In taped interrogation, Westerfield tells police 'my life is over'

San Diego Union Tribune ^ | January 7, 2003

[TomB]

In a videotaped interrogation with San Diego police detectives four days after Danielle van Dam was kidnapped, an exhausted David Westerfield says "my life is over," seemingly coming close to an admission that he murdered his 7-year-old neighbor.

"As far as I'm concerned my life is over, the life that I had, the life that I was living is over," Westerfield says in the interrogation conducted the evening of Feb. 5, 2002. Danielle was last seen the night of Feb. 1.

"But you can't blame anyone but yourself, Dave," answers one of the police detectives.

"And I have no problem with that," Westerfield replies.

In the tapes released Tuesday, Westerfield admits "unusual" sexual encounters with his wife, denies anything improper about his alleged use of binoculars to watch neighbors and says the child pornography found on his computer was simply something he downloaded along with a lot of other pornographic images and that he had no sexual interest in children.

Superior Court Judge William Mudd agreed Monday to unseal the videotape along with hundreds of pages of transcripts, documents and recordings in the Westerfield case, as well as transcripts of police interrogations and court hearings conducted in secret.

Some of the material – audiotape and videotape of Westerfield being interrogated during the early stages of the investigation – was released Tuesday afternoon.

The remainder of the material, which ranges from transcripts of closed-door court hearings to motions regarding potential evidence, will be released Monday, Mudd ruled.

The ruling Monday came three days after Mudd sentenced the former design engineer to death for kidnapping and murdering 7-year-old Danielle van Dam, his neighbor in Sabre Springs.

Monday's court hearing came in response to a request by The San Diego Union-Tribune, which has been seeking access to the information for months. The San Diego-based 4th District Court of Appeal has ruled that Mudd must release the information.

The San Diego chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists made a donation to the legal costs.

Westerfield, who attended Monday's hearing, is scheduled to be moved within days to death row at San Quentin State Prison outside San Francisco.

During earlier court appearances, Westerfield was always dressed in civilian attire, but he appeared in court Monday in a green jail jumpsuit. He sat in a holding area so he couldn't be filmed by a television camera.

[wimpycat]

So what you're saying is, throughout this whole thing, throughout the whole interrogation process so far, this "innocent/framed/wrongly accused" man hasn't YET said he didn't do anything, hasn't proclaimed his innocence, agreed with the interrogators when they said his life is over by his own fault,etc.?

[Freedom2specul8]

We should create a thread and can only argue the opposite position on it. That'd be a hoot.

[Freedom2specul8]

Hey you don't think his atty advised him not to do ya? Hey, the atty can get fined or disbarred (I forget the exact consequence) if he says his client is innocent when he knows he's not.

[EllaMinnow]

That's what I'm saying.

[EllaMinnow]

I think wimpy is talking about during the interviews.

[Valpal1]

WRT, the plea bargain, the defense declined all samples of physical evidence to do independent testing re DNA, etc. Why do you suppose that is? Because they knew it would be a complete waste of defense resources, maybe?

I know UCANTSEEIT, but DW is guilty, the LE officers recognized it from his demeanor from day 1, just as they claimed to have, and the more they investigated him, the more obvious it became to them. Then they found blood/hair in the MH, later the body w/fibers all connecting DW to the murder victim and her to him.

Not even Feldman has the cajones to claim frame job or falsified evidence. Even now, he doesn't claim this, because he knows it was a clean bust and they got the right guy. Even now Feldman doesn't proclaim his clients innocence, only that his "rights" were violated by procedural mistakes. Let me tell you, that if Feldman thought his client was innocent, and was framed, there'd be a sight more fireworks on his part. He is not a legal slouch.

[Freedom2specul8]

Just thinking about this case, the only way I could argue the opposite side is if I pretended I was a defense atty...ignoring that he did it and just defend him. Cuz he's guilty!

[Freedom2specul8]

"I think wimpy is talking about during the interviews. "

Oh yeah..sorry wimpy..my mind went in fast forward mode. :-)

[Freedom2specul8]

Please post if you get transcripts..I have to sign off and rest. will try to check in later..

[wimpycat]

When the police were interrogating him, he didn't have access to his lawyer. His lawyer wasn't present, if he had, in fact, retained one at that point.

Even if he had one, what lawyer would tell him it's OK to talk to the police, but whatever you do, DON'T say you're innocent? He did a lot of talking during that interrogation...but from what I've seen, he never said he didn't have anything to do with Danielle's disappearance. He did a lot of talking, but didn't say he was innocent.

[Freedom2specul8]

You're right of course, I was being sarcastic a bit about the lawyer advising him to not say he's innocent. (I was thinking about when he did have an atty.)

I'm taking a break..have sat here too long and is gettin tired.. :)

[EllaMinnow]

I'm sorry I just referred to you as wimpy - I meant no disrespect. I was very fond of Popeye when I was little.

"I'll gladly pay you Wednesday for a hamburger today..."

[wimpycat]

Don't sweat it. My cat is named Wimpy, so it's just a name to me--I forget about what it means until some lamebrain makes a snide remark about it. I can tell the difference. :-)

[UCANSEE2]

Yea. The BASS PRO SHOPS were supposed to take over Bannister Mall. I guess the deal went south. Wonder what will happen now? I used to ride motorcycles all over that land. Then Harold part of it for the Highway (435), then sold the rest for BMALL. We even used to ride go-carts through the mines underneath. Even funnier is that the land where BMALL is used to have constant cave-ins due to the first owner of the mines robbing the ceilings. I guess they solved that problem before building over it.

Would be funny if it turned back to an open area like it was when I was young. Well, it was part farm, part wildgrowth.

[UCANSEE2]

Now that is a very interesting and intellectually stimulating challenge. Of course, that would eliminate about 99% of the current posters, don't you think?

[cyncooper]

Polygraph test starting now on RR.

[EllaMinnow]

First of 4...

[cyncooper]

First of 4...

I thought I heard RR say they gave him four polygraph tests, but thought I might have not heard that correctly.

Well, that's interesting. It was not a case of taking one test and declaring themselves satisfied that DW was being deceptive, is how I would interpret it.

[UCANSEE2]

Hi.

WRT, the plea bargain, the defense declined all samples of physical evidence to do independent testing re DNA, etc. Why do you suppose that is? Because they knew it would be a complete waste of defense resources, maybe?

The defense declined ALL SAMPLES to do independent testing. Were there not some samples that they could not get because they were destroyed in testing ? Were there not some that were so late in getting tested (due to rush to trial) that defense didn't get time to test them ?

I am not an expert on lawyers or Feldman specifically. I do know that lawyers make deals. They go like this..... Let us have this one, and we will let you have the others. This one is high profile and our whole department's reputation now rests on this case. It doesn't matter one damn bit if you are guilty or not. The lawyer agrees to 'throw the fight'. You can say it doesn't happen but I have personally seen it and had a friend whose had it happen to him.

There seem to be a lot of questions as to why Feldman did or didn't do certain things in this case. THROWING the fight is one possible explanation.

[cyncooper]

Redden is explaining to DW after their "dress rehearsal" of a polygraph that he always gives a minimum of two tests and he averages three tests.

As RR has revealed, he ultimately administered four tests to DW.