In this post I went through and analyzed artifacts in the headers and footers of the CREW version of Foley related emails to show that what we had were two sets of emails, printed out a month apart. One set was between Foley and the LA Page. The second set of emails was between the LA Page and whom we now know to be Danielle Savoy, who is on the staff of Rep Rodney Alexander – the LA Page’s reference and hometown Rep. The emails between the LA Page and Danielle Savoy looked to have been chopped up when large white-space gaps appeared between sentences and paragraphs. The email looked like it had had sections whited out.

In this later post I reviewed the ABC News version of the Foley Emails (the email between the LA Page and Ms Savoy is in a separate file and my review of that at the end of this post) and found that there were some areas of original sourcing (the print out dates in the footers and most of the redactions in the email headers themselves). But the ‘page x of y’ headers and the facsimile headers found in the CREW versions were missing – which clearly meant a different custody path with ABC News maybe be one step closer to the source (as we shall see in a moment). I also noted that the versions that were up on the website that supposedly broke this story were crude fakes based on the contents of the information CREW and ABC News had in their possession before the website posted their fakes.

Since these posts another blogger emailed me with doubts about my conclusions (which I thank him for – I need someone to test my theories and conclusions to make sure they can stand the test of skepticism). Here is his challenge and my resonse:

Other Blogger’s View:If I’m reading the fax numbers correctly, 9 pages were faxed to CREW on May29th – the cover page is missing in the CREW pdf.

It then looks like CREW faxed the FBI in bunches – the first three pages 1, 2 and 3 of 3 are one email thread. The other individuals were sent, maybe at the same time, but labeled 1 of 1.

The ABC emails look to have come direct from a source who received them on 9/13/05 – the date at the bottom of each one. It might be interesting to know if Rogers did any bragging around that date as to have somehting hot in his possesion.

Real strange – look at the bottom of each page in the CREW set – some say 9/13/2005 like the ABC pages, but the first three say 10/17/2005.

My Response: Interesting, but I am sticking with my conclusions – here’s why. The dates on the bottoms of the printouts (the footer) are from a printer or the word processor – they are not Fascimile dates. The “Page x 0f y” headings at the top (the header) are some other numbering artifact – possibly from scanned versions of the two original printouts. They are not fascimile page numbers – and there are two instances of them since one is “Page X of 4” and the other is “Page X of 1_”. Only the CREW versions have this second pair of page numbering headers.

Only the CREW emails have a facsimile header (May 29, 2006 – 759 – Page X). The 759 is the job number in the fax machine (sending end I would believe). That header is across all the pages in the CREW file which means CREW RECEIVED them all in one fax. Page numbering for the facsimile are superimposed on top of the “Page x of y” headers – which confirms they were not the fax numbering. Remember, CREW said they sent them to the FBI on July 21! The fax header date is May 29.

The ABCNews versions have no Fax header and no Page numbering headers. But the do have the printout date in the footer as does the CREW versions. The redactions of a majority of the email headers are identical between the two veriosn. Therefore the dates on the lower left are a separate artifact from the “page 3 of X” in the upper right (CREW only), which are again separate from the FAX header (CREW only). Now it is possible someone blocked out the “Page 3 of X” headers on the ABC News version, and these were there on Sept 13 and Oct 17 printout dates. But why delete the page numbering headers?

No, I am positive the the printout date footers are in the originals and that is the only thing in the originals. Someone printed out something two different times to get the two “page X of Y” headers that are in the CREW file, and someone then faxed them to CREW on May 29, 2006.

But thanks for the question. It made me realize there were more steps than I had originally envisioned. Someone took the two print outs and somehow scanned them or something in order to generate a second printout header for each separate file in order to generate two different “Page x of y” headers!

I am posting this here to comment on how the custody chain is different between the two versions of the emails at CREW and ABC News. There appear to be no headers on the two sets of originals printed out in September and October of 2005. These appear to be printouts of emails from the LA Page to Danielle Savoy. Somewhere, at sometime, the email headers of these printouts where redacted to cover up the dates of the Foley to the LA Page. There was also an effort to overwrite the Foley Email subject lines with ’email 1′, ’email 2′, etc – which would never be in the subject line or added by an email program.

At this stage ABC News gets a copy which includes the email address of Danielle Savoy (which can be seen to have been ‘fuzzed’ out by ABCNews). The CREW versions go a separate path because of the ‘Page x of y” headings. These appear to be headings added to a scanned version of the files. But since there are two sequences (one out of “4” and one out of “1-“) the separate scans were made of the separate original files printed out one month apart from each other. Why scan them in again? Lots of reason, like you want to keep the originals and send a copy electronically.

The next difference in the CREW version is the facsimile header which overwrites the pager numbering header from the scanned copies. The facsimile header is the last artifact added to the emails and is continuous across both printouts of the two files of scanned emails. It dates the transmission of these files to CREW as May 29, 2006. Therefore someone scanned the originals, and then someone printed them out for faxing before May 29, 2006 and after Oct 17, 2005 (the printout date in the footer of the email file to Ms Savoy).

The same basic story holds for the email from the LA Page to Danielle Savoy, except Ms Savoy’s name is in the clear in the ABC News version. The email still has the same white spaces and choppy flow indicative of sections ‘whited-out’. The printout date in the footer is 10/17/05. There are no header fields. The only thing is the ABC News versions are separate files scanned in files! Recall these two email exchanges are printed out a month apart in the fall of Sept 05. CREW has them as one combined file from a fax. A fax created when printing out scanned versions of the two originals into two hardcopies for faxing. ABC News had two different scanned versions of these documents they used to post on their website. Which means they received these as two scanned files or two hard copy files without printout numbers in the header (no fax header may mean a copy was not faxed – but that could have been removed by ABC News).

The point is ABC News received two individual pieces of evidence – the question is what form did ABC News get these pieces in. If the two email files were in the form of two hard copies (printouts) then ABC News scanned them in to make two individual electronic copies, the ones we see on their website. In this scenario ABC News could be the source of the CREW versions if they printed them out again, and then faxed them over to CREW. But why do that if they had the hardcopies? Why not send an electronic copy? Well, one thing about Fax machines is you cannot always tell what was sent as you can with emails (at least that is the ‘theory’ – which is not true depending on the fax machine). The other option may be that ABC News could only make a scan of the originals and then had to give them back.

If the source that gave the material to ABC News scanned the two hardcopies, or had two separate scans, then they would send ABC News two separate files for the documents. Again, just like the ones on the website now. But then that begs the question of why the source, if it was the same source, would print out versions of their scanned in files for a fax to CREW and send electronic two electronic files to ABC News? Why the extra effort to make the CREW versions?

I doubt the source for ABC News would use a different, more combersome production and transmission method for CREW. We could have two different sources for the documents, or someone at ABC News could have made a print out and sent a fax in hopes of covering their tracks with management. I would like to know how (form and transmission method) the other two Florida news outlets received this same information in the fall of 2005. Did they get two separate scan files or a fax or what? Also, most important, is what form did John Aravosis get his copy in (he admits having a set in the July time frame). Aravosis could be the intermediary which printed out the two files from the common source and faxed them to CREW as well. The other option is the May 29 date on the Fax was not the day CREW received the information but the day someone else did, passing the fax to CREW at a later date. Whatever the answer, the custody chain of this information is key to understanding who knew what and when (and why they never alerted authorities when they did know). Aravosis and others with copies may be the key.