When requesting that Travis Scott give over his phone information to the plaintiffs in the 2021 Astroworld catastrophe, Scott's attorneys claimed that his phone was lost at sea when it fell off a boat in the Gulf of Mexico in 2022. Does this mean the case is now impossible?!
Regarding the hundreds of lawsuits that were brought against him and others over the deaths and injuries at the 2021 Astroworld concert, the artist, 32, was deposed on Monday in Houston for about eight hours.
Scott and his team allegedly failed to provide the necessary documents, according to an emergency motion filed by the plaintiffs' lawyers for Astroworld last week, before Scott's deposition.
The motion sought records of Scott's phone conversations about the festival, as well as information about his company, XX Global Inc., and its workers, including David Stromberg, general manager of Cactus Jack.
Scott's lawyers responded by claiming that the star's phone was lost in the ocean two months after the events of November 5, 2021, and would never be found again.
ALSO READ: Astroworld Tragedy Case Update: Travis Scott Questioned During Lengthy Civil Deposition
Scott's lawyer Steve Brody said that one of the plaintiff's attorneys, Noah Wexler, had provided him a draft of the emergency petition last week.
Five hours later, he filed an official motion before he could reply, according to the transcript of the hearing that Rolling Stone was able to access.
"Travis Scott and his team stand apart as having not produced a single text, WeChat communication, video, or photo from their phones - not because they don't exist - but because his attorneys chose not to image or search their phones the order to do so by the court," the motion read.
According to Brody, Stromberg granted him access to his phone data last Wednesday and told him he would have the records available by September 27. Scott's phone "fell off a boat in January of 2022 and landed somewhere at the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico and is not able to be retrieved," according to Brody, taking a strange turn at that point.
The phone tale is eerily similar to the well-known UK libel lawsuit of Coleen Rooney and Rebekhah Vardy, which became known as the "Wagatha Christie" case.
Caroline Watt, Vardy's agent, had her phone dropped in the North Sea after the court ordered it to be turned over for analysis.
"We know that Ms. Watt's phone is now in Davy Jones' locker, don't we, Mrs. Vardy?" remarked Coleen's attorney, Mr. Sherborne.
The star apologized, saying, "I don't know who Davy Jones is," in response.
But the vast majority, if not all of Scott's texts with Stromberg about the festival will be recoverable, according to Brody, who claimed Scott did not back up his phone via iCloud because of "significant hacking worries" and that the contents of his phone "is not going to be retrievable."
Per the transcript, Judge Kristen Hawkins questioned Scott's attorneys over the phone, saying: 'There does not seem to have been any action, from what I am hearing right now, taken on the part of Mr. Scott's legal team to either, A, secure and download anything from his phone immediately following an event in which 10 people died, or, B, trying to recover text messages from alternate sources when Mr. Scott would have the ability to go and get that information, possibly from the carrier, or from other sources," she said.
Travis Scott appears in court on Monday in Texas to face questions about the 2021 Astroworld Festival incident, and since then, he has been "fully cooperating" with investigators.
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