate the true identity of the person that registered the Hotmail account from which the threatening email was sent. Mr. White was allowed to go free from his "forensic incarceration", with the admonition not to communicate with her in any way for a period of one year.
In fact, web-based email can be problematic as it leaves a much smaller trail on the user's computer than other types of email. A deeper discussion of this issue can be found in the white paper, Challenges in Recovering Deleted Email. More on the Day / White story can be read in Fan ordered to stay away from Cindy Day, by Sherri Borden Colley.
White was held in the East Coast Forensic Hospital (ECFH), in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Canada. Let us pause a moment to consider that term. To this poor citizen of the United States and denizen of his computer forensic lab, a Forensic Hospital sounds like a place to take a computer - or a dead body. It appears, however, that here in the U.S. of A. we would call it a hospital for the criminally...er...unsettled mind. My Canadian associates are free to correct my ignorance.
Back to our story, still in progress...
Ms. Day received an email from a person who claimed to be her husband (Day is not married), threatening to kill her and a male companion and to make them suffer in the process. The email made certain demands and said that if the demands were not met, the author of the email would go to the studio when she was broadcasting, and kill both her and himself on live TV.
During the trial, evidence was presented that White was indeed infatuated with Day (he kept a photo of her on his bed), had written her letters (he so admitted), had send her gifts (including a decorative crystal piano), and had several Hotmail accounts. The judge thought that White might have been the author, but law enforcement was unable to demonstrate the true identity of the person that registered the Hotmail account from which the threatening email was sent. Mr. White was allowed to go free from his "forensic incarceration", with the admonition not to communicate with her in any way for a period of one year.
In fact, web-based email can be problematic as it leaves a much smaller trail on the user's computer than other types of email. A deeper discussion of this issue can be found in the white paper, Challenges in Recovering Deleted Email. More on the Day / White story can be read in Fan ordered to stay away from Cindy Day, by Sherri Borden Colley.
I had to stop reading the article because of errors of fact and grammar/spelling errors. The first paragraph threw me.
- "is than not a great name". Should that not read "is that not a great name"?
- "Ms. White may have other infatuated viewers". I thought her name was Day unless White (the accused) is transgendered. Who is Ms. White?
-"To this poor citizen of the United States and denizen of his computer forensic lab". Are you talking about White or yourself? At first I took it as White since the prior sentence was about white and the term "to this poor citizen" referred to White. But after reading it several times, it appears as if you are talking about youself.
-What are you trying to say here " denizen of his computer forensic lab?" White has a computer forensic lab?
I got the jest of the article but it was brutal reading.
Reply to this
- "is than not a great name". Should that not read "is that not a great name"?
-"To this poor citizen of the United States and denizen of his computer forensic lab". Are you talking about White or yourself? At first I took it as White since the prior sentence was about white and the term "to this poor citizen" referred to White. But after reading it several times, it appears as if you are talking about youself.
-What are you trying to say here " denizen of his computer forensic lab?" White has a computer forensic lab?
-I got the jest of the article but it was brutal reading.
Reply to this
One last thing, your article contained this sentence:
"Ms. Day received an email from a person who claimed to be her husband (Day is not married), threatening to kill her and her "husband" and to make them suffer in the process"
The actual story reads:
"received a message from a person who claimed to be her husband and said he was upset about her being with another man she said was her husband. Ms. Day is not married."
Your sentence puts a different spin on the entire case.
Reply to this
Thanks for your (2nd) comment. I had intended to shortcut my discussion of the email contents by putting quotes around "husband." I felt that the point of my blog entry was that the sender of the email could not be positively identified, so the contents of the threatening email were not of as much consequence to my entry. I also had my own questions about the full story behind this email. The source article left unanswered questions for me that I opted not to discuss in my blog entry. While I don't feel that my summary (avoidance, really) of the threatening email put a different spin on the entire case, I can see how it could for someone else. I'm glad the entry had a link to the source article so that you could see the whole thing for yourself.
Reply to this
His Canadian associates are free to correct my ignorance.
Reply to this
Just wondering why the email was not subjected to authorship analysis? - this
can be very helpful in such cases.
Reply to this
Good question. Guess we'd have to check with the Canadian authorities on that.
Reply to this
Hey, that was interesting,
If the email was there, in black and white, how could he get equited all the evidence suggests that he is sick in the head yet they equit him...
Thanks for writing, most people don't bother.
Reply to this
The thing is, William, while the email was there and while everyone knew he was the one, there wasn't adequate evidence to prove it. Being a nation of laws and all, people aren't supposed to be convicted without adequate evidence, hence the release with a warning. This, of course, gets abused by both sides all the time.
Reply to this
People should not scare with this kind of e mails. These should ignore.
Reply to this