DNA Dispute In Laci Case

CBS News ^ | Oct 30, 2003

[runningbear]

DNA Dispute In Laci Case

Scott Peterson enters the courtroom in Stanislaus County Superior Court in Modesto, Calif., Friday, Oct. 24, 2003. (Photo: AP)

DNA Dispute In Laci Case

MODESTO, Calif., Oct. 30, 2003

Peterson Hearing Opens

The hair, found in a pair of pliers on the boat Scott Peterson took fishing the day his wife disappeared, matched a genetic sample from Laci Peterson's mother, an FBI expert testified Wednesday, the first day of the preliminary hearing.

(CBS/AP) As Scott Peterson's preliminary hearing resumes in Modesto, California Thursday, disputed DNA evidence will likely be the center of attention.

The hearing will determine whether he must stand trial for the murder of his pregnant wife, Laci Peterson.

On Wednesday, both sides disputed the type of DNA test that prosecutors say proves a hair found in his boat was Laci Peterson's.

The hair, found in a pair of pliers on the boat Scott Peterson took fishing the day his wife disappeared, matched a genetic sample from Laci Peterson's mother, an FBI expert testified Wednesday, the first day of the preliminary hearing.

For much of the day inside a packed courtroom, FBI lab supervisor Constance Fisher testified about the controversial method of DNA analysis she specializes in that can show a genetic match between a mother and child.

She testified that a one-inch strand of hair found on pliers in the boat did not match Scott Peterson, but did match a swab of DNA taken from the mouth of his mother-in-law, Sharon Rocha.

Defense lawyer Mark Geragos is challenging the admissibility of the testimony, saying the analysis was the subject of a "raging debate" in the scientific community and suggesting that the hair sample may have been contaminated or tampered with by law enforcement.

The technique has not been widely accepted in courts, and it was only ruled admissible once in a California state court, in the case of an accused murderer in San Diego.

With the exception of a brief mention of Laci Peterson's family at the start of the hearing, the 27-year-old substitute teacher's name was never uttered again during the daylong hearing in Stanislaus County Superior Court.

The hearing is expected to last into next week, after which Judge Al Girolami will decide if Peterson is tried on two counts of murder that could lead to the death penalty.

While the proceedings are expected to reveal the broadest and most detailed look at the case police built against the 31-year-old former..............

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Peterson will put on DNA expert

Posted 11/2/2003 11:11 PM Updated 11/3/2003 7:17 AM

Peterson will put on DNA expert

By John Ritter, USA TODAY

MODESTO, Calif. — Could a single strand of hair be the smoking gun in the Laci Peterson murder case?

Scott Peterson's attorney wants hair evidence kept out of the case. By Al Golub, pool

Seems possible after most of last week's testimony centered on that hair. If it wasn't important, why did Scott Peterson's lawyer, Mark Geragos, spend seven hours grilling an FBI scientist on the nitty-gritty of DNA analysis?

And why, after all that, will he put his own DNA expert on the stand this week to try to persuade Judge Al Girolami to reject the hair as evidence?

Only the defense knows. But legal analysts caution that what seems compelling in this preliminary hearing — an early phase of Scott Peterson's battle to beat a double-murder charge and stay off death row — may not be later.

Geragos may believe the hair is a key to prosecutors' theory that Peterson killed his wife and dumped her body in San Francisco Bay on Christmas Eve. Prosecutors will try to prove the hair was Laci Peterson's and ended up in the boat after she was dead. A clash this week may be over whether Laci had ever been on her husband's recently purchased boat. If prosecutors can show she hadn't, the hair might seem even more damaging.

Geragos is fighting aggressively to keep the hair away from a future jury. Failing that, another strategy "may be to make the hair seem like a bigger deal than it is," says Laurie Levenson, a law professor at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. "Then if he can knock the hair out, it sounds like he knocked out the case."

But the hair may not be crucial — even to prosecutors. Their goal is to convince the judge to hold Peterson for trial, not to present their whole case. They may save their best evidence, including blood, witness statements or wiretaps.

In the 1995 O.J. Simpson murder case, a knife prominent in the preliminary hearing barely came up at trial. "It was a big red herring," Levenson says. "This hair could end up the big red herring."

Even if prosecutors David Harris and Rick Distaso consider other evidence more critical to a conviction, they may feel pressure to offer hair as scientific evidence.

"If they go to trial in a case of this magnitude without impressive scientific testimony, some jurors may be disappointed," says Ed Imwinkelried, a law professor at the University of California-Davis. Disappointed jurors could spell acquittal, he says.

Even though the DNA analysis at issue is new to most courts, judges almost always have allowed it as evidence in cases where it has been argued, Imwinkelried says.

Knowing that, Geragos may be trying to get the judge to limit how far a prosecution witness can go in attaching importance to the DNA..............

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DNA at Center of Laci Peterson Hearings

DNA at Center of Laci Peterson Hearings

Monday November 3, 2003 12:46 PM

By JIM WASSERMAN

Associated Press Writer

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) - Defense attorneys in the Scott Peterson trial have called mitochondrial DNA evidence questionable science, frustrating experts and putting under a microscope what has become a mainstream tool of American justice.

Mitochondrial DNA, the genetic identification method cited last week in Peterson's preliminary hearing, has been used hundreds of times in the nation's courtrooms, helping convict the guilty and free the innocent, experts say.

It first appeared in a sensational 1996 Tennessee murder trial, but it has been used less frequently in California, which has higher barriers for new evidentiary techniques.

Prosecutors in the Peterson case are using mitochondrial DNA to make a case that a human hair found in pliers in Peterson's boat came from his wife, Laci, whom he is accused of killing last year.

The evidence is key to a possible prosecution argument that Peterson used the boat to ferry his pregnant wife's body to a watery grave on the day she disappeared from their Modesto home. Peterson, 31, is now charged with murder in the deaths of his 27-year-old wife and their unborn son.

Mark Geragos, Peterson's attorney, has attacked the mitochondrial DNA evidence, calling it the unreliable subject of ``raging debate'' among scientists.

Not so, said Dr. Terry Melton, chief executive officer of Mitotyping Technologies in State College, Pa., one of a handful of laboratories in the United States that extract cellular blueprints from evidence.

``It's been around for about 20 years,'' Melton said. ``The armed forces used it to ID remains of Vietnam veterans for 10 years. Now it's being introduced quite a bit in court.''

Experts say mitochondrial DNA - a tiny ring-shaped molecule that's much smaller than the more familiar nuclear DNA that reveals genetic makeup - helped identify victims of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attack in New York. It can be extracted from hair and bones when little else remains of a body. The process takes a few days and typically costs about $2,500, Melton said.

Geragos grilled the prosecution's FBI witness about the science's weak points, prompting admissions of computer glitches and breakdowns in lab equipment. He plans to call his own witnesses to discredit forensic........

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Prosecutor slowly shows Peterson case

Prosecutor slowly shows Peterson case

By GARTH STAPLEY

BEE STAFF WRITER

Last Updated: November 2, 2003, 12:08:14 PM PST

The mystery surrounding the Peterson case lives on. A court-imposed gag order kept evidence securely under wraps for several months, fueling speculation by TV pundits and coffeehouse gossipers.

Did Scott Peterson kill his pregnant wife, Laci, and dump her body in San Francisco Bay? Did Satanists snatch her for an evil ritual? What about his affair, the brown van and hypnotized witnesses?

The wild guessing only added to the mystique surrounding the double-murder case -- one with a Hollywoodlike story-line that started with a seemingly happy young couple about to become parents, and ended in deception and death.

Wait until the preliminary hearing, various media trumpeted. That's when closely guarded evidence will come out, and all will become clear, they assured.

And it is coming out -- but at a trickle, with a heavy dose of droning about mitochondrial DNA. In fact, the first two days of the much-heralded hearing opened with exhaustive technical detail surrounding a single human hair.

Trials begin with opening statements by attorneys on both sides. They lay out in simple terms what they hope to prove, so jurors know what to look for as the evidence unfolds.

But preliminary hearings are different. In this one, Stanislaus County Superior Court Judge Al Girolami -- who has reviewed thousands of pages of documents kept sealed from public view -- needed no introduction.

Consequently, the public is being fed details in bits and pieces, with no real context. And observers continue to rely on incomplete media reports and talking heads whose view of the big picture is, at best, obscured.

"The judge knows where it's going," said legal scholar Michael Vitiello, a criminal law professor with Sacramento's McGeorge School of Law. "He doesn't need the same kind of game plan you would have for a jury."

Pine-Sol, dark warehouse

Among the unlinked pieces of testimony offered Friday:

A house cleaner mopped the kitchen floor with water and "a little bit of Pine-Sol," but used chlorine bleach for bathroom floors.

Laci Peterson and her sister, Amy Rocha ..........

Early questions on Peterson's story

Early questions on Peterson's story

By JOHN COTE AND GARTH STAPLEY

BEE STAFF WRITERS

Last Updated: October 31, 2003, 03:33:00 PM PST

3:33 p.m., PST: Scott Peterson showed police a parking receipt from the Berkeley marina on Christmas Eve but didn’t respond when asked what type of fish he went fishing for, an officer testified today.

“He couldn’t say,” Det. Jon Evers said in Stanislaus County Superior Court during Scott Peterson’s preliminary hearing.

The 31-year-old Modesto man is charged with double murder in the deaths of his wife, Laci, and their son. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty. At the conclusion of the preliminary hearing in Stanislaus County Superior Court, Judge Al Girolami will determine whether Peterson should be held over for trial.

Evers, who was a patrol officer at the time Laci Peterson disappeared, also testified that Peterson did not respond when his wife’s stepfather, an avid fisherman..........

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FROM THE SHERIFF'S PRESSRELEASE LINK:

"Court on Monday & Doc Online

Posted on Friday, October 31 2003 at 3:04 PM PST ----

ATTENTION: Court on Monday, 11/3/03 begins at 9:00 AM. If you have a pass for seating in the courtroom, you MUST BE IN THE COURTROOM and SEATED by 8:45 am (PST).

A new court document is also now available online at http://www.pressupdate.info. Click on "Court Docs" for the following document.

1. Minute Order: Preliminary Hearing 10/31/03 (ie; Third day court provided overview) PDF (30 KB)

IMPORTANT!!! You must be in the courtroom and seated by 8:45 AM on Monday. Court begins at 9:00 am.

Anyone using the audio overflow room must turn their cell phones off - that means COMPLETE OFF - no vibrating/ringing phones permitted. This room is an extension of the courtroom and the sames rules apply.

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Superior Court, Stanislaus County October 31, 2003

Minute Order: Preliminary Hearing
(ie; Third day court provided overview

[Jackie-O]

I agree Sandy, if the hair is all they have, I could not convict either...I don't think the State is fool enough to think they can try him on that alone. He will never be bound over on just that...there has to be much more, I think the hair is just what they need to link Laci to the boat, the boat was the means to dispose of her. We'll see what the 90 bags they took out of the house provides for their case, along with the previous family testimony that underminded his alibi.

[Velveeta]

"Someone" wanted to secure that crotch area. Doesn't make sense that if a stranger killed her they'd take such care at taping her up. You'd think they would just dump the body asap.

[Velveeta]

LOL! No.

[Jackie-O]

LOL!!!

[Cloe]

I do agree!
My mistake was I kept thinking the duct tape had to do with securing that area in regards to the pregnancy.But I just realized he might also have been worried about other bodily fluids!

That seems to me to be so much worse - not only to commit a murder, but to make sure you have a really clean work environment to do it in !

[Cloe]

No, it doesn't make sense that a stranger would take such care taping up a body. I think it is a detail that would not even be considered by most people - unless they had put a whole lot of thought into what they were about to do.
So the duct tape would be a huge find if they can connect it to Scott.

[Sandylapper]

He will never be bound over on just that...there has to be much more

He's going to be bound over based on the fact that her body and the baby's washed up very near the spot where he said he was fishing, if all the talking heads are correct. Using that one hair seems trivial to me, when there's a waist band out there that would tell us what she was wearing. Why not use your best weapon? That hair ain't it, I hope. JMO

[Sandylapper]

Frankly, I'd love to see something that would prompt me to question his guilt.

Me, too, Vel, and I haven't seen it. But, I will say that I believe the MPD acted a little too hastily in treating him as a suspect. If you put yourself into his shoes for just a couple of minutes (we do owe him the presumption of innocence, don't we?), then why were they so anxious to take him to the warehouse? Believe I saw where they went down there at 11:00 p.m. on the 24th, and they were reacting to Sharon's question about the word "missing", and Grantski's questioning him about the timing of the fishing trip! Under those circumstances, if I were innocent, I'd be shutting up, getting a lawyer, too. And I might not be overly cooperative, if I thought they were trying to nail me for a crime I did not commit based on my in-laws say-so.

The Sandlapper and I were talking, remembering last night, and we agreed, we did NOT tell our in-laws, or my mother, whenever we bought a boat, cars, or anything until after the fact. Frankly, we didn't want their input!

[Devil_Anse]

I'm glad you said that: why would a stranger with no known link to Laci do all that taping business? (Sick!)

Furthermore, why would a stranger with no known link to Laci take her 85 miles to dump her in the bay? Or move the body even 1 mile? Once a stranger left the place where he killed her, he'd be unconnected to her in any known way. He wouldn't need to hide the body, b/c he was never going to return to where she was killed (her house, or her neighborhood). He'd only need to hide himself!

[Devil_Anse]

I agree, there's nothing odd about not telling one's extended family (even one's parents, when one is a married adult), about such purchases.

But how often did you or your husband go out and buy something like that w/o telling each other first?

Okay, okay, we can pretend like he DID tell Laci. Well, what about after the fact? He'd had that boat for over 2 weeks. He then decided one day to go fishing in it. Wouldn't that have been a likely time for it to come up in conversation with, say, his sister-in-law, or perhaps his dad, when he happened to be talking to dad on the phone right on the same day he'd taken the boat out for its first run?

I, too, would want to clam up immediately if I were suddenly in the middle of a murder mystery. Scott could have done that, and there is no way the police or anyone else could ever hold that against him legally, anywhere. Notice they are not saying, "He hasn't told us the whole story of his affair", or "He hasn't done a minute-by-minute account of his activities the 23-24, so therefore he must be guilty." They know they can't use such things against him legally.

While I would not want to talk to the cops if I didn't think it would do anything but make them wrongly suspect me, I certainly wouldn't LIE to them, either. I wouldn't tell them the electricity was out when I knew very well it wasn't out. I wouldn't tell people who asked, during that dire situation when my spouse was missing, that I wasn't having an affair, when in fact I had been having one. I would realize that any "trouble" I might get into over confessing that would be totally minor compared to the trouble another human being, my spouse, might be in.

There's a way to preserve all one's rights, yet not tell misleading lies which might lead to the missing person not being found as quickly--and Scott didn't follow that way.

[Devil_Anse]

When I heard, in late December, all the family members on both sides saying what a great guy Scott was, I believed them. I did not think he had done it until later. One thing that made me finally start to wonder about him was his camera shyness--considering that both sets of parents, plus brothers, sisters, etc., had all taken the plunge and gotten up there to ask the public to please be on the lookout for Laci.

Scott is surely no shyer than, say, Amy Rocha. She was out there in front of the cameras, even though all she could do was look depressed and cry. He wasn't. He was almost fanatically camera-shy.

UNTIL suddenly everyone wasn't saying he was a great guy all the time. Suddenly his affair came to light. Uh-oh--the old IMAGE (narcissist's all-important image) was in danger! It's one thing when something minor like your wife and baby are in danger, but it's getting out of hand when your perfect IMAGE is in danger!

[Canadian Outrage]

No kidding Vel. That was an excellent view of Snott's "fishing" trip. baaaaaaaaaaahh

[Canadian Outrage]

You hit that one outta the park Dev.!! Couldn't have said it better myself. That is the way I see it too. Henry Lee is "overrated" not because he doesn't have lots of credentials and lots of Knowledge. However, he has chosen, it would appear, to take the low road in his testifying at trials. These are serious cases, they don't need some rediculous antics to get the point. I find NOthing funny about spitting up ketchup to attempt to produce a blood spatter pattern. I am sure that was extremely distasteful to all in the Michael Peterson case.

[Canadian Outrage]

No no, there was absolutely NO evidence that Connor was born. Quite the opposite. However that does not preclude some leakage of amniotic fluid if Laci was hit hard enough to rupture her membranes. The autopsy clearly says he was NOT born but released through the top (fundus) of the uterus when it decomposed enough!!

[Canadian Outrage]

What drew his attention there is that he was taping her up into a sausage roll!! The cervix had never been opened!! The baby was expelled through the fundus or top of the uterus after it became weak from decomposition!

[texasbluebell]

I do agree that the baby was not born. But to me, saying the cervix was "intact" does not mean it was fully closed. I keep wondering about the duct tape applied to that area - it seems as if something drew his attention there.

Just speculating here, but maybe her water broke, and there was amniotic fluid all over the floor. And he might have used the bleach to mop that up.

[texasbluebell]

However that does not preclude some leakage of amniotic fluid if Laci was hit hard enough to rupture her membranes.

If I had kept reading a while longer, I would have seen you had already mentioned amniotic fluid.

[Canadian Outrage]

That hair is likely the "least" of what they have. They are introducing it along with damaging testimony to his alibi and truthfulness to get to trial!! The wiretaps are gonna be good. He's a big mouth. His egomania keeps his lips flapping before his brain ever gets in gear. He's gonna convict himself with his own big mouth. Plus he's a pathological liar. The string of non-stop lies eventually makes people doubt anything he says. And then there is his actions. I am kinda of the opinion that he may have given Amber some of the jewelry that he said Laci was wearing when she went "missing"!

[Canadian Outrage]

Sandy, I heard Detective Ridenour address that "suspect" and rush to judgment issue. Firstly, it is NORMAL for the spouse in any homicide to be investigated first, secondly, the Detective said they interviewed literally hundreds of registered sex offenders in that area AND surrounding areas. They followed up each lead regarding other men even the two that robbed the neighbours house. They DID do their job. They clearly were never able to rule Scott out and I can see why.

[Sandylapper]

Anse, I can't argue or even want to, the hypotheticals you raise. I was merely stating how I might feel a little less than kindly disposed toward MPD on the day my spouse disappeared, if on the same day they began treating me as a suspect. I was for just a couple of fleeting minutes, giving him his due presumption of innocence.

I'll be interested in defense's response to the accusation of the lie about the lights being out at the warehouse. Some businesses (many, I'd say) have timing devices installed so that lights go out at night, and I've never heard whether this could be the case or not. As to why he lied about having an affair with Amber, nobody I've encountered recently; (i.e. Bill Clinton, Gary Condit, et al) has readily admitted to "such personal matters". Hadn't you heard?