Chain of custody, electronic media, and unholy press leaks
The insight and information provided within the past few pages by papershuffler on chain of custody and proper handling (and thank you for providing them, pprshfflr) have provoked a question or two. Most all reasonable observers - and also all officials involved, we wish - seek to avoid the knee-jerk reaction. This is not a problem, though, where reform or addition to ICAO's regulatory system is concerned - ICAO's knee moves very, very gracefully, never jerkily.
Is it time to specify, in some form, whether a SARP or a lower-hierarchy official pronouncement, the scope of agreement which should be in place, and be publicly and officially known and disseminated, between the AAIB on the one hand, and the law enforcement community on the other? While France may have a somewhat different point of departure for this collaboration - between AAIB and the law enforcement officialdom - nonetheless, coordination still needs to happen, and does happen....but is there an advantage to be gained by placing the subject under the "uniformity" rubric by which ICAO operates and moves forward? Spell out how they should work together, in every member State. Plus:
Then, add in the need to assure proper handling of electronic media containing perhaps crucial evidence - and in the case of pax, clearly containing data files of utmost intrinsic value to families of accident victims - and does the question become one of need, of necessity to move toward uniformity? The pace of change in society at large brought about by electronic and social media is, if anything, increasing; the need to address this type of evidence, in the context of joint-authority enquiries, thus also is becoming more urgent (at least, more acute).
And then, add in the need to assure that the slime-balls who would purvey faked footage - if that is what has happened - have less room to move within the context of a coordinated AAIB-law enforcement action plan. The higher-profile the disaster, the more ambulance chasers will lie, cheat or steal their way to an upper hand in the lawsuit lottery games.