CA - Joey, Summer, Gianni, Joseph Jr McStay Murders - Feb 4th 2010 #2

[Tortoise]

Broken leg could easily happen on a dead body thrown into grave i guess?

I don't know, she said that it was extremely hard to break a leg bone like that and they have lots of data to refer to such as sporting/cricket bat injuries.

 

[missy1974]

About the credit card info.....CM said Joey gave him his credit card number to purchase materials. Dan confirms this in the cbs8 interview with David Gottfried and specifically mentions CM and others having access to credit card numbers linked to the Paypal account.

2:05 on video

Dan Kavanaugh interview - Nov. 26, 2013

Oh wow, thanks for that! The financials are going to tell the story here IMO

Honestly, I listened to that again last night, Chase seemed to have a lot of knowledge about Joey's finances, banks, etc., I found it interesting and wanted to know how much truth was in what he was saying. Was Patrick involved in EIP in the beginning? was his name attached to it? IIRC he was... but I'm not sure what is truth anymore lol

 

[asyousay]

Just to say I don’t find it at all strange Joey would give Chase access to his bank cards details for the business.

Joey was in business with him so he obviously trusted him and he was considered a friend so why wouldn’t he give Chase bank details for convenience for Chase to pay for stuff?

It’s easy now in hindsight to say Joey was a complete idiot but he wasn’t to know that Chase was planning to kill his entire family over greed.

 

[missy1974]

I believe the VM itself could be deleted but not its existence

I don't disagree, but I don't think they requested that ( IIRC he was asked) And I'm not sure the data was still available when the bodies were discovered. If they did, we will know later I guess.

 

[asyousay]

Chase obviously did keep Joey and summer phones as they wasn’t in the grave but if he had switched the phones on to listen to voice mail messages and delete them couldn’t they trace were the phone was pinging?

This is going back years but wasn’t the last time Joeys phone pinged it was in bonsall bridge area?


I do apologise as my spelling is probably totally wrong. But it was a bridge in California.

 

[ehenson88]

Chase obviously did keep Joey and summer phones as they wasn’t in the grave but if he had switched the phones on to listen to voice mail messages and delete them couldn’t they trace were the phone was pinging?

This is going back years but wasn’t the last time Joeys phone pinged it was in bonsall bridge area?


I do apologise as my spelling is probably totally wrong. But it was a bridge in California.

If he knew Joey's voicemail password he would not have had to call from Joey's phone to check the vm. All you have to do is call the number and press * or # when the vm greeting plays, and then enter the password

 

[Tortoise]

Mini-transcript - re. Merritt/DuGal interview concerning Dan and Hawaii.

I've red-bolded a few words which I think highlight his attempts to create suspicion and motive around Dan, and others which suggest he has knowledge of Joey's demise, and green-bolded all the "you know" statements, which in my opinion show how hard he is working to get them on board with Dan being who Joey was afraid of. He stutters a fair bit, so doubled up words are not transcription errors!


20.33 to 24.06 inclusive in the linked video:

TD: Dan’s in Hawaii?

CM: Dan’s flying here today. He’ll be here today.

TD: But you’re sure he was in Hawaii? [CM glances over to the jury]

CM: Well I…

TD: How long has he been in Hawaii?

CM: As long as I’ve known Joseph, as far as I know.

TD: So 2 ½ years?

CM: I think so. I’ve, I’ve never known him to not be in Hawaii. I mean I, I heard, Joseph talks about..

TD: But you had never [?]

CM: Never met Dan.

TD: Oh you [inaudible]

CM: I met Mikey.

TD: You’ve only talked to Dan on the phone […]

CM: And only over the last week. I’ve never talked, before this, this happened to Joseph, I’d never, never talked to Dan ever. Didn’t even, I mean I knew of his existence, I knew his role in Joseph’s business, I knew um that Joseph was almost, had almost paid him off and I think he was paying him $50,000 for his part of the business, I think that was the number - I’m not ev.. not even sure about that, but I know that he only had $2,000 left, to pay. And Joseph was going to then own Earth Inspired Products and just pay him to run the website, instead of them being partners. Because up until he paid him off he was [Joseph’s?] partner, I know that. Um, he would talk about that all the time. Because Joseph was always afraid. 6, 7 months ago Joseph and Dan had a, [pause] a spat, I don’t know exactly what, how, you know, how deep it was or anything so it was 6 or 7 months ago, I think, maybe, I’m sorry I don’t know, but they [long pause] decided at that time that Joseph was going to pay him for the, for his part of the business and for what he had done to build the websites and stuff, because apparently Dan is extremely adept at website building and you know he’s, he’s like a big hacker from what I, from what I gather, um, even from him personally when I talked to him over the last week um, I was talking to him the other day and he said, I said something about him knowing the web and he said yeah I’m not a person that you want to piss off on the web

TD: yeah

CM: matter of fact like, and I said yeah I know, Joseph told me that you could, there’s a lot you could do, you know, you could shut the, shut the website down because Joseph was afraid that he was just going to push the button and the website would be gone. Because that’s what Dan said. They were, you know, [slashed?]. Dan said look, this is what I want, you know, I ..I don’t have to continue working this website and so Joseph made a deal with him to, to buy his part of it because, I don’t, Dan wasn’t making enough money, I don’t even know what the, what it was but I know a while back they decided they were going to buy, Joseph was going to buy him out. And then he was just going to run the website. That’s the, that’s the extent that I know of. Um but Dan is coming here, he’s supposed to be here.

TD: [inaudible]

 

[asyousay]

It’s interesting that Chase said he would kill Chase but from that interview they never actually interacted until Joey vanished so why the hatred?

I assumed they had had years of tension and Joey was piggy in the middle.

 

[mrjitty]

snipped

Mini-transcript - re. Merritt/DuGal interview concerning Dan and Hawaii.

I've red-bolded a few words which I think highlight his attempts to create suspicion and motive around Dan, and others which suggest he has knowledge of Joey's demise, and green-bolded all the "you know" statements, which in my opinion show how hard he is working to get them on board with Dan being who Joey was afraid of. He stutters a fair bit, so doubled up words are not transcription errors!

Thanks so much for this!

I completely agree - and that is also what is happened right here at trial!!

CM has the advantage of knowing "what really happened"

This means he can let his counsel know about mistakes the prosecution is making. This may be because things actually did happen differently, or he knows counter arguments, or he knows secret info only the murderer can know.

 

[mrjitty]

So the source for DK being a hacker is Chase?

 

[mrjitty]

Did Joey also pay Dan K to do web work?

I know people mock the website, but 50K for a high ranking SEO website is not that expensive. The design is actually typical for an SEO oriented site - thats why so much text and clutter (I agree the UX is awful). I once had a client who had a similar site that made a tonne of money in the mid 00s

Many SEO firms charge retainers of many 1000s per month for this kind of work.

 

[asyousay]

So the source for DK being a hacker is Chase?

No as Mike also knew him as hacker Dan from Joey.


DK had a reputation as a hacker this one isn’t down to Chase.

 

[Tortoise]

So the source for DK being a hacker is Chase?

The problem with his tittle-tattle is that he makes a big song and dance about Dan being a big bad scary hacker who can press the button and exterminate the website...but Joey was going to continue to hire him to...run the website.

 

[mrjitty]

The problem with his tittle-tattle is that he makes a big song and dance about Dan being a big bad scary hacker who can press the button and exterminate the website...but Joey was going to continue to hire him to...run the website.

Assuming Dan had site access for his work, he wouldn't need to be a hacker to do this.

A simple edit on the hosting dashboard could take a site down for example. It's actually fairly standard for both Developers and Hosts to threaten to 404 a site if you don't pay your bills.

I understood Dan threatened to remove back links from authority domains - which could damage Joeys Google rankings. But again this isn't a hack.

My guess is DK exploited the relative naivety of his client

I recall reading a long email from Joey elsewhere to his webhost where he explained why DK was exiting

It was a very well written email and might be worth checking as it sets out JMs thinking in this area.

Certainly he didn't seem to believe DK was a scary hacker - more an errant kid.

 

[mrjitty]

No as Mike also knew him as hacker Dan from Joey.


DK had a reputation as a hacker this one isn’t down to Chase.

OK.

Just wondering how much of this reputation was horsing around because the guy could code, and how much is based on actually being able to hack anything.

 

[asyousay]

OK.

Just wondering how much of this reputation was horsing around because the guy could code, and how much is based on actually being able to hack anything.

The guy is a twat but that doesn’t mean he killed the family. Also no doubt he is a nasty piece of work and Patrick Mcstay isn’t a fan either. He has also been arrested before for domestic violence.

He also I think suffered with delusions of grandeur about what his role was in Joey’s business. Case in Point

"I didn't just do the web site," he said. "I created all of the traffic to the site. Joe did very little. He just answered the phone. I built the entire business

 

[oceanblueeyes]

This makes no sense to me but then I don't know Cali rules?

The defense case appears to be that DK did the murders

So why the hell would DK appear as a defense witness? That would be insanity for the defense as well as the witness would then be hostile to the defense's own questioning?

Unless this is all so crazy that DK is basically OK with all that and wants to give testimony potentially implicating himself in quadruple homicide?

I do think given the defense case, it would be appropriate for the State to compel him to testify. And normally (though my knowledge is sketchy) it is negotiated between state and defense as to who calls the witness.

But maybe state won't call DK precisely so such a bloodbath can take place?

Anyway a big issue for the defense in that situation is that they can't X the witness. They get his EIC. So DK can simply give the most harmless self serving evidence he wants and the defence can't attack it - unless they get him declared hostile?

I think it would be better for the state strategically to let the defense call DK in their own CIC. That way when he is crossed by the state they can ask leading open ended questions when they would not be able to do in their own CIC.

If neither calls him then the state in CA can reminded the jury the defense had ever right to call DK in their own case if they believe he truly is the killer.

Imo

 

[Bernina]

Why is it soooo easy for CM to continue to call his girlfriend his "WIFE"? Is he trying to hint to spousal privilege (which doesn't exist in his case anyway) ?

His LE interview was nothing but red flags......he's just so full of himself.

 

[Bernina]

I think this "Hacker Dan" stuff is entirely overblown, it was probably easier to say than "Computer Dan", or "Tech Dan" or whatever. Any high school kid in the 1990's who took computer could work up a web site, find missing passwords, etc., etc.

My son could do this back then when he was 15.

Web site developers make good, GOOD money, my brother's done it for years.

 

[oceanblueeyes]

Just to say I don’t find it at all strange Joey would give Chase access to his bank cards details for the business.

Joey was in business with him so he obviously trusted him and he was considered a friend so why wouldn’t he give Chase bank details for convenience for Chase to pay for stuff?

It’s easy now in hindsight to say Joey was a complete idiot but he wasn’t to know that Chase was planning to kill his entire family over greed.

I thought CM was just a subcontractor?

I've never known a subcontractor being given that kind of access.