NZ computer expert aids US murder case

Computer forensic specialist Daniel Ayers has rewritten software to help in the Stinnett murder and kidnap inquiry in the United States. Picture / Dean Purcell

A New Zealand computer forensics expert is helping American investigators gather evidence against the woman accused of murdering a pregnant Missouri woman and kidnapping her unborn child.

Daniel Ayers, of McCallum Petterson in Auckland, was approached by an FBI-sponsored forensic laboratory in Kansas City to help unravel key evidence in the case against Lisa Montgomery.

Montgomery, 36, is charged with killing Bobbi Jo Stinnett last month in Skidmore and cutting her baby from her womb, a crime that has shocked and repulsed the public.

Montgomery faces life imprisonment or execution if convicted. The baby, named Victoria Jo, was found alive in Kansas.

Mr Ayers has modified software he developed to scan a computer the accused allegedly used to track and set up a meeting with Stinnett.

"The specific request was whether I could modify software I had written for Microsoft Windows to work with an Apple iMac computer. I said I would do my very best."

Mr Ayers said the investigators were trying to establish whether there was premeditation, and key evidence included traces of internet usage on Montgomery's home computer. Investigators believed Montgomery met Stinnett on the internet and, once discovering Stinnett was pregnant, contrived to meet her at her home. Mr Ayers said her Apple iMac computer contained thousands of traces of internet use, but as that type of computer was not frequently encountered by investigators, assistance was required to extract and interpret evidence.

"Lisa Montgomery had used an assumed name to contact Bobbi Jo by the internet so the length of the time she did that is quite relevant to pre-meditation."

Mr Ayers said computer forensic analysts used software and techniques to reassemble previously deleted computer files, track what had happened on a computer over several years, and see what files had been copied and printed.

He had assisted with investigations into serious crime before, both in New Zealand and internationally.

Last year he was an expert witness in an Auckland abduction case where the accused tried to use his computer use as an alibi.

Mr Ayers proved the accused's computer alibi was faked, created by deliberately manipulating the computer clock in an effort to avoid conviction.

He also helped with a murder investigation in Canada and a drug trafficking trial in Auckland.

Much of his work is in civil disputes concerning fraud, intellectual property and breach of contract.

Mr Ayers has written computer forensic analysis software that was used by more than 120 laboratories around the world. They include the US police and secret services and the Army and police in England, Germany and Australia.

"New Zealanders are well known as technological innovators. We often have an inferiority complex as a result of our geographic location. The reality is that in many areas we are right up there with the rest of the world."

Mr Ayers said the computer forensics field was changing very fast.

The high-profile David Bain and Mark Lundy murder cases raised similar evidential issues to the criminal work he now undertook and he would have liked to have had the opportunity to investigate them.