And I have thought about it honestly, and my answer is no, and the reason is worth saying.

I did not decide, in some cold-blooded way, to gather evidence against my mother-in-law.

I did not see the violence coming and coolly hit record.

What happened was subtler and, I think, more true: that a deep professional instinct, worn into me over nine years, fired automatically the instant a situation began to feel wrong.

When you have spent a career preserving records — when documenting the moment a thing goes sideways has become as automatic to you as flinching from a flame — your hands begin to do it before your conscious mind has caught up.

It is not calculation.