NFL: Tom Brady destroyed his cellphone
Tom Brady’s cellphone — and its destruction — is now at the center of Deflategate.
In announcing its decision to uphold Brady’s 4-game suspension, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell cited information about the intentional destruction of the quarterback’s cellphone. NFL-appointed investigator Ted Wells and his colleagues had requested access to text messages and electronic information in examining the deflation of footballs by Patriots staffers in the 2015 AFC Championship Game.
From the “Factual Determinations and Findings’’ section of Goodell’s 20-page decision, during which the NFL commisioner states that Brady’s cellphone provider confirmed in a letter that the 10,000 text messages sent from or recieved by the destroyed cellphone cannot be recovered:
Brady explained that when he gets a new cellphone, he destroys the old one. However, the NFLPA hired forensic expert Brad Maryman to look at Brady’s cellphones, which included one cellphone used from the spring of 2014 through to November 5, 2014 and another from March 6, 2015 to April 8, 2015. The fact that Brady still had an old cellphone when he originally claimed he destroyed them was problematic, explained Goodell.
In the “Conclusion’’ section of the decision, Goodell discussed the weight he gave to this information about the cellphone.
From the section entitled “Did Mr. Brady refuse to cooperate with the investigation:’’
Goodell continues in that same section, emphasizing how the cellphone relates to Brady’s failure to cooperate with the investigation:
Timeline of Deflategate
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