So grand master of all that is Apple, what pray tell is the truth?
Well, my FRiend, looking at everything that has come out and the statements of the people since this development was revealed, I think the FBI asked the IT guys at San Bernardino County to change the AppleID so they could attempt to reset the passcode on the iPhone using a known AppleID and password, not knowing that would wipe any current iCloud backups because they had not yet involved Apple in the process.
Now, they are playing "Blame the Other Guy!" and "Cover Up Our Big Boo-Boo!" by trying to get Apple to pull our cookies out of the fire, unaware that Apple could tell that someone had changed the AppleID password after they had possession of the iPhone and would call them out on it.