Attorney: There's A Reason Why Scott Hasn't Been Seen

Attorney: There's A Reason Why Scott Hasn't Been Seen
Laci's Family, Friends Continue To Wait For DNA Results

MODESTO, Calif. -- Family and friends of Laci Peterson continue to wait for results of a DNA test on two bodies found earlier this week in Richmond.

And they also face another concern: the whereabouts of Scott Peterson. NBC11's Karen Brown spoke with Peterson's attorney, Kirk McCallister, on Thursday.

McCallister said there is a very good reason that his client has not been seen in town since this past weekend, Brown said.

Scott Peterson, who said he went fishing the day his wife disappeared near the area where the bodies were found, has not been named as a suspect in the case. McCallister says he's not been seen at home because of the microscope he's been he living under.

"The shark-feeding frenzy's made it so that he can't go home. So for that reason, his life is, on many levels, is turned upside down. That's obviously not the least of the problems," McCallister said.

Meanwhile, investigators at the crime lab in Richmond said they are already planning to work through the weekend if they have to and will do whatever it takes to identify the body.

They have not been able to identify a good sample of DNA from the female body, although they have been able to get a sample from the baby.

Laci Peterson's family remains in seclusion. Her father said that the waiting is excruciating, and he is just trying to keep busy, Brown reported.

In the meantime, a shrine to Laci continues to grow in front of her Modesto home.

Nine-year-old Bianca Ontiveros is one of the steady stream of Modesto residents showing up at a makeshift memorial outside the Petersons' home. She is crushed to think that the bodies found in Richmond may be those of Laci and the baby boy.

Some people also showed up to express their anger with Laci's husband, who has not been seen in the area since last weekend.

"Anger that he's not here supporting his family and in-laws, just that he's nowhere to be found," said Rubin Ontiveros, a neighbor.

"There's a lot going on behind the scenes right now. We just don't have anything to make public right now," said Jimmy Lee of the Contra Costa County Sheriff's Department.

McCallister also said that Scott Peterson hopes that the bodies are not that of Laci and the baby, Brown said.

"A phone answering machine at the home of Scott Peterson's sister, Susan Caudillo refers media calls to the Laci Hotline. A woman answering the Laci Hotline takes a message but says the family will not be returning calls. Curiously, it's the same answering service woman that takes calls to Scott Peterson's warehouse headquarters for his agricultural chemical business. And the message is the same.

If the Modesto Police have an idea where Scott Peterson is, and you might think they would, they're keeping it to themselves. At a news conference Tuesday, Detective Doug Ridenour said, "I don't know where Scott Peterson is and if I did, I couldn't tell you."

For quite a while after Laci Peterson disappeared, Scott wasn't hard to find. He'd show up daily at the volunteer search headquarters to help work the phones. Or he could be found working around the Modesto house he and Laci shared.

Even when reporters and camera crews filled his street Scott came and went at will.

But today, although the grass looked freshly cut, neighbors say the house has looked abandoned lately.

Neighbor Cory Emerson described the house as "very quiet, no cars there, don't see any movement. Obviously, the yard is getting done, but don't know by who."

Out at the edge of town, a spokesman at the Del Rio Golf Course country club told KRON 4 News that Scott had sold his membership.

In San Diego, camera crews have been staking out the home of Peterson's parents, but no one has reported seeing Scott. A sister there told a television news reporter that Scott was not in San Diego.

"We don't have another person in mind," said John Tonkyn, a missing persons supervisor at the Attorney General's Richmond DNA Laboratory.
By Paul Sakuma, AP

RICHMOND, Calif. (AP) — The county prosecutor in Modesto says he feels "pretty strongly" that the body of a woman that washed up on shore this week is the missing Laci Peterson.

"If I were a betting man, I'd put money on it," Stanislaus County District Attorney James Brazelton told the Modesto Bee for a story published Thursday. (Related graphic: DNA used to verify identity)

A state crime lab was working to determine whether two bodies found on the shores of the San Francisco Bay were Peterson and the baby she was carrying when she vanished Dec. 24. She was eight months pregnant at the time.

"I feel pretty strongly it is (Peterson)," said Brazelton, whose jurisdiction includes Modesto. "It's too much of a coincidence to have a female and a baby found close to each other a day apart and no others were reported missing."

Asked about Brazelton's comments, Laci Peterson's stepfather, Ron Grantski, said Thursday that he had not been told that personally. "Our family is waiting until we are told personally, not told by the press," he said.

State Department of Justice spokesman Nathan Barankin told the paper that lab technicians had determined that samples from the infant's body, found Sunday, contained enough intact DNA to be used for testing. A determination was expected Thursday on whether enough DNA could be extracted from the woman's body, found Monday.

"We've determined that we can yield a usable DNA profile from the fetus sample," Barankin said. "We're doing a little more work on the adult sample to finally determine whether we will be able to get a usable DNA profile."

Earlier, lab supervisor John Tonkyn had said, "We don't have another person in mind" other than Peterson.

When asked why dental records weren't being used, Tonkyn said the lab wasn't provided with teeth. Published reports have said the woman's body was headless. The full-term baby still had an umbilical cord attached.

The 27-year-old substitute teacher vanished on Christmas Eve from her home in Modesto, 90 miles southeast of Richmond. She was eight months pregnant. Her husband, Scott Peterson, said he saw her as he left to go fishing that morning in Berkeley, not far from where the bodies were found.

Scott Peterson, 30, a fertilizer salesman, hasn't surfaced publicly since the bodies were discovered by people walking dogs. His in-laws stood by him early in the investigation, but a rift developed after he acknowledged having an affair with a Fresno woman.

Scott Peterson has not been named as a suspect in his wife's disappearance, but police have seized his boat, truck and nearly 100 items from his house.

His father, Lee Peterson, said Tuesday at his house north of San Diego that he didn't know where his son was.

The property manager of the building where Scott Peterson rented an office, who identified himself only as Mark, said Peterson moved out earlier this year and is trying to find someone to take over the lease.

If the woman's body is not identified as Peterson's, the lab will begin comparing the samples with likely matches in a database of 100 DNA samples of other missing people or their relatives. The state has more than 25,000 active missing person cases.

MODESTO, Calif. -- Crime analysts say they have enough DNA to see if an unborn child's body that washed up on a San Francisco shoreline this week is related to Laci Peterson.

"We've determined that we can yield a usable DNA profile from the fetus sample," State Department of Justice spokesman Nathan Barankin said.

The analysts expressed hope that they will be able to extract usable nuclear DNA from an adult female body that was found nearby a day later to be able to get a quick identification.

"We're doing a little more work on the adult sample to finally determine whether we will be able to get a usable DNA profile," Barankin said.

On the "Today Show," Thursday, DNA expert and former O.J. Simpson defense attorney Barry Scheck explained why the process is so time-consuming.

"They literally take a drill and a bit to the middle of a bone to try and get to the marrow. Hopefully, they can take those shavings and extract two kinds of DNA," Scheck said.

Also, the county prosecutor in Modesto says he feels "pretty strongly" that the adult body is missing Modesto woman, Laci Peterson.

"If I were a betting man, I'd put money on it," Stanislaus County District Attorney James Brazelton told the Modesto Bee for a story published Thursday.

Earlier, lab supervisor John Tonkyn had said, "We don't have another person in mind" other than Peterson.

http://www.nbc4.tv/news/2118224/detail.html">DNA Lab Tests Remains With Laci Peterson In Mind

DNA Lab Tests Remains With Laci Peterson In Mind
Cause Of Death Could Be Difficult To Determine

RICHMOND, Calif. -- While the parents of Laci Peterson have stayed out of the public eye since the remains of a woman and baby washed ashore in San Francisco Bay, they may play an important role in confirming whether the bodies belong to their missing daughter and her unborn son.

State crime lab technicians are analyzing DNA swabbed from the mouths of Sharon and Dennis Rocha to compare with samples from the severely decomposed corpses found a mile apart this week on the rocky shoreline of this city east of San Francisco.

Experts: 'Coffin Birth' Could Explain How Dead Woman Could Deliver Baby Coffin Birth

At this point, the scope of their identification work is limited to determining if the months-long search for Laci Peterson and the baby boy she was due to deliver in February is over, authorities said Wednesday.

"We don't have another person in mind," said John Tonkyn, a missing persons supervisor at the Attorney General's Richmond DNA Laboratory.

Peterson, 27, was eight months pregnant when she vanished from her Modesto home on Christmas. Her husband, Scott Peterson, said he last saw her that morning as he left to go fishing in Berkeley, 90 miles northeast of Modesto and three miles south of where the bodies surfaced.

Stanislaus County District Attorney James Brazelton told the Modesto Bee he thinks the woman's body is that of Laci Peterson.

"I feel pretty strongly it is," said Brazelton, whose jurisdiction includes Modesto. "It's too much of a coincidence to have a female and a baby found close to each other a day apart and no others were reported missing. If I were a betting man, I'd put money on it."

In addition to testing specimens from Peterson's mother and father, the lab in Richmond will also compare tissue and bone from the two unidentified corpses with DNA extracted from strands of hair taken from Laci Peterson's brush.

Uh back to the DNA. Couldn't find one, huh?

From this page.... Number XI is especially interesting. I seem to have lost number I in my cutting and pasting, but the source window is closed now, so if you want to see it you have to go there and see for yourself. Sorry for the oversize fonts, they are from the site.

II. Cellmark CACLD errors. There were two different proficiency tests administered by the California Association of Crime Lab Directors in 1988 and 1989. Cellmark made one false match in each of these tests. These false positives are discussed in more detail in a paper by W. Thompson and S. Ford [In: Forensic DNA Technology (Proceedings of the American Chemical Society, Science and Law Conference, Los Angeles, CA, 1988), M. Farley and J. Harrington (eds), Lewis Publisher, Chelsea, Michigan].

III. Genelex paternity error. A lab error in the private paternity and forensic laboratory Genelex, led to a false declaration of paternity. In the accompanying complaint the details of this case are laid out. The president of Genelex in another affidavit agreed to points III 5-7, which are the important issues regarding the lab error.

IV. California DOJ proficiency test error. The transcript of testimony by the technician that commited the error is provided here. An interesting twist on this errror is that initially the supervisor did not catch the error and then when the technician was asked to correct the error she made additional errors.

V. Cellmark Kocak case error. This was an actual sexual assault case analyzed by Cellmark. The vaginal swab apparently had DNA from only the victim. However, Cellmark switched labels on the known samples from the victim and suspect and thus declared a match between suspect and the DNA in the sperm fraction of the vaginal swab. Charlotte Word at Cellmark catches the error while testifying in court. Cellmark's spin on this is that (i) the ultimately caught the mistake and (ii) the DNA technology worked OK there was a transcription error only. Does this mean that court testimony is now considered a regular part of Cellmark's review process? What if there had been a plea bargain before the Cellmark employee was asked to testify? In the end a report that erroneously says a person matches some evidence DNA does as much damage whether the error was clerical or had some deep scientific genesis.

VI. SERI proficiency test error. This is simply a classic false match due to human error. How will improved technology that permits us to look at more loci or smaller samples ever counteract the kinds of lapses in concentration exhibited here?

VII. APEX proficiency tests results. The document here provides a summary of results from a proficiency testing agency. The names of the participating laboratories are not revealed but the results were shocking to me. The test is a relatively simple sexual assult: a known sample from the victim, a known sample from the suspect and a mock vaginal swab made up of 0.5 million white blood cells from the victim and 1.4 million sperm from the suspect. As an example of how proficiency tests differ from real case work consider how the evidence sample was handled after preparation (air dried, vacuum sealed with desiccant and stored at -20o C). There was also a hair sample from the victim provided for mitochondrial DNA analysis. In this test it is clear that the major error that can be committed when comparing the sperm fraction of the evidence to the suspect is a false negative NOT a false positive. Nevertheless, 3 out of 135 labs reported that the sperm fraction was only consistent with the victim. Obviously these labs reveal how a switch of the knowns (as in the Kocak case) could then lead to a false positive. Since the hair sample could theoretically match either the victim or the suspect this test provided an opportunity for a false positive (e.g. if the lab declared a match to the suspect). Only 14 laboratories did mitochondrial DNA tests but among this group one lab made a false match. For those of you without a calculator this is an error rate of 7.1%!

VIII. BCA sample switching. In this example evidence sample from different cases were actually switched. While there was not false match as a direct consequence of this error it is again not difficult to imagine that under different circumstances a false match might have resulted.

IX. Philadelphia Police Department False Match. This error occurred in an actual case and was detected by my colleague at U. C. Irvine, William Thompson. This error is similar to the Kocak case where the known samples had apparently been switched. At the time Bill Thompson was asked to review this evidence the defense attorney had convinced his client to take a plea bargain due to this "damaging" DNA evidence. The link is to a powerpoint file with documents detailing this case.

X. BCA case work false match. Sometime in 1999 the Minnesota BCA sent out a report that contained a false match. The report had been reviewed by three people at the BCA. A routine audit of this report discovered the error and two to three weeks later an ammeded report was sent to the Warren Police Department. An interesting side issue that is revealed by this testimony is Ann Gross' answer to Pat Sullivan's question about how often the defense requests the entire DNA file the lab keeps for each case. Ms. Gross estimates that except for Hennepin County (Pat Sullivan's County) it happens less than 5% of the time. Thus, the defense is doing little scrutiny of these types of test results, at least in Minnesota.

XI. Las Vegas Case False Match. This lab error involved both a sample switching error and a database match. A man in jail for an alleged immigration violation was accused by his cellmate of rape. Samples were taken from both men but were apparently mislabeled. The known samples were then compared to evidence samples from unsolved assaults and several hits were made, but to the wrong person.

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