Los Angeles police investigators have discovered a workable method to bypass the hardened security features of a locked iPhone 5s belonging to the slain wife of “The Shield” actor Michael Jace, according to the court papers reviewed by The LA Times.
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Michael Jace’s attorney in January argued in court the actor suspected his wife was having an affair and may have become enraged moments before the shooting, after seeing something on her iPhone, according to a report at the time from the New York Daily News.
Apple refused to comply with the court order demanding a tool to defeat encryption on the iPhone in the San Bernardino case.
Nothing was revealed about the method used, nor the version of iOS installed on the phone, but it raises questions about why the Federal Bureau of Investigation was still insisting in the San Bernardino case that it could not access the iPhone 5c – which does not have a Secure Enclave and should be less challenging to hack – without Apple’s help.
LAPD Detective Connie Zych wrote in a search warrant obtained by the Los Angeles Times that on March 18, the department found a “forensic cellphone expert who could “override” the locked iPhone function”. In other words, the Federal Bureau of Investigation might have thought about asking its pals in local law enforcement for an extra hand, since the LAPD had the resources to do it: a “forensic cellphone expert” who was capable of hacking into the device. There was also no detail on the operating system on the device.
Jace’s attorney and the prosecutor assigned to his case could not be reached for comment.
Investigators state that they had argued “about their relationship” shortly before he shot and killed her. The request to hack April’s iPhone is due to a lack of motif in the killing.
The 40-year-old, a financial aid counselor at Biola University, had three sons, including the two with Michael Jace.
Earlier this year, the actor’s attorneys persuaded a judge to delay the Jace murder trial until the wife’s phone underwent a more exhaustive search of its contents. The following month, authorities tried to inspect April Jace’s iPhone but it didn’t even turn on, the warrant stated.
The couple’s sons, both under 10, were home at the time and unharmed.
“At very least they heard the shots”, then-LAPD Det. “It is a awful tragedy, made all the more worse by their children being there”.
The moment Jace was arrested for his wife’s murder.
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A handgun was later recovered in the home.
