HALL COUNTY, Ga. — New court records show Georgia State Patrol investigators used an uncommon digital forensic technique in the DUI case against Hall County Sheriff Gerald Couch, but the search produced no evidence.
More than three months after Couch’s Feb. 27 arrest, investigators obtained a warrant to search the infotainment and telematics system in his county-issued Chevrolet Tahoe. The vehicle’s electronic hardware later underwent a specialized forensic “chip-off” examination by the U.S. Secret Service.
“The Chip-off was successful. However, there was no data on the chip,” U.S. Secret Service forensic examiner P. Mitch Mitchell wrote in his report…