Access
A number of IM programs save messages. I have to save mine deliberately in a file with AOL's program. Mac's Ichat can be set to save messages automatically, which my wife does to archive my daughter's messages. Don't know what Foley and the former page were using.
All this information, when saved, is packed inside our individual computer hard drives. Unless there's something I'm missing about how the system works, someone with access to either Foley's computer or the recipient's would have to have saved these, pulled them up three years later, and sent them to the media.