Motion 5: Before It Disappears — Emergency Motion to Preserve the Evidence

Digital evidence is fragile. Comments get edited. Posts get deleted. Videos vanish. Church cameras overwrite. Bodycam systems purge on a schedule. Phones get replaced. And screenshots get cropped to tell whatever story someone wants.

This motion asks the court to freeze the record now — before the evidence that proves what really happened quietly disappears. It doesn't ask anyone to decide who's right. It just keeps the truth available so the truth can be decided honestly.

The motion as filed — page one.

What I'm asking the court to do

Order immediate preservation of:

• All HCSO records — bodycam, dashcam, CAD, dispatch, call sheets, reports, officer notes, open-records materials.
• All church surveillance and security-camera footage.
• All complainant/witness phones, texts, messages, videos, photos, and social-media posts about me or the incident.
• The Costello-folder materials, the Joe & Cindy Black folder, and any arrest/incident folders the State or a witness relies on.
• All RealRyanNichols.com articles, drafts, uploads, comments, and source files about this matter.
• All public comments claiming I pulled, pointed, brandished, or shot a firearm.
• All threats, doxxing, and retaliation directed at me.
• All metadata — timestamps, URLs, account IDs, headers, file hashes, and original file names.

Why it matters

This case is being argued in public on rumor while the objective record sits exposed to deletion. A protective preservation order costs the truth nothing and protects everyone — including the State. Litigating over missing evidence later is no substitute for keeping it now.

The law behind it

• U.S. Const. amends. V, VI, XIV and Tex. Const. art. I, §§ 10, 19 — due process and the right to present a defense.
• Tex. Code Crim. Proc. art. 39.14 — Texas criminal discovery.
• California v. Trombetta, 467 U.S. 479 (1984) — due process requires preserving apparently exculpatory evidence.
• Arizona v. Youngblood, 488 U.S. 51 (1988) — bad-faith failure to preserve potentially useful evidence violates due process.
• Brady v. Maryland, 373 U.S. 83 (1963); Giglio v. United States, 405 U.S. 150 (1972); Kyles v. Whitley, 514 U.S. 419 (1995) — disclosure of favorable and impeachment evidence.
• Crawford v. Washington, 541 U.S. 36 (2004); Davis v. Alaska, 415 U.S. 308 (1974); Washington v. Texas, 388 U.S. 14 (1967); Chambers v. Mississippi, 410 U.S. 284 (1973) — confrontation and the right to present a defense.

The facts, and how I've classified them

• FACT: Public reporting described the allegation as hand-on-grip conduct.
• RYAN STATEMENT: I deny drawing, pulling, pointing, brandishing, or firing a firearm.
• RYAN STATEMENT: The public story changed and escalated.
• FACT: RealRyanNichols.com documents the public rumor, my denial, public threats, and source-chain concerns.
• FACT: The Costello folder and the Joe & Cindy Black folder exist as raw evidence folders.
• NEEDS AUTHENTICATION: Each image, video, audio file, and message thread requires native authentication before it is treated as a trial exhibit.

My declaration

My name is Ryan Nichols. DOB December 6, 1990. I am the Defendant. Under penalty of perjury (Tex. Civ. Prac. & Rem. Code § 132.001):

• I am asking the Court to preserve evidence, not to decide guilt or innocence in this motion.
• I believe public narratives and witness accounts have changed over time.
• I believe bodycam, dispatch, church video, public posts, and screenshots are necessary to fairly decide what happened.
• I am concerned relevant digital evidence could be deleted, edited, overwritten, or selectively screenshot if preservation is not ordered now.

Executed June 1, 2026, in Harrison County, Texas. /s/ Ryan Nichols

The public side of this record is already documented here: the church parking lot story changed, when I asked for a comment to come down, and every day, they tell me to die. (Exhibits EX-002–EX-012.)

The proposed order

• All State agencies and served custodians shall preserve all records, media, metadata, screenshots, videos, audio, posts, messages, bodycam, CAD, dispatch, church-camera footage, reports, and notes identified in the motion.
• No person with notice shall delete, alter, destroy, overwrite, or selectively modify responsive records.
• Native-format records and metadata shall be preserved where available.

The bottom line

Freeze it all now. You can't cross-examine a deleted comment or replay an overwritten tape. Preservation doesn't decide the case — it makes an honest verdict possible.