Matthew Wild — Direct/Cross/Redirect/Voir Dire
804 linesJUDGE NEWMAN: Next witness.
MR. CONRAD: State calls Supervisory Special Agent Matthew Wild.
The witness, MATTHEW WILD, was first duly sworn and testified as follows:
COURT CLERK: Take a seat in the witness stand. State your name again for the record. Spell your last name, please.
MATTHEW WILD: My name is Matthew. Last name Wild, W-i-l-d.
VOIR DIRE EXAMINATION
BY MR. CONRAD:
MR. CONRAD: All right. Good afternoon, Agent Wild.
MATTHEW WILD: Good afternoon.
MR. CONRAD: Where are you employed, sir?
MATTHEW WILD: I'm a special -- I'm a supervisory special agent with the FBI. I'm assigned to FBI headquarters, but I sit in Rock Hill, South Carolina.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and specifically what were your job duties in Rock Hill, South Carolina?
MATTHEW WILD: Right now I supervise five full-time agents and about seventeen part-time folks in my unit, the Cellular Analysis Survey Team.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and explain to the jury what the Cellular Analysis Survey Team is.
MATTHEW WILD: So the Cellular Analysis Survey Time, or CAST, is group of about eighty special agents and task force officers. We're all across the country, and what we specialize in is analyzing historical phone records, specifically the location data associated with those.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and is that something that you do personally in your job?
MATTHEW WILD: It is.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and explain just a little more. I know we'll get into more when we get into your report, but what do you mean when you analyze cell phone location data? What are you doing when you do that?
MATTHEW WILD: So, what I'm doing is I'm looking at the call detail records. These records are very much like the old paper phone bill like we all got in the mail maybe ten or fifteen years ago. They had the date. They had the time that the calls occurred. They tell me who called who. So, if I made a phone call or someone called me, those numbers are listed on it. They have the duration of the call. The major difference between the old paper phone bill we all got in the mail and the records I look at is the records I look at have a cell tower, so they tell me which cell phone tower was used to handle my call, and then they tell me which side of that tower was used to handle that call. So, what I do is I take that cell tower information, I can compare it to a list of all the cell phone towers for that carrier, whether it be Verizon, T-Mobile, or AT&T, and then I can take that date, time, and general location from the cell phone records and I can compare it to a known date, time, and location. So, most of the time when law enforcement is investigating a crime, they generally know what date, time, and location that incident occurred.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and as part of your cell phone analysis, do you also take location data from -- directly from phones if available and plot that as well?
MATTHEW WILD: I can do that, yes, yes, sir. So, when law enforcement downloads a phone, it comes in a big report and there's a location data section on there, and I can also -- I analyze and map that data as well.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and how long have you been doing this cell phone analysis?
MATTHEW WILD: Part-time since 2012, full-time since about late 2016.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and have you undergone any training to help learn cell phone location analysis?
MATTHEW WILD: I have. I have over 400 hours of training. In 2012 I went to a course called Basic Project Pinpoint, where it was three days. We learned how to read the records, compare the records to a tower list, and generate a very basic map. I used that technique in every one of my cases from 2012 to 2016. In 2016 I attended Advance Project Pinpoint, which was a week long course. And during that course we took a deeper dive into the different types of records we can get from the carriers and how to use them. At the conclusion of that course, I was selected to go to the CAST certification course. At that time it was four weeks, the first week being training on radio frequency theory, so learning how radio waves travel between the phone and the tower, and then back through the network. The second week we have trainings from -- we had presentations from each of the carriers. So, Verizon came into our training.
We learned from the network engineers; those are the people who designed and maintained the network. And we also learned from the records custodians. Those are the people who provide the record skills. The third week we did drive testing. So, I have a piece of equipment I can put in my car and drive around a specific cell phone tower to figure out generally how far that tower reaches. And then the fourth week was a moot court exercise where we had a real case. We had to read the records, generate a map, go and do the drive test, and then testify to it, and at the conclusion of that I was certified. Now every year since then, I have attended the CAST recertification course, which is usually four days, where we go and meet -- go back and meet with all the carriers. We get technology updates. And then because we're located around the country, and sometimes in different parts of the world, we do case presentations to each other in what we're seeing in our respective areas.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and in your role as a cast supervisor and prior, have you ever been qualified as an expert in court before?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: How many times?
MATTHEW WILD: Over 130 times.
MR. CONRAD: So, you've done this a time or two before.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: At this -- and when you've been qualified before, specifically what have you been qualified as?
MATTHEW WILD: I've been qualified as an expert in historical call detail record analysis and cellular technology.
MR. CONRAD: All right.
MR. CONRAD: And, Your Honor, at this time the State would move to -- as Mr. Wild, excuse me, Agent Wild, as an expert in cell -- historical cell phone location analysis. If I said that correctly, sir?
MR. BARBER: No objection, Your Honor.
JUDGE NEWMAN: He's so qualified.
DIRECT EXAMINATION
BY MR. CONRAD:
MR. CONRAD: All right, and in your role as a CAST supervisor, you became involved in this case. Is that correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And do you recall approximately when you became involved and how?
MATTHEW WILD: I believe -- so, I wasn't a supervisor at the time. I was just a -- I was a regular agent, but I was asked in either late -- it happened in July of 2021, to provide some assistance in this case.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and asked by who?
MATTHEW WILD: I believe it was Dylan Hightower.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right, and specifically, at least in July of 2021, what did he ask your assistance for?
MATTHEW WILD: Well, he had obtained a few sets of call detail records on some of the phones in this case. And there's a question as to whether or not -- where there was a 911 call that was made, and the tower that was using that 911 -- the tower that was used to handle that 911 call, there was a question as to whether or not that tower could provide coverage up to Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and so there was a question about why the 911 call first bounced off a tower in Hampton?
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct.
MR. CONRAD: County, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And Moselle, to your knowledge, is in what county?
MATTHEW WILD: I think it's Dorchester, Chester.
MR. CONRAD: Or could it be in Colleton County?
MATTHEW WILD: Colleton. I'm sorry, Colleton County, yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And you were asked -- your assistance was asked to help figure out if that was possible, if someone could be at Moselle and a call could bounce off a tower in Hampton, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And the Cast Team, does it have tools that can assist in figuring that out?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah. We have something called the Gladiator Autonomous Receiver, and it's basically a box that we can put in our cars. It's a computer and it has a couple of receivers in it, and as we drive around that, box maps out the latitude and longitude, so like where we are with the box. And then it measures all the signals from the cell towers that the box can see in its area. It's very much like the old Verizon can you hear me now commercial. It's just hearing that hundreds of times a minute. It's just constantly doing that as we're driving around.
MR. CONRAD: And just to simplify that a little bit, would it be fair to say that what you -- what this tool can do is help you map specifically where cell coverage exists and where it doesn't. Is that correct?
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and as you move forward, did you go ahead and conduct that test?
MATTHEW WILD: I did. Myself as well Dylan Hightower and another agent with the FBI, we grabbed three of those pieces of equipment, three GARS, and we put them in three cars, and over two days in the beginning of August we basically drove everywhere all around Moselle, all the way down to Hampton, all of the way up to -- I believe it's Ehrhardt and over to 95.
MR. CONRAD: Did you also go on the property at Moselle to take these measurements?
MATTHEW WILD: I personally did, yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right, and afterwards were you asked to prepare a report and to take the cell -- all of these cell records in and prepare a report and provide this report to show the locations of various phones involved in this case?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, I was.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. I'm going to show you what's been marked as State's Exhibit 458, and I'll have you take a look at it and see if you recognize it.
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah. This is the report that I generated for this case.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and when you say generated, what kind of information did you take in to help you generate that report?
MATTHEW WILD: Well, so I had to take in the cell phone records. So, the records that we received from Verizon, I take those in. I also take in the Cellebrite downloads that came from one of the phones. And then I also had a -- after we did the drive test create some maps to kind of show and display that data.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and from this report specifically, there's a couple of numbers that we don't want read, but whose records did you look at, and for Maggie, Paul, and Alex, you can read their numbers. But whose Verizon records did you look at?
MATTHEW WILD: I'm sorry, I couldn't hear the end of your question.
MR. CONRAD: I'm sorry. Whose Verizon records did you look at?
MATTHEW WILD: I looked at Alex's, Paul's, Maggie's, and then there's Marty Cook and C.B. Rowe.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and did you prepare a report showing locations off of towers where those various phones were on the days of and surrounding the murder?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah. I showed the general area where the phones were on the days surrounding the murder.
MR. CONRAD: And you mentioned you got the Cellebrite data on a phone, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: Do you remember who you got that location information from?
MATTHEW WILD: I got that from Britt Dove at SLED.
MR. CONRAD: And specifically whose phone did he -- whose location data did he provide you?
MATTHEW WILD: That was Paul's location data.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and did you plot those locations provided on your report?
MATTHEW WILD: I did.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and those would include times as well, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: At this time, the State would move to enter Exhibit 458 into evidence.
MR. BARBER: No objection, Your Honor.
JUDGE NEWMAN: It's admitted.
(CELL PHONE DATA MARKED AS STATE'S EXHIBIT NUMBER 458 WAS RECEIVED INTO EVIDENCE.)
MR. CONRAD: All right, and, Your Honor, the State would to enter this under seal because there's some phone numbers included. I do have a redacted copy that we're going to publish for the jury -- for now for the jury and the audience.
JUDGE NEWMAN: Okay.
MR. BARBER: No objection, Your Honor.
MR. CONRAD: All right, Agent Wild, I'm going ask you to step down with the Court's permission, and we're going to pull this report up. And this is going to be a little tricky. We've got some tight areas to work in, but can you stand on -- in that area there? And I will -- okay. So, Agent Wild, I'm going to hand you this, and I'm going to essentially ask you to start going through this report with the jury to explain to them. I'm going -- I'm going to probably interrupt if I feel like something needs to be clarified.
MATTHEW WILD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: You just tell me when you need to click to a next slide, but at this point I'm going to let you take it away, sir.
MATTHEW WILD: All right, sure. All right. So, the first slide here, this is just who I am, my case number, and then the telephone numbers involved. The second slide, it just gives a background. So, I was asked by SLED to conduct an analysis in this case, the first paragraph. Methodology is the second paragraph. So, again, I take the call detail records. These are kept by the carriers for billing purposes, for some other technical purposes, but I take these call detail records. I compare the cell tower data on those call detail records to a list of towers, and they tell me whether that phone is in Hampton, whether that phone is in Charleston, whether that phone is in Spartanburg or Greenville, and it gives me a general idea of where the phone is. And then -- so the cell site locations. So, the towers split. The towers can change over time. Okay, just in the last couple of years, we've gone from using a 3G to LTE, and now we all have the 5G bar on our phone, right?
So the tower list change -- the towers change, and we get updated tower lists on a regular basis from the carriers. So, I use the tower list that was in effect around the time of the incident, so around the time of June of 2021. The survey analysis section. So, again we took three pieces of equipment and we basically drove everywhere all the way around the -- around this area, or around the area, trying to record all the signals from the different cell towers. What this gives us is a general area of -- it actually maps out the area of where there's coverage from those cell towers and cell sectors. And then my conclusion. So, this slide just shows different types of cell phone towers, okay? I draw your attention to the one on the top left. We have these speaker looking devices hanging on this tower. Those are the antennas that transmit and receive a signal to and from a phone. Okay, a phone a very much like a car radio.
As I drove here today, I tune into my favorite radio station, or my favorite frequency, and somewhere along my route, there's a radio tower. It admits a signal at that frequency. My car radio can receive that signal; I can listen to my favorite station. The major difference between a car radio and a cell phone is that with a cell phone, that information has to go into two directions. It has to be able to receive from the tower, but you'll also need to be able to send that information back to the tower. So, those are the antennas that send and receive those signals. The second thing about this is you'll know that those -- you'll realize those antennas, they're on a triangular shaped structure. Most of the towers are designed to cover a full circle, or 360 degrees, and the way that the carriers accomplish this is by breaking that circle into three sides, or three sectors.
So, later on in my report you're going to see these wedge shapes, and I like to just think of the center of this wedge shape as nothing more than the center of one side of this triangle. Going on. In a lot of other places, urban, more suburban areas, there's not really room to build, like, these big towers like on this one on the top left, so they start putting them on the sides of buildings. The smaller ones will be on top of light poles in the cities. So, just because they're not -- just because you don't see it or you don't realize it's there, it's still there. Another example of that, of course, is my favorite, the pine tree. These are all over the place and they usually sit about 150 feet taller than of the other trees around them, but at the top there's these spray painted antennas, and they provide the same service as the regular towers that you can see. All right. So, again, the tower separated in to three -- most towers are separated into three sides, or three sectors.
When I look at the call detail records, they tell me the tower number. Say it's 23. They tell me the sectors. Say it's 1. What I have to do is I have to go into the tower list and I have to look up tower number 23, and then I have to look up Sector 1, and that tower list is going to tell me which way that sector faces. What I'm looking for there is something called the azimuth, or the orientation. Azimuth and orientation are just two big scary words for direction. Okay? So, if the azimuth is zero, all that means is that side of the tower faces north. Okay? If the azimuth is 180, all that means is the tower faces south. So, what I have to do is I will to draw a line at zero if it faces north, and then I'll go 60 degrees in one direction, 60 degrees in the other direction, that gives me one-third of that tower, or one-third of that circle, which is the sector in which the energy is being admitted. So, I display that information using this wedge shape.
So, you can see it's a 120 degree wedge; there's just shaded area in the middle. Okay. Just because that shaded area is there doesn't mean the phone has to be within that shaded area. Radio frequency is like -- it's like light. It's like if I shut all the lights off in this room and I shined a flashlight to the back of the room, it's just going to be emitted in that direction. That's all I'm saying by showing the shaded area. The energy from that tower is being emitted in that direction. And then this is how I map -- this is how I map the sectors on the map. I use that wedge. Each one of 16 these green dots on this map happens to be a cell tower. And so generally the phone is going to be somewhere within that wedge, within the arms of this wedge, but somewhere between the tower that's being used and the next one in that direction are closer to the one that's being used. All right, another set of records that we can get, something called RTT, or timing events.
This is a Verizon case, so the records we have are called RTT records. What RTT records are is it's an estimation of the distance between the phone and the tower at the time that that transaction occurred. All right. So, what we get is a regular wedge, like we know which tower, we know which side of the tower is being used, and then the Verizon tells us approximately how far the phone is from that tower at the time that it's used. Okay? This is based on, like, a basic time over distance theory. We know how fast the signals travel -- they travel at the speed of light -- and then all we have to do is time them from the time it takes to go from the tower to the phone and back to the tower and then estimate the distance. So, the phone -- when these types of things occur, we have these records, and what we're going to have is this high ball or this wedge, this shaded wedge here, this shaded band here, and that phone is going to be somewhere inside that band, or just slightly inward from the band.
MR. CONRAD: And would another -- could you use another word for that shade of band? Could you call it an arc?
MATTHEW WILD: An arc, yes.
MR. CONRAD: Would that be accurate?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MATTHEW WILD: All right. So, now this slide, this is going into the actual case here. So, this is showing the legends, and this is where all the locations in this state are located. Starting with the top left one, the, the top one, the red pin here in the center of the page, that's the address of the crime scene on Moselle Road in Islandton. Next is the green pin, which is Almeda. And then next is the orange pen. That is 10 -- 1104 Luray Highway in Hampton, South Carolina. The purple pin is 123 Russell Road in Brunson, South Carolina.
MR. CONRAD: And I'm going to stop you there, and let's go on to the next slide.
MATTHEW WILD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: And one of the things I'm going to ask you to do, Agent Wild, as you go through some of these, the colors kind of bleed sometimes on these monitors, so the jury may not be able to read some of the place names and where they're at. So, each time we go to a different map, if you would just kind of provide a general orientation of where the cities are and some of the roads are just so the jury can see it with us, please?
MATTHEW WILD: Okay. That works. All right. So, this map --
MR. CONRAD: All right. So, that's cut off at the very bottom there.
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. We can go through the exhibit.
MATTHEW WILD: Okay.
(Break in proceedings.)
MR. CONRAD: So, this is --
MATTHEW WILD: Thank you so much.
MR. CONRAD: All right. So, what's the timeframe on this one?
MATTHEW WILD: So, the timeframe on this one is June 7th, 4:53 p.m. to 6:09 p.m., and this is the activity for Paul Murdaugh's phone ending in 7845. So, the blue pin is the address in Okatie, South Carolina.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and what times do you show Paul's phone in that general area near Okatie, South Carolina?
MATTHEW WILD: So between 5:40 and 6:03, generally in that area.
MR. CONRAD: On the afternoon of what day?
MATTHEW WILD: On the afternoon of June 7th.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right, and there's several hits off several towers, isn't there?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah, there's some down -- there's some at the bottom. So, 4:53, 5:11, it's in the tower just south of there, and then 5:21 on through 6:09 the phone is using the tower north.
MR. CONRAD: And just so the jury understands, you know, this is that sector you were talking about a few minutes ago, right?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: So, when the tower pinged off of this at -- in this sector at this time, in theory that phone could be anywhere within this sector, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct. That phone could be anywhere within that sector. It could also those slightly outside of that sectors because those lines, I can't go out to this tower and look up and see those three lines coming off. It's kind of like a fuzzy -- like a fuzzy area between the sectors.
MR. CONRAD: So, the sectors aren't hard and fast every time.
MATTHEW WILD: Correct.
MR. CONRAD: But, you know, it's just as -- in your general experience, you know, within what range will you usually see a phone ping off a tower? What's the general max range? And I know it can vary.
MATTHEW WILD: Well, it can vary because it depends on where the phone is. You know, in a rural area the phone can be 6 to 8 to 10 miles from the tower, and it can use that tower.
MR. CONRAD: All right.
MATTHEW WILD: It just kind of depends on where it is.
MR. CONRAD: Because towers are usually far apart out in rural areas.
MATTHEW WILD: In rural areas -- I mean, they're set up for population density. So, in rural areas not a lot of population, a lot of farmland, they're going to be further apart, whereas if you get closer in the city or suburban areas, they're going to be closer and closer together.
MR. CONRAD: And is -- just as a general rule, do cell phones try to connect to the nearest tower, or they have the best signal, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Well, the cell phone tries to connect to the tower and sector it sees as the best signal. That's not always the nearest tower, but most of time it is.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right, and so Paul's phone is in the area of Okatie starting 5:30 p.m. to about 6:09 p.m. on the afternoon of June 7th, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and just so it's clear for this jury, when we say Paul's phone, you can't testify as to who was holding that phone. Is that correct?
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct. I have no idea whose hand that phone was in all during each one of these calls. All we know is that was the phone that we believe he was using.
MR. CONRAD: But Paul's phone is in these areas during this time.
MATTHEW WILD: It is.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right. Okay. We'll continue with Paul -- Paul's phone. Continue.
MATTHEW WILD: So, this next slide is 6:17 p.m. through 7:30 p.m. And basically at 6:17 the phone is way south down here in the bottom of the page.
MR. CONRAD: And let's do some general orientation here. What's this town right here? Can you read that?
MATTHEW WILD: Yemassee.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and this is -- and this is where?
MATTHEW WILD: That's Varnville.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and that green was again what?
MATTHEW WILD: Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and red -- and this red up here is?
MATTHEW WILD: That's the Moselle property.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right. So, what do you see this phone doing during this timeframe starting at 6:24 p.m.?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah. So, between 6:17 and 6:53, it's traveling north from the bottom of the page up to the side, and then kind of to the top, and then finally where it gets to Sector 1 here at 7:05 and 7:30, it's consistent with being in the area of Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and this is just a pinging in this area at 6:24, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah. These are just the phone calls -- these are the phone calls that are coming on the phone, and those are the towers that the phone is selecting as the best tower at that time.
MR. CONRAD: And this general direction seems to be traveling up north, and Okatie would be somewhere down in this area off the map, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And that's off to the -- for the record, off to the right and below where this slide is. And then you see the general progression north towards Moselle, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and we see Sector 3 here. And what time does it ping in Sector 3 just due south of Moselle?
MATTHEW WILD: It's 6:53 p.m.
MR. CONRAD: And then we see it switch over to Sector 1, which is the north facing sector, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And what time is Sector 1?
MATTHEW WILD: 7:05.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MATTHEW WILD: And then at 7:30 it uses that same Sector 1 at a distance of 2.91 miles, which is in the area of Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: So, at 7:30 it's somewhere in this arc like we talked about before, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: The arc, the number provided is not necessarily 100 percent accurate, right?
MATTHEW WILD: It's not because depending on where the phone is. If the phone is out in the middle of field 1 mile from the tower, it should register at a mile. But if the phone is in a house, or let's say the phone is in this courtroom, those signals have to go through the exterior walls of the courtroom, hit my phone, and go back out through the exterior walls, and it might slow the signal down, which will make the distance just slightly further.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. So, it's generally reliable but not necessarily exactly accurate when you see that arc in the distance, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It's not -- it's not exactly accurate.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right, but regardless, at 6:53 it's pinging to the south of Moselle in Sector 3, and at 7:05 it's pinging in the -- the same sector where Moselle is to the north, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and what does that -- what inference can you draw, in your opinion, of what the cell phone did between those two times?
MATTHEW WILD: Well, in between 6:53 to 7:05?
MR. CONRAD: Uh-huh.
MATTHEW WILD: I mean, it could have been moved from Sector 3 to Sector 1, or it could have been on the line between Sector 3 and Sector 1 at that time and just bounced back and forth.
MR. CONRAD: But you would agree that generally this direction is towards where?
MATTHEW WILD: Towards Moselle, yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. We're on the next slide, and tell us what we see. And this is still Paul Murdaugh's phone, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is. This is 7:30 p.m. to 8:40 p.m.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MATTHEW WILD: So here on the right side of the page starting at 7:30, there's those activate RTT hits. At --
MR. CONRAD: And that was the same from the last one.
MATTHEW WILD: That's the same from the last one.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MATTHEW WILD: Right, and then 7:33 there's another RTT hit and a call. I'm sorry, another RTT hit on this tower to the bottom left.
MR. CONRAD: All right.
MATTHEW WILD: And then where those arcs overlap, when they're in close timing to each other, that's generally where the phone is going to be. And so you can see that is arcs overlap in the area of Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: So, by -- about that time, 7:30 to 7:33, would your opinion about be that cell phone is that area of Moselle?
MATTHEW WILD: It has to be somewhere in the area of Moselle, yes, sir. And then we have other calls at 8:40 -- 8:32 and 8:41.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. At 8:40, and it pings off of this sector at 8:40 --
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: -- is that correct? And that's sector which of this tower?
MATTHEW WILD: That's Sector 1 off of that tower.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and, again, same direction as Moselle.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and what do we see on this slide?
MATTHEW WILD: This is 9:03 p.m. on June 7th. So, here there's a call, and then there's an RTT distance of 3.11 miles.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and let's just do some general orientation again. The red is what? This red marker is what?
MATTHEW WILD: That's Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and the green is what?
MATTHEW WILD: It's Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and then what's this town right here?
MATTHEW WILD: That's Varnville.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right, and we have a hit at 9:03:22?
MATTHEW WILD: Yep.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and what -- and it's off sector what?
MATTHEW WILD: It is off Sector 3, but again there's -- there could be a little overlap there between Sector 3 and Sector 1.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MATTHEW WILD: And there's a chance -- I mean, the phone is likely still in the area of Moselle. It's just using a different sector.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. Your opinion is it is likely in the area of Moselle.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes. There is -- I know for a fact that there's, there's signals on this sector in the area of Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: And you have a slide to show that.
MATTHEW WILD: I do, yes.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right, and then here we have at 10:34 p.m. another hit.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And again this is the same map as last time, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is. 10:34 p.m. It's usually in the same -- it's the map, just the sector has changed back to Sector 1.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and in your opinion, that phone is still pinging.
MATTHEW WILD: It's consistent with being in the area of Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and now we're transitioning to something else with Paul, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir. This --
MR. CONRAD: And what is this?
MATTHEW WILD: These are the -- this is the IPhone location data that was taken from his -- from the download of his IPhone.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and we have some times here, and can I go ahead one slide --
MATTHEW WILD: Sure.
MR. CONRAD: -- because it has more information. It shows a overhead map of the area, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And let's talk about this. You've been out to this property, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, I have.
MR. CONRAD: And this is where? What is this called?
MATTHEW WILD: That's Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: And what am I pointing at right here in the bottom middle part of the screen?
MATTHEW WILD: That's the main house there.
MR. CONRAD: And then this -- this area up here in the -- basically due north of the residence, what is this area?
MATTHEW WILD: That's the dog kennel or the -- or the hangar.
MR. CONRAD: All right. There's a big hangar building --
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: -- and then there's a smaller series of dog kennels right next to the hangar, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right, and we have some location data from Paul's phone here, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, we do. So, between 7:45 and 7:56, all of these circles in and around the road and close to the kennels, that's where the phone is being used. And then at 8:00 there's two hits down south of there at 37 and 100 meters.
MR. CONRAD: And we see these red circles. What is that red circle and what does it represent?
MATTHEW WILD: So, the red circle is the -- it's a -- it's the area that the phone could potentially be within. The phone shouldn't be any further than -- the phone should be where the pin is but it shouldn't be any further than the exterior of that circle.
MR. CONRAD: So, sometimes the GPS information provided by a phone isn't exactly 100 percent accurate, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Correct.
MR. CONRAD: But it does -- the phone information provides information that allows you to determine how accurate the location information is, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It's basically a level of accuracy. So, if the level of accuracy is, like, 3 or 4 meters, I mean, the phone is going to be within this general area around me. But if the level accuracy is, let's say, 5,000 meters, that just tells me it's here in town somewhere.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right, and we see some of those distances listed in your data here, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: So, at the 7:45:31 hit received -- and what is this number?
MATTHEW WILD: That's the latitude, longitude, so that's like the specific point of where phone returned where it's located.
MR. CONRAD: And then I see a number next to that. What is that?
MATTHEW WILD: That's the radius, so the red circle in meters.
MR. CONRAD: And talking about this again, data point, what does that number say?
MATTHEW WILD: 48.
MR. CONRAD: 48 what?
MATTHEW WILD: 48 meters.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. So, from the information -- excuse me -- so, if I understand what you're telling us is at 7:45:31 p.m., the phone is at this -- within about 48 meters of this lat and long, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And then, you know, we see some different uncertainty in the area, so at 7:46:09 p.m. there's about 165 meter circle. So, that's a much bigger circle here.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir, it is.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and then we see 52 meters at 7:56:06 p.m., correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And then we -- you talk about these hits and -- down here at 8:00.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And we're going to advance one more slide to show the digital map. The previously slide had the exact same data, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: All right. So, we're still looking at an overhead -- ariel view of Moselle, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes. This is 8:04 to 8:05 p.m.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and so now we're seeing some hits across this Moselle Road, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct.
MR. CONRAD: And, again, we see the location area of value, and it's somewhere within these circles --
MATTHEW WILD: It is.
MR. CONRAD: -- at those times, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. Now we're at 8:06:20 p.m., correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And at 8:06:20, where do we see the phone?
MATTHEW WILD: So at 8:06:20, it is here near Moselle Road just north of the driveway.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MATTHEW WILD: And from there it moves towards the dog kennels, or the hangar -- it moves towards the dog kennel at the hangar, then kind of up the driveway, and then finally winding up back up at the house at about 8:14.
MR. CONRAD: So, we see a series of location hits, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And looking at the timing, it would appear that the phone moves back toward -- through the kennels, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And then moves up this road towards the house at the main residence, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And we see some circles associated with this data, but the -- several of these circles start to get pretty small, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, they are pretty small.
MR. CONRAD: And what are those size of the circles?
MATTHEW WILD: 20 meters are the final ones that are in and around the house.
MR. CONRAD: And just so I clarify it, we see the blue pin, right?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: Ad that represents the actual lat and long that was reported by the phone, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, it does.
MR. CONRAD: The air -- the 20 meters means it's almost certainly within that circle --
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: -- within that particular pin, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and when you see a series of kind of rapid pings like this within a short period of time, generally what does that tell you is going on with that cell phone at that time?
MATTHEW WILD: Well, the phone is using some kind of application or some kind of map or something that's using its location hit.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and then regardless, by 8:08:45 p.m., where is Paul's phone?
MATTHEW WILD: It's, it's back at the house.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and that's got a load area of how big? I'm sorry?
MATTHEW WILD: An accuracy of 20 meters.
MR. CONRAD: An accuracy of 20 meters. Okay, and that makes a pretty small circle around the size of that house, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It does.
MR. CONRAD: And there's another hit at 8:14 p.m. at the same place, it appears.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. Now we moved on. We're still looking at this overhead map of Moselle, and we have some more hits starting at 8:14 and going through to 8:35:07 p.m., correct?
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct.
MR. CONRAD: And all these seem to be centered around the residence.
MATTHEW WILD: They are, yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: Now, there's some varying degrees of accuracy, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah. There's one that goes up to 165, 165 meters, but most of them are 20 -- between 20 and 79.
MR. CONRAD: 8:35: p.m., that phone, Paul's phone, is within 20 meters of the Moselle residence, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right, and we're going to skip one more slide and just keep with the digital map.
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah.
MR. CONRAD: And just so it's clear to the jury, this slide contains the exact same information, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, it does. And then I just switched the map over from the regular street map to the Google Earth Map.
MR. CONRAD: All right. So, now we see another series of phone locations for Paul's phone. This is, again, the night of June 7th of 2021, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: 8:38:07, where do we see that phone start pinging?
MATTHEW WILD: Again, it's a 56 meter -- there's a 56 meter hit at right around the dog kennels.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. So, by 8:38:07 p.m., that phone is within 56 meters of the dog kennels, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and then we see some more hits. There's a little bit larger of an area starting at 8:58:44.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: But then we see a hit at 8:44:55 p.m., and it says media location. What does that mean, sir.
MATTHEW WILD: So in the Cellebrite report itself for that record, it came from a movie file. That's where that location was generated from.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and have you reviewed or seen that video that the location data came from?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, I have.
MR. CONRAD: And just generally speaking what is that a video of?
MATTHEW WILD: That's a video inside the kennel when Paul is playing with the dog.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and that video was recorded at -- the time stamp recorded on the video is 8:44:55, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And that matched exactly with the dog kennel, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, it does.
MR. CONRAD: And I don't see a number next to that data point. Why don't I see an accuracy number?
MATTHEW WILD: Not 100 percent sure why there's no accuracy number, but we know the video was taken inside the dog kennel because we can see the video. And then the next one right after that -- I mean, basically there's records just before 8:44 and 53 seconds and 8:44 and 56 seconds, and both of those put it in the area of the dog kennel.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and I'll skip one more slide here. And we're still looking at this overhead map of Moselle, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And we have it looks like a hit location data of 10:18 p.m.?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And 10:18:03 p.m., correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And both of those are centered on where again?
MATTHEW WILD: They're again just right there in the vicinity of the dog kennels.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. Now, did you plot every single location data plot that you received from Lieutenant Dove?
MATTHEW WILD: No, I did not. So between 8:44 and 10:18, there was a series of location data points, but most of them were between like 4 and 6 or 7,000 meters, so they wouldn't -- in my opinion, they weren't super helpful to figuring out exactly where that phone was at that time.
MR. CONRAD: When you see an accuracy of that big or uncertainty of that big, in your opinion is that location something that can be -- is that reliable information?
MATTHEW WILD: I mean, not 100 percent reliable because it's such a huge area it could be.
MR. CONRAD: And, you know, going back to the last couple of slides between then and now, between 8:44 p.m. and this 10:18 p.m., did you see any information off of Paul's phone that suggests it went anywhere but staying at those kennels?
MATTHEW WILD: No.
MR. CONRAD: All right. Now we're going to move on to Maggie's phone, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: So, we're going to rewind back to earlier in the day, and let's look at this map. First of all, what's this map generally of?
MATTHEW WILD: This is, like, the West Ashley area, so just south of Charleston.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and we see some tower hits and this starting at --
MATTHEW WILD: At 4:25 p.m., and then ending at about 7:05 p.m., the phone is generally in this West Ashley area.
MR. CONRAD: So, Maggie's phone in that general area until about 7:05 p.m.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and then here -- okay. This is a bigger map, so let's get oriented. What is this area right here?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah. So, that's North Charleston that you're circling here.
MR. CONRAD: And Charleston down here?
MATTHEW WILD: And Charleston just to the south of that.
MR. CONRAD: And then out here, what is that red marker again?
MATTHEW WILD: The red marker is Moselle, and the green marker is Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and then we see a series of hits with Maggie's phone. You've label them, what, one, two, three, four, and five, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And these start at what time?
MATTHEW WILD: They start at 7:07 and end at 7:50.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and so generally speaking what does this indicate Maggie's phone is doing to you --
MATTHEW WILD: It's traveling from the Charleston area west towards Moselle or Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right, and here we have a hit at 7:50 p.m. -- 7:50:20 p.m., correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And where is this?
MATTHEW WILD: That's right in Walterboro, actually right here.
MR. CONRAD: Right here in Walterboro, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And, you know, did you take a look at what appeared to be Maggie's general route from Charleston out towards Moselle during that time?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And what road would she most likely have been on to travel that way?
MATTHEW WILD: Route 17.
MR. CONRAD: And so that route would have taken her right through the center of Walterboro?
MATTHEW WILD: It would have, yes.
MR. CONRAD: I think right out here, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And so she's somewhere in this sector at 7:50 p.m., probably right in the middle of Walterboro, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and just in your analysis, did you just -- looking -- just looking for a rough number here, did you calculate a rough or drive time from here, the center of Walterboro, out to Moselle?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah, it was under 30 minutes.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. Roughly 30 minutes give or take?
MATTHEW WILD: Roughly, yes.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and this ping is 7:50:20 p.m., correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: All right. Now, were there any other -- did you get any more tower information off Maggie's phone for the rest of the evening?
MATTHEW WILD: No. That 7:50 p.m. was the last tower hit I received that was on the records from Maggie's phone.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. Now, there were some phone calls to Maggie after 7:50 p.m., correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: But were any of those answered?
MATTHEW WILD: No.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and so you don't have any good tower information for her phone after 7:50 p.m.
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct.
MR. CONRAD: All right. Now we've moved on and we're looking whose phone?
MATTHEW WILD: We're looking at Alex's phone.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and what timeframe are we talking about here?
MATTHEW WILD: This is 4:10 p.m. to 6:25 p.m.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. Let's get oriented here. This is -- the red marker is what?
MATTHEW WILD: Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: And the green marker is what?
MATTHEW WILD: Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and then the town of -- what's this town right here?
MATTHEW WILD: Hampton.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MATTHEW WILD: And Varnville is just south of there.
MR. CONRAD: And we see some hits off these two towers between 4:10 and 6:25 p.m., correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And are you familiar with the location of the law firm formerly known as PMPED?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And is that in the vicinity of Hampton?
MATTHEW WILD: It is.
MR. CONRAD: And would that be within these areas that Alex's phone was to be in?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah. That would be consistent with the activity on the phone records.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and that's up until when?
MATTHEW WILD: 6:25 p.m.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and here we are the next slide, and again, orientation, green is what?
MATTHEW WILD: Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: Red is what?
MATTHEW WILD: Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and what information do we see here?
MATTHEW WILD: Here we have a number of calls between 6:40 and 9:10 p.m., and they're all using tower 159263.
MR. CONRAD: And that's which tower?
MATTHEW WILD: That's the one that's shown, which faces north and is consistent with being in the area of the Moselle property.
MR. CONRAD: So, starting at 6:40 p.m. you see him north in this sector, which is the sector where Moselle is, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right. So, here we are -- well, let me go back. And the rest of these phone calls being in the same sector up until 9:10:47, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right, and now what timeframe are we talking about with this slide?
MATTHEW WILD: Now we're looking at 9:12 to 9:18.
MR. CONRAD: And in the 9:12 phone record, where does Alex's cell phone ping? What sector?
MATTHEW WILD: It uses Sector 3 on tower 159263, which is the one closest to Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: So, somewhere south or close to the border of this tower, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And then at 9:18 p.m. we see a ping off of this tower, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, off of 159217, which is closer to Varnville.
MR. CONRAD: And it would be in the north -- most likely in the north side of that tower --
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: -- correct? All right, and now this is the same two calls, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is.
MR. CONRAD: All right, but now I see some -- it looks like some shaded overlay over this. I'm going to give this back to you.
MATTHEW WILD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: What is that shaded overlay, and what does that mean?
MATTHEW WILD: So, the shaded overlay is the coverage area that we're able to determine from doing that drive test with our equipment. And so basically we had to drive everything all around these addresses and then go back and look at the data, and then it creates these bubbles that show us where the coverage -- where the equipment saw that tower and that sector. And so here you can see that at 9:18 -- I'm sorry, 9:12 she's in the sector that's kind of highlighted in green. And then at 9:18 it uses this one on the bottom, 159217 that's in pink.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and so what your drive test found is, you know, you kind -- you've described it as neat sectors at the beginning but in reality they're kind of more messy, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: They are a lot more messy.
MR. CONRAD: And from what you found from the actual field testing is you could get coverage off this tower and it looks like it's just south of Varnville anywhere in this pink area, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And that's in that particular sector. What sector is that again?
MATTHEW WILD: That's Sector 1.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and then this green area, you could be anywhere in this green area and potentially be getting coverage from this tower up north towards Moselle, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And now there's some overlap, though --
MATTHEW WILD: There is.
MR. CONRAD: -- correct? So, there's some areas where a phone could potentially connect to either tower, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct.
MR. CONRAD: And --
MATTHEW WILD: But in 2 minutes -- I mean, the -- I'm sorry, the calls are 6 minutes apart --
MR. CONRAD: Right.
MATTHEW WILD: -- so, I mean, within 6 minutes the phone used both of these sectors at the same time.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and just as a final point, the sectors aren't exactly black and white neatly drawn, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Correct.
MR. CONRAD: And so in reality, like this little green corner above this tower, that phone could be in that area and still be pinging off this sector of the tower, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes. Absolutely, yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And this coverage is something that -- you told this jury about the driving test, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Correct.
MR. CONRAD: And that's when you guys went out with actual equipment to measure the coverage in all of these areas, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir. We drove all these roads, and again that equipment every few seconds it's recording the GPS point, and then it is measuring the signal level from all of the towers and sectors in that area. And then what I do is I go in and I can read the tower and sector that was used by looking at the call detail records, and I can go in and select the covering area, or this blob, for that tower and sector.
MR. CONRAD: So, let's go on to the next slide. And we see now we have some information starting at what, 9:20:34, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir. So, at 9:20 -- from 9:20 to 9:46 there's a handful of calls all using tower 159217, but using Sector 2 that kind faces towards the Almeda address.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MATTHEW WILD: And then there's one RTT hit at 2 -- at 9:34 at about 2.09 miles, which is consistent with being in the area of the Almeda residence.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and that starts at -- he's -- that phone is within the sector starting at what time?
MATTHEW WILD: 9:20.
MR. CONRAD: And it -- the last phone call in that sector is what time?
MATTHEW WILD: 9:46.
MR. CONRAD: And Almeda is in that sector, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is.
MR. CONRAD: But if a car were driving up this road towards Varnville, and I believe that's Highway 378 -- or 278, excuse me, that's still on that same sector, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. So, if someone is in that vehicle on that 278 right there in that sector, you would get the same information.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: So, at 9:46 if a car has already left Almeda and were on 278, it would still ping at that same --
MATTHEW WILD: It should, yeah.
MR. CONRAD: All right. We'll go on to the next slide. This is still Alex's phone, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It's just a zoom-in version of the last slide.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. So, it's the same information but looking closer, and I probably should have made some of those points on this one, but we see that road 278 here, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: Within that sector, and there's Almeda. It's also in the same sector, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and so in theory unless it -- for the RTT hit at 9:34, the phone could be anywhere in this arc, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It could be anywhere in that arc.
MR. CONRAD: And for the rest of these hits, it could be anywhere within this whole sector?
MATTHEW WILD: It could be anywhere between this tower and sector and then the next one in that direction.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right. We'll go back. This is the next slide, and this again is Alex Murdaugh's phone, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, it is.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and we see some hits starting at 9:52:59 p.m., correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir. So, 9:52:59 the phone was using the sector with the 240 in it, so it's not using the one that faces towards Almeda yet -- I'm sorry, towards Moselle yet.
MR. CONRAD: And the red -- what's the red?
MATTHEW WILD: It's Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: And the green?
MATTHEW WILD: Is Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. So, just in the previous slide we saw the phone down here in the area of Almeda, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah. It was using that tower near Almeda but facing Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: And by 9:52 p.m. -- 59 p.m., Alex's phone is pinging off of the -- this tower right by Varnville, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: I'm sorry, can you repeat the question?
MR. CONRAD: Which tower is --
MATTHEW WILD: At 9:52 and 9:53 the phone is using the tower closer to Moselle, but on the sector facing towards Varnville.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and then we have a 10:06 hit, 31, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And do you recall what particular phone call was placed from Alex's phone on 10:06 and 31?
MATTHEW WILD: That was the 911 call.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and it hits of off which tower?
MATTHEW WILD: It hits off the tower closer to Varnville.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, but then at 10:17 there's another hit with Alex's phone, and which sector is it pinging off of at 10:17?
MATTHEW WILD: That's using the zero azimuths, or the Sector 1 that faces towards Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: So, that initial 911 call hit off this tower down -- way down here by Varnville, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It did.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and that was one of the reasons you were called in to help figure out why that happened, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: I was, and I figured out why it happened. It's because somebody -- so in radio frequency, the higher the frequency the shorter distance that it can travel. The lower the frequency the longer it does travel. So, on this tower there's two different sets of sectors, and one is at a higher frequency and one is at a lower frequency. So, this call here happened on the lower frequency and, therefore, the signal can travel slightly further.
MR. CONRAD: So, it's -- in your opinion, it's consistent the phone could have been up here at Moselle at the time of that 10:06 911 call.
MATTHEW WILD: It could have been, yes.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. Next slide. And we're going to come up on it in a little bit, but do you have some more detailed map showing the actual call direction?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes. I think.
MR. CONRAD: This is it?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: All right. So, what information do we see on this slide?
MATTHEW WILD: So, this is the tower and sector being used on 9:52 and 9:53, and again this blob shape here, that's the coverage area for that tower. As you can see, it's a big - - mostly in the center here, but there are some dots out mostly that kind of faces towards Varnville.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and the calls at 9:52, 9:53 occurred somewhere within this sector, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, it did.
MR. CONRAD: And that line with this slightly shaded area represents the actual real coverage that you went up and measured where that phone could have been during that time.
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and we zoomed in here, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah. So, we zoomed in again. Now we're zoomed in kind of on the Moselle property just showing that there's a couple little specks of coverage there from this tower and sector on that property.
MR. CONRAD: And again, which tower is this? This is the tower that's closest to Moselle, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is, yes.
MR. CONRAD: But it -- you do actually see some actual coverage area right there on the farm, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and the red is right there, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, the red is Moselle.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: And here we are, we're zoomed back out. Again, red is Moselle. And this is that tower just down south of Varnville, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is. So, that's the tower south of Varnville, or near Varnville facing north, and this is for the 911 call, again on that lower frequency, so the signal goes a lot further. Actually there's little specs all the way up here to Yemassee.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. So, this is Varnville, this is Moselle, and this is the coverage that you actually went up -- excuse me -- and measured in real -- with real equipment --
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: -- and you determined all of these shaded pink areas, if a phone could be covered in this tower sector in these pink areas?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And we see some of that pink area up right by Moselle, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: We did, yes.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: All right. This is a 10:17 ping, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And it's in that sector, now we're back to the tower that's closest to Moselle, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is.
MR. CONRAD: And that's that north facing sector.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, it is.
MR. CONRAD: All right.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and here we see again that 911 call at 10:06:31 p.m., correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: That originally pinged off of this Varnville tower, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: But we see this is the two coverages overlay between these two towers that both have coverage at Moselle, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, it is.
MR. CONRAD: And you see some of that pink from that Varnville tower up right on the Moselle property, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, but you see more from the green -- from this tower sector that covers that same property, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: And here we're zoomed in, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah. We're zoomed in now and then we have both of the coverages showing. So, we're showing the pink, which is from that tower down by Varnville facing north, and then the green, which is from the tower right here close to Moselle also facing north. And you can see there's coverage from both of those towers actually in the area of the kennels.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and in your opinion, that phone could have been right in that area for both of these phone calls at 10:06 and 10:17 p.m.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And that's Alex's phone, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And it does appear there's more coverage from the green sector off of this closer tower. Isn't that correct?
MATTHEW WILD: There is.
MR. CONRAD: All right.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and this is just the remainder of the night for Alex's phone, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is. Again, 10:19 to 11:18 p.m., and the phone mostly uses that tower closest to Moselle. There is another hit at 10:21 on the tower near Varnville.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. Next slide. All right, and then continuing, what's the date on -- this is the next day at 6/8, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes. So, this is June 8th starting at 6:31 a.m., ending at 8:54 a.m., and the phone is using the tower sector consistent with being in the area of Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. So, this is the morning after the murders, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is.
MR. CONRAD: All right.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: And this is continuing the same -- this is the next day, June 9th of 2021, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is. Same tower, same sector, time period is 7:52 a.m. to 8:36 a.m.
MR. CONRAD: All right.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and here we see some information from June 10th of 2021, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir. From 3:32 a.m. to 8:49 a.m., basically using the same tower and sector here just to the left of Almeda, except for this RTT hit at 3:32 in the morning where that band overlays on top of the Almeda address.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: And now we're on June 11th for Alex's phone, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes. Again, in the morning, 3:52 a.m. to 8:15 a.m., and it's using the tower and sector consistent with being near Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: And this is June 12th of 2021?
MATTHEW WILD: Yep. 1:41 a.m. to 8:14 a.m., again using that same tower and sector near Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide, please.
MR. CONRAD: June 13th of 2021 for Alex's phone, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: First call in the morning is at 9:09 a.m., and again using the same tower and sector consistent with Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: Now we're on June 14th, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. CONRAD: And what are the times do we see in these pings?
MATTHEW WILD: 12:04 a.m., and then 9:53 and 9:55 a.m., again using that same tower and sector consistent with Almeda.
MR. CONRAD: Did you see any phone calls from Alex's phone between 12:00 a.m. and 9:53 that you were able to get tower information --
MATTHEW WILD: No.
MR. CONRAD: -- on that day?
MATTHEW WILD: No, sir.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: This is June 14th later in the day, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: It is. 10:27 to 12:29 p.m. 10:27 a.m. to 12:29 p.m., and that was using the tower facing north out of Varnville, but also using the tower facing out into Hampton.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and this is June 14th continued. And does that phone remain in the area of Almeda the rest of June 14th at least until 4:26 p.m.?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and then here we're on June 14th?
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah.
MR. CONRAD: And starting at 4:33 p.m. up to 6:08 p.m., where do we see Alex's phone move generally?
MATTHEW WILD: It moves generally from there just south of Almeda over towards Charleston.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and that's this area up here. And it specifically -- I don't know if you can read it, but what is that area? Can you read that place name where that last tower is on the map?
MATTHEW WILD: Is it Summerville?
MR. CONRAD: Does that say Summerville?
MATTHEW WILD: I think so.
MR. CONRAD: All right.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: Okay. June 14th continued?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And this is up in the area that -- the same. Summerville, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes. This is in the area of Summerville. So, between 6:08 p.m. on the 14th and 8:00 p.m. on the 15th, all of the calls hit that tower and sector in Summerville.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and then on June -- later that June 15th, what do we see the phone do on June 15th?
MATTHEW WILD: It travels from Summerville back to Hampton between 8:10 a.m. and 11:40 a.m.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: All right, and then now we're on June 15 for Alex's phone, and what two towers is his phone pinging off of for most of the day?
MATTHEW WILD: Again, the one in Varnville facing north, and the one in Hampton facing toward Varnville.
MR. CONRAD: Okay.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: And then finally June 15th, and his phone is consistent with remaining in the area of Almeda during those times, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And those are 12:35 p.m. to 2:33 p.m., correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: Next slide.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and just real quickly for these last three slides, you also received the records of C.B. Rowe and Marty Cook, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: And you reviewed them for the night of the murders, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: I did.
MR. CONRAD: And in your opinion from the information you could see from their call records and their tower information, were any of those phones in the vicinity of the murder location between 8:50 p.m. and 9:00 p.m.?
MATTHEW WILD: No.
MR. CONRAD: All right. Nothing further from the State.
JUDGE NEWMAN: Let's all stand for a moment.
(Break in proceedings.)
JUDGE NEWMAN: Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, if you'll go to the jury room for a break.
(The jury left the courtroom.)
JUDGE NEWMAN: We'll be in recess for about 10 minutes.
(A break was taken.)
JUDGE NEWMAN: You may bring the jury.
(The jury returned to the courtroom.)
COURT BAILIFF: The jury is present, sir.
JUDGE NEWMAN: All right. Thank you. Mr. Barber?
MR. BARBER: Thank you, Your Honor.
CROSS-EXAMINATION
BY MR. BARBER:
MR. BARBER: Good afternoon, Agent Wild.
MATTHEW WILD: Good afternoon, sir.
MR. BARBER: I don't think I'll have many questions; this won't take long at all. We were looking at a lot of maps and they had a lot of time stamps, and I think they were referred to as pings sometimes.
MATTHEW WILD: They're not pings. They are --
MR. BARBER: Okay. What are they?
MATTHEW WILD: They're activations on the record. So, whether they be incoming or outgoing phone calls, or there's RTT activations, which are slightly different, or the other things with Paul's phone. Those are like the IPhone location data records.
MR. BARBER: But we're looking at calls, text messages. Will the text message always make one of those time stamps?
MATTHEW WILD: No. So on Verizon, which all of the phones in this case were, with Verizon we're not going to get call detail records. We're not going to get location data with the text messages. It's just the way they're designed.
MR. BARBER: Okay. I just wanted to be clear when we said that there weren't any more calls coming into Maggie Murdaugh after 7:00 that there were some text messages, but if there were, they wouldn't show up.
MATTHEW WILD: Correct. They wouldn't show up in her call details records with cell tower information.
MR. BARBER: Right. What would it like look on these maps if a call -- well, let me ask this. Do calls hand off between towers while they're still going on?
MATTHEW WILD: They do.
MR. BARBER: And what would that look like on these maps?
MATTHEW WILD: So, it would -- it look the same way it looks like now. So, again, when -- before the call is even set up -- so, if my phone was on in this room right now, my phone is constantly scanning the environment. It's trying the tower and sector with the strongest signal. Okay? It's very much like sitting in the airport trying to find the best Wi-Fi to connect to while you're waiting on your flight. So, what happens with a call hands off between towers during a call is the records like look they look. It's still going to show the initial tower and sector that the phone saw as the best tower and sector at the time the call occurred, and then after that -- let's say the call is an hour long and I drive from here to Columbia. You know, I'm going to hand off tower to tower to tower, but on Verizon I'm not going to see that hand off in the records.
MR. BARBER: Right, and that, I guess, was my question is you're just going to see that first tower. So, if you're handed off, like, Tower 1 to 2 to 3, you're not going to see on the same calls hits on Towers 2 and 3 on this map.
MATTHEW WILD: Correct. You're only going to see the initial.
MR. BARBER: And do the coverage areas intentionally overlap to some degree to allow for hand offs?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. BARBER: And we saw GPS data for Paul Murdaugh's phone.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. BARBER: Did you have any GPS data for Maggie Murdaugh's phone?
MATTHEW WILD: I did not. There was nothing in the location database for the time period that was questioned.
MR. BARBER: Do you know why that was?
MATTHEW WILD: It's either something Paul was running on his phone that generated it, or a lack of something that Maggie wasn't running on her phone that did not generate it. I really don't know the answer to that.
MR. BARBER: I mean, so the answer would be that you don't know.
MATTHEW WILD: I don't know, yes, sir.
MR. BARBER: What about Alex Murdaugh's phone?
MATTHEW WILD: There was nothing during the time period.
MR. BARBER: So, you mentioned that you've testified as an expert, I think, in over 100 cases?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. BARBER: And in some of those other cases, were you able to show phones moving together?
MATTHEW WILD: Sometimes we are, yes.
MR. BARBER: Were you able to do that in this case?
MATTHEW WILD: I did not do that in this case.
MR. BARBER: When you're doing the drive-around to create that sort of coverage map, did you go onto the Moselle property?
MATTHEW WILD: I did.
MR. BARBER: Was that with the consent of Alex Murdaugh?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, I believe so.
MR. BARBER: Could we pull up Slide 35?
MR. BARBER: Can you see the screen?
MATTHEW WILD: I can.
MR. BARBER: And I think the previous testimony was that this 10:06:31 call was the 911 call?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. BARBER: I just want to ask about that time stamp because we heard from someone from the FBI yesterday the 911 call was actually placed at 10:06 and 18 seconds, so what would account for the 13 seconds difference between the two?
MATTHEW WILD: I guess it depends on the records you're looking at. It would be -- there might be a slight offset between the records the other person was looking at and the records I was looking at.
MR. BARBER: And the 911 call center, of course, would have a time stamp on the incoming calls --
MATTHEW WILD: Correct.
MR. BARBER: -- correct? Have you ever seen cases where there's a few seconds difference in between those time stamps and this kind records and what the 911 center might have?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir. I mean, there's a -- there's a difference between when you press the green button and it usually takes a couple of seconds to connect on the other side.
MR. BARBER: And could we on the ELMO go to slide 56?
MR. BARBER: And the reason I would like to do this on the ELMO is I think that the presentation was cutting off the bottom of the screen.
MATTHEW WILD: It was.
MR. BARBER: And this -- we see the top so we can kind of get context for what this is.
MR. BARBER: Just, yeah, slide it down so that the top is visible.
MR. BARBER: So, this was Alex Murdaugh information, and this was on June 15, 2021, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. BARBER: And do you know that was a Tuesday?
MATTHEW WILD: I don't.
MR. BARBER: Can we scroll so we can see the bottom?
MR. BARBER: It says that activity after 2:33 p.m. indicates travel to Summerville. Is that correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. BARBER: Okay. Do you have any data after that? Is that the end of the data that you have regarding Alex Murdaugh?
MATTHEW WILD: Is that the last slide?
MR. BARBER: Do you have -- so this is slide 56 that we're looking at.
MATTHEW WILD: Yeah, there was other data after that.
MR. BARBER: And do you have location data for Alex Murdaugh after June 15th?
MATTHEW WILD: I think so. I think --
MR. BARBER: In this report?
MATTHEW WILD: Not in this report, no.
MR. BARBER: So, in this report -- I'm sorry because that's what we're looking at here --
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. BARBER: -- because I understand, of course, you have cell phone records. He kept using his cell phone obviously after the 15th.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, he did.
MR. BARBER: But for what's being presented for the jury, the last entry is, I'll represent to you, Tuesday, June 15 is the end of what you have.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, it is.
MR. BARBER: And he's going to Summerville.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. BARBER: And finally the last two or three slides, we don't need to show them. There was some information for some other people, a C.B. Rowe and a Marty Cook.
MATTHEW WILD: Yes, sir.
MR. BARBER: Why did you have -- why were you looking at information for them?
MATTHEW WILD: I was requested to look at the information for them for the night of that incident.
MR. BARBER: Were you requested to ever look at information for an Eddie Smith or Spencer Roberts?
MATTHEW WILD: Eddie Smith sounds familiar, but I'm not sure about Spencer Roberts.
MR. BARBER: Did you look at information regarding Eddie Smith?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. BARBER: Do you have that information with you?
MATTHEW WILD: I do not.
MR. BARBER: You do not have the information?
MATTHEW WILD: I don't have it with me, no.
MR. BARBER: Beg the Court's indulgence.
(Break in proceedings.)
MR. BARBER: No further questions, Your Honor.
JUDGE NEWMAN: By the State?
MR. CONRAD: Just briefly.
REDIRECT EXAMINATION
BY MR. CONRAD:
MR. CONRAD: Agent Wild, you were asked by Mr. Barber whether you've been able to pinpoint two phones together in other cases, correct?
MATTHEW WILD: Yes.
MR. CONRAD: Generally speaking, what kind of data are you using when you try to -- have been able to pinpoint two phones together at the same time?
MATTHEW WILD: I mean, first of all, the two phones have to have activity around the same time, so you would have to have calls at 9:00 on one phone and calls at 8:58 or 9:00 on the next phone. That's first thing you would have to do. The second thing is it would have to be indication the phones were traveling together or stationary at the same place at the same time.
MR. CONRAD: Okay, and after 7:50 p.m., was there any Verizon location tower information provided by Verizon?
MATTHEW WILD: There was not on Maggie Murdaugh's phone. There was not.
MR. CONRAD: So, you wouldn't be able to provide any opinion as to whether her phone was near any other phone in the world after 7:50 p.m., correct?
MATTHEW WILD: That's correct, because there's no data to compare it against --
MR. CONRAD: Okay. All right.
MR. CONRAD: Nothing further from the State.
MR. BARBER: I beg the Court's indulgence one moment.
(Break in proceedings.)
MR. BARBER: No further questions, Your Honor.
JUDGE NEWMAN: Thank you, sir.
MATTHEW WILD: Thank you.
(The witness exited the stand.)