The Nancy Kissel Case - Part 27

A forensic scientist from the Technology Crimes Bureau has told the Nancy Kissel murder trial how he recovered fragments of e-mails and Web site addresses from a purple Sony Vaio laptop which the prosecution alleges was used by the accused.

Testifying in the High Court Wednesday, police officer Cheung Chun-kit said he found fragments of e-mails that passed between the accused and her alleged lover, Michael del Priore, Internet addresses for Web sites about sleeping pills and possible evidence that an Internet search had been made for ''Sleeping Pills Overdose.''

Nancy Kissel, 41, is accused of serving her banker husband Robert Kissel a pink milkshake laced with sedatives, which left him unconscious at the foot of their bed as she beat him to death with a heavy metal ornament on Sunday night, November 2, 2003.  The accused told a doctor and the police at the time that her husband was drunk and had assaulted her after she refused him sex, and then disappeared.  She denies the murder charge and is out on bail.  The banker's decomposing body, wrapped up in a carpet, was discovered in a storeroom in the Parkview residential complex, Tai Tam, in the early hours of November 7.

In his opening submission at the beginning of June, Senior Assistant Director of Public Prosecutions Peter Chapman said "E-blaster'' spyware, secretly installed on Nancy Kissel's laptop, recorded on August 28, 2003, the words "Sleeping Pills. Overdose Medication Causing Heart Attack. Drug Overdose.''

Cheung, who received four computers for examination on November 24, 2003, said Wednesday it was "possible'' the words were entered as an Internet search.

Cheung said the spyware, when installed in a computer, is capable of recording which applications, such as Word or Excel, have been used, what was typed on the keyboard and which Internet sites have been viewed.  If set accordingly, the spyware can also directly forward e-mail correspondence to another designated address.

Cheung found a "text fragment'' which read, "After having a private investigating firm follow me, are they going to be watching me forever? Hidden cameras, tapped phones. I recognize what the affair has done trust-wise.''

When asked why he found this fragment both on the Sony Vaio laptop and the IBM laptop used by the deceased, Cheung said E-blaster had captured that fragment from the Sony laptop and sent it to the Hotmail account, and the IBM computer must have been used to access and view that same fragment. The Web site addresses of "Sleepingpills.net'' and "medhelp.org'' had also been viewed for between one and three minutes.

According to the temporary Internet files folder, the Hong Kong Police Force Web site was also viewed on November 6, said Cheung.  A telephone-contacts page was also seen but, owing to the poor quality of the recovered Web page, Cheung said he could not specifically tell which telephone numbers for report rooms were viewed.

There were two user names for the Sony laptop, one of which said "Kissel,'' and the other was the name of their youngest son.

The case continues today before Justice Michael Lunn.

(SCMP; no link)  'Missing' site browsed using Kissel computer.  By Polly Hui.  July 21, 2005.

Nancy Kissel's computer notebook was used to browse Hong Kong Police Force's websites on missing and wanted persons some four days after she allegedly murdered her husband, a computer forensics expert told a court yesterday.

Cheung Chun-kit, of the police technology crime division, said nine temporary internet files found on the defendant's Sony Vaio notebook indicated that a number of police webpages had been browsed between November 5 and November 6, 2003. These included webpages featuring "Wanted Persons", "Missing Persons", and telephone numbers of police report rooms.

Mr Cheung told the Court of First Instance his finding on the accessing of police websites was supported by a spyware activity report sent to the e-mail account of the deceased, Robert Peter Kissel, around November 6, 2003. The prosecution alleges Kissel, 41, bludgeoned her husband to death at the flat on or about November 2, 2003.

The officer said e-mails received by the deceased indicated that he had installed spyware program eBlaster on the Sony notebook and one of two desktop computers used by their three children. It allowed him to receive by e-mail "activity reports" which recorded the keystrokes typed, e-mails read and sent and websites accessed.

The defendant, who reported to Aberdeen Police Station on November 6, 2003 that her husband, a banker for Merrill Lynch, had assaulted her and left home, has pleaded not guilty to murder.

Other activity reports sent to the deceased after his death showed someone using the accused's e-mail account had e-mailed a friend on November 5 saying that she could not attend a birthday party the following day because a family member was ill. The officer said an e-mail sent to a friend of the accused using the account on November 6 said: "Unfortunately, Rob is away for business."

Mr Cheung said only two user names were found on the notebook - "Kissel" and "Reis", the latter the name of the defendant's son.

Mr Cheung said spyware reports showed the notebook had been used on August 20, 2003, to access websites on medications, including www.sleeping-pills.net.  The witness said the report also showed Internet Explorer entries of the words "sleeping pills", "overdose", "medication causing heart attack", and "drug overdose" - possibly entries to a search engine.

Prosecutor Peter Chapman also asked Mr Cheung to identify an eBlaster report dated August 21, 2003, which indicated a Microsoft Word entry on the Sony notebook that said: "I am not quite sure how he feels about me ... after hiring a private investigating firm to follow me ... Are they going to be watching me forever? Hidden camera in the bedroom, tapped phone ... I realised what the affair had done to him ... trustwise."

The court has heard the accused began an affair with TV repairman Michael del Priore while in the US state of Vermont in 2003.