The second part of Day 2 of the MH17 case begins. Prosecution will now present how it investigated different competing scenarios for a surface-to-air missile shootdown. First, JIT inventorized all possible s-2-a systems that could have technically shot MH7 down.
In addition to BUK, these two other systems were the only alternatives that were in the general area and had the capabilities to achieve the altitude. Neither of them could have the observed damage though, so it *was* a BUK. 
Now that it was clear it was a BUK, the question remained whose BUK - and from where it shot. Based on Russian BUK data, the range was limited to 36 km from place of impact
While JIT had calculated a firing spot near Snizhne, it investigated alternative location scenarios proposed by Russia, such as near Zarochenskonoe
First location was the village of Yanakieve, which was mentioned in a few intercepted phone calls right after the downing. There was no objective data for a launch from this place, and separatists who spoke about it were found to have no involvement or knowledge. So, no Yanakieve
Second excluded location was provided from Russia based on "witness testimony" from a couple who gave verbatim the same testimony on two different dates. They referred to having seen a BUK missile launch near Amrosivka. Nothing supported this claim, incl. other local witnesses.
A third location that was assessed was the Snizhne supermarket Fourchette, which was presumed to be the launch place based in intel data from Ukraine and NL secret services. JIT did not find any objective data to support such intel data. It concluded maybe that was a stop-over.
And we come to the main Russian claim, that the launch site was just south of Zaroshenske, which Russia said was under Ukrainian control on that date.Russian MoD showed a satellite photo purporting to contain a Ukraine base with a missing BUK system between first and second photo
Russia also showed what it said were two sat photos, from 17.07 and 18.07 showing what it said were two BUK systems on the date of shooting, missing the day after. The location was south of Zaroschenske.
However, when JIT obtained a photo from the European Space Agency of the Ukrainian military base that Russia proved showed a missing BUK Telar on 17.07. It showed a completely different situation with no missing BUK telar.
Prosecution here cites @Bellingcat's investigation and its own investigation proving that the location showed by Russia did not contain a functional BUK at all, nor did it disappear on July 17
Other comparison of photos presented by Russia and same location photos obtained from Google earth showed that Russia, in fact, used photos that could not have come from the dates it claimed.
Last, JIT checked with the Dutch meteroligal service and found that the photo presented by Russia could not have been taken on the claimed date, as there were clouds on that date and time that didn't match the photos. Russia refused to provide raw satellite data for years.
Just a coupe of days before the start of the MH17 trial in March, Russia finally responded that it "didn't store the original satellite photo data" because it was cloudy on that day.
Ignoring the obviously fake satellite data, and using the data on BUK's ballistics provided by Almaz Antey, the Royal Belgiam Miliary Academy recomputed the flightpath and conclude "Zaroschenske is an extremely improbably launch location". No witness ever confirmed a launch.
The only "witness" quoted by Russian media was an Ukrainian ex-officer, Baturin, who defected to Russia alleged to have confirmed he heard there had been a launch from Zaroshenske. JIT asked for witness testimony, and Russia said he had not provided testimony.
Russian journalists visited and talked to people from Zaroshenske who said they had not heard or seen of any BUKs present or missile launches on that day. Not telephone intercepts suggested such calls either. Notably, the separatists themselves were shocked by the Moscow claims
An intercepted call between the local militant mayor and a militant commander (read it pls) shows that Zaroschenske was under pro-Russian militants control.
The same was stated to a Russian TV reported who called the same military commander. (Note: this interview was never aired, I believe)
Based on all of this, JIT concluded no other launch location other than the reverse-engineered spot near Snizhne could be plausibly taken as a realistic site, so no further investigation into such alternative plots was needed or possible.
JIT obtained from Ukraine the map of deployed BUK SAMs on July 17. it provide the first map. JIT asked independently Dutch military intel for its map. That's the second map. There was one extra BUK telar that Dutch intel showed, outside shooting range.
In May 2018, JIT requested Russia for data on manufacturing date and ownership data of the venturi of the missile fragments found on the crash site. Russia replied that this number is of a sequence from the 23rd anti-aircraft brigade that was deployed in Ukrainian USSR
Russia also said that a delivery of this BUK to that unit was confirmed by a receipt. Russia did not provide such receipt to JIT. Ukraine then provided the missile log of the unit that Russia claimed received this unit. This missile is not listed in the Ukraine log.
Russia's log presented to JIT lists the type of warhead as 9M314. This is the older type of warhead. Above the printed text, an M is hand-inserted. The M seems to modify the type to a more recent type of missile.
Russia however claims officially (now) that the warhead is of the older type than the "M" type indicated by the hand-written note in the Russian logbook. This is incompatible with the claim that this logbook shows the provenance of the missile that shot down MH17
Crucially, Russia provided assembly documents for the missile that it said was in Ukrainian possession. However, this did not match the production date that was on the missile remains - which were not provided to Russia (!)
JIT was faced with dilemma whether to proceed to investigate further this line of evidence - Russia's claims of provenance. JIT concluded that Russia has consistently lied and therefore there's little point in taking its evidence at face value any further.
In conclusion, after investigating all alternative launch locations, including the one provided from Russia, these were discarded as technically impossible and unsupported locations. Russia's claims that the missile belonged to Ukraine was proven to be not true.
With all of these alternative scenarios out of the window, the prosecution focused on validating the main scenario - the only one that was supported by holistic evidence - that a Russian-provided missile shot down MH17 from Snizhne. The presentation of this evidence after a break
Interim takeaway: now you understand all the hacking attempts on JIT, @Bellingcat and other investigative journalists. The Kremlin had no clue what the investigation has as evidence, and couldn't customize its lies to fit the evidence.
Hearing continued. Prosecution presents the main scenario, based on a multitude of sources including the initial narrative boasted by the local militants. JIT will now start with describing with the route of the BUK Telar (the launch vehicle) as it arrived to the launch site
Typically an investigation would not spend as much effort defining the route, but in this case it presented additional validation for everything that did happen on July 17.
These are generally speaking the two types of vechicles - the top one has its own radar targeting unit, and the bottom one (TELL) has no independent targeting and needs to be always integrated with a radar system
This is the route that JIT was able to reconstruct for the fateful BUK- Telar - starting from Yenakieve, via Donesk and on to Snizhne
JIT was able to track the movement of the BUK-Telar by identifying phones of people who traveled with the vehicle. Once finding the correlated numbers, it was easy to track the movement near perfectly
This same route was validated by witnesses who saw or photographed the BUK Telar as it traveled. The letter-number combinations on this chart indicates different anonymized witnesses that have passed the credibility test.
Prosecution describes now the (draconian) credibility tests applied for each witness. The credibility was initially assessed by the investigators, then by prosecutors, but ultimately by the investigative judge. Many were only partly "credited" for their testimony.
For example, the investigative judge threw out statements about having seen the BUK Telar froom witnesses V49 and V54, despite the fact that they matched the content of what other witnesses described. These two were just not convincing enough.
On top of the telecoms metadata and witness evidence, JIt superimposed social media and photo data that was published as the BUK Telar moved. This resulted in this consistent composite route map.
JIT first started its route investigation based on this photo in Paris Match magazine. JIT contacted the owner of the business that had its number on the side - he testified that his business had been seized by "DNR militants"
The owner - who became a witness - provided a receipt for his truck being impounded by the DNR militants
The owner also presented security camera footage showing the seizure on 8 July. But that's not all - the commander who impounded the truck was later detained by Ukraine, and he testified confirming the takeover, and his own role in the DNR. He was in charge of support & logistics
In 2015, JIT received a video from which this screentshot was taken. Metadata was fully analyzed, and also visuals were geolocated and chronolocated. The spot was geolocated to the road to Makeevka. The time was also determined based on sun shadows, light direction etc.
Dutch forensic experts analyzed the video and found zero evidence of manipulation. Russia, however, presented the below analysis at a press-conference, claiming the image had been manipulated.
The Russian press conference raised many more questions about what Russia was saying, than about the underlying picture. The lines that were shown on the photo as unexplained evidence seemed completely random.
We presented the press conference to forensic experts anyway, just in case - they concluded once again that there was no manipulation.The "parallel lines" analysis is completely unusable in the case of two moving objects, lens curve or image compression- all of which were present
Experts demonstrated the composite effect of image compression , moving objects and variable shutter speed
In addition, experts demonstrated on the photo itself the rolling shutter effect (the curved line in the white circle) which makes any expectation for parallel lines being retained, implausible.
Bottom-line, the video and photograph were deemed comprehensively validated and used a a starting point. But there was another initial photo too. This one.
This photo was emailed anonymously to JIT with the subject line "BUK...Makeevka" JIT needed to validate this. This is why JIT published it on 19 Oct 2017 asking for help identifying the location. @Bellingcat very quickly identified it was Iycha prospect in Donesk
JIT then did it's own validation and confirmed @bellingcat's findings - for example, by finding social media posts "spotting" the BUK at the place we had identified at exactly that time.
JIT asked the forensic institute to focus on the allegedly inconsistent shadow under the white car (used by Russian "experts" to argue forgecy). NFI stated it could easily be explain with composite shadows from neighboring objects, like trees. It stood by its authenticity.
A phone intercept moving concurrently with the vehicle shows the owner saying "move to the left lane and occupy it completely" - this matches the tweet that observed the BUK in Donetsk.
These three witnesses described the trailer and the Volvo namely on Ilycha Prospect on July 17 in the morning.
All these three witnesses gave descriptions of various components of the group of vehicles as seen on this photo, and all gave their testimony in 2015 - 2 years before this photo was published and could have influenced their "memories"
Now prosecution will move to describe its validation of the launch site at Snizhne. The hypothesis for this location started from open-source data showing a missile contrail near Snizhne - also validated by @Bellingcat. JIT contacted the author of the photo in Torez.
He/She provided additional photos to JIT, and provided the direction of the movement of the contrail, shown by the arrow
The original SD card was handed over to JIT and was authenticated as non-manipulated. The contrast was increased to see the contrail better (left). According to the experts, the trail was lifting upwards and could not be a plane.
The type of trail, time, location, direction of missile launch were thus analyzed and showed a consistent picture of source of launch.
Additionally, Western journalists who visited the site shortly after the crash, were able to photograph scorched earth at a location just outside Snizhne
The scorched site fully coincided with the plot that was reverse-engineered as a launch location based on the arena tests and other experimental and theoretical data relating to a BUK flight path.
The firing location was also supported by satellite photos before and after the launch date - on the 21 July discoloration from fire is clearly visible.
Moreover, reverse-engineering the progression of fire allowed JIT to determine the place where fire originated (B)
Two additional independent analysis pointed to the same corner of the discolorized plot as the likely deployment of the BUK Tela.r
Furthermore, a witness interrogated by the investigative judge, pointed to a precise location where he/she saw the BUk Telar (the cross). It is exactly the place seen on the satellite photos.
A second witness who was a separatist militant at the time and was present at the launch, confirmed this same location. (His testimony will be discussed in more detail later).
Based on cumulative, multifaceted data from telecoms, witness statements and witness-provided documents and photographs, satellite photos and open source visuals, were sufficient to convince the JIT they had conclusively identified the launch site.
Then JIT had to reconstruct the outbound route following the shoot-down. It had fewer data-points, partly because the escape was at night where fewer witnesses would have had a chance to see or photograph it.
The one thing that made it easier to validate the return route was that a former DNR militant had become a witness who had taken part in the repatriation - and was charged with moving the BUK-Telar to Debaltseve
Another objective piece of evidence was the video of the BUK Telar with one missing missile in Luhansk
In the March session JIT explained how Russian MoD faked a non-existent address onto this video to claim it was made in Ukrainian-controlled territory
The prosecutor again cites @Bellingcat's investigation that proved Russia purely fabricated a non-existent street sign to make a false point.
JIT was able to obtain the original camera from which the video was made. Videos on this camera were compared to landmarks on Google Earth and the location in Luhansk was determined with high confidence. Timing was chronolocated to 4:03 and 4:20.
Russia then asserted that this video is faked - which conflicted Russia's assertions 4 years earlier at the press conference where they had themselves said the video is authentic - but had forged on a signpost text that didn't exist.
Intercepted calls showed that a series of 9 telephone numbers had been issued to people accompanying the BUK Telar, all starting with +3806334263*
The intercepted conversations specifically indicate that the BUK Telar arrived from - and was repatriated into - Russia. And that this BUK Telar was only one of several heavy weapons installations provided by the Russian federation.
The prosecution now moves to the already disclosed conclusion that the BUK, named as BUK Telar 3*2, beonged to the 53r Brigade of the Russian army.
Here JIT describes one of the unique markers of the BUK Telar that made it possible to identify it as one belonging to 53rd Brigade. (@Bellingcat published a very detailed comparison back in 2016 bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-eu…)
Similarly to what we did, the JIT used the "odd" wheel as one of many individual characteristics that made it clear the Torez BUK-Telar from 17.07.2014 was the same as the one photographed on social media on 23.06.2014 in Stary Oskol in Russia.
Social media on Russian social media by members of the 53rd Brigade confirm that the unit where this BUK Telar belonged was on the way to Ukraine's border at that time in late June
JIT requested from Russia information about whether this BUK Telar belonged to 53rd Brigade, and where this Telar 3x2 was located on July 17 2014. Russia replied that "the photographs of this BUK Telar in Ukraine are fake and therefore we do not need to give you this information"
We kept telling Russia that it's not up to them to decide if this information is necessary or not. Russia has as of today refused to provide any answer as to where this BUK Telar was on 17.07.2014.
Prosecution: Not the full answers have been obtained. The reasons for the shoot-down still have not been conclusively established. This work will continue.
One conversation that was taken into account was the "Birdie" conversation, which took place around 16:20. However, neither of them made calls before or after this conversation that suggested they received or passed information about an oncoming airplane.
However, there was another commercial airliner that had just passed over Stelmakh's location (based on the telecoms data), and he might have been eyeing that other plane. Furthermore, the bird conversation was only a minute before the shoot-down.
Therefore, JIT had to conclude that it is not certain that this conversation contributed to the shooting down of MH17. There was no evidence that the outcome of this conversation reached the crew of the BUK Telar before the shootdown.
Another hypothesis that JIT investigated was whether the actual target of the BUK had been an Aeroflot flight, under the theory that the intent was a false-flag operation aiming to blame Ukraine for a commercial airline shoot-down. JIT concluded this was unlikely.
In conclusion, JIT has not completed the investigation into what exactly happened in the last moments before the shootdown, and what led to the decision to fire at MH17. At this point, the most plausible scenario still is the mistaken targeting a Ukrainian military plane.
For the current criminal proceedings against the current 4 indictees, the precise intent is not of critical substance. This would be of relevance in the criminal investigation of the crew, which is still ongoing.
The prosecution now summarizes the course of investigation, emphasizing that it not only considered the alternative scenarios, but tried to rebut its own main scenario - with even more coherent arguments than Russia's random and internally inconsistent attemtps at rebuttal.
In tomorrow's session, the prosecution will answer questions from the judges and defense, and will provide their position on the hypothetical "combatant immunity" claim for the defendants. (End of session)
