FKR accidentally proves the CW right about the taillight
Yesterday, I came across this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CBqMcX4jgeA
This person managed to get their hands on the exact model of Lexus taillight that Karen Read had. I'd seen someone do this before with similar results, but not with a video, so this was an incredibly helpful demonstration.
The first revelation? The taillight, with the cover broken off, has red-glowing LED's:
This makes the 5am video make so much more sense, as there was a lot of debate about the color we're seeing from the sub-optimal quality of the Ring camera. Yes, we see a red reflection on the fence as Karen's backing up, and a red-ish color as she's pulling out, because the LED's are glowing red.
However, this isn't how the taillight looked as it was photographed in the sallyport, because a clear plastic diffuser piece was broken off and recovered at 34 Fairview. The uploader broke off this diffuser in the same section (and I believe they did so quite accurately - see evidence photographs of the taillight housing and recovered pieces), and showed how it looked without it:
See, this taillight does not actually have LED's in that middle "L" section. It's diffused through that clear plastic portion to make it glow without producing any light itself.
And what does it look like in the Ring video? Take a look for yourself. Note - I highly recommend watching the full Ring video (found here around 9 minutes in), as the dynamics of it make it even more clear than this screenshot:
We see the single vertical strip on the corner, and the small horizontal strip to the bottom right of it, exactly like this creator showed. We do not see the second vertical strip that we'd see if this diffuser portion were still intact. This makes it clear that this piece is gone by 5:08am.
Also note - the taillight will trigger an additional light at the bottom when the brakes are pressed - that does not appear to have broken in the housing pictures, and also appears consistent with what we see in this video where she brakes as she proceeds down the driveway.