Posted on 05/24/2003 8:06:32 AM PDT by runningbear
A Laci Peterson look-alike 'debunks' mistaken identity
Homer and Helen Maldonado say they saw Laci Peterson Dec. 24.
Laci Peterson look-alike 'debunks' mistaken identity
By JOHN COTÉ and GARTH STAPLEY
BEE STAFF WRITERS
Published: May 24, 2003, 06:24:24 AM PDT
Two people who insist they saw the pregnant Laci Peterson walking her dog after 9:30 a.m. Christmas Eve now have even stronger reason to believe they are right. A woman from the same neighborhood resembles Peterson, was pregnant last year and could have been mistaken for her.
But that woman had her baby in October and said she did not walk her dog that day. Scott Peterson, his wife's accused killer, said he last saw Laci at 9:30 a.m. Dec. 24 when he set out from their Modesto home on a fishing trip.
Prosecutors allege that Peterson killed his wife "on or about and between" Dec. 23 and 24, and have discounted reports from people who say they saw Laci Peterson after her husband contends he went fishing.
Mark Geragos, Peterson's lead attorney, said the woman who resembles Laci Peterson, but was no longer pregnant in December, "debunks their whole theory."
The woman, who has since moved from the La Loma neighborhood, has a golden retriever named McKenzie -- the same breed and name as the Petersons' dog.
She said she is sure about not walking her dog on Christmas Eve, because her husband's two sons were at their home to go shopping that day.
"I'm 99.9 percent sure I was not walking that day," said the woman, who asked not to be identified. She is a prosecutor in another county.
Scott Peterson has pleaded not guilty to two counts of murder in the deaths of his wife and their unborn son, Conner. Soon after taking Peterson's case, Geragos announced that he was launching an investigation to "find out who did this to Scott's wife and Scott's son."
The defense was searching for one woman in particular, but Geragos declined to say Friday if she had been found.
The woman who resembles Peterson said she has spoken to police and Modesto attorney Kirk McAllister, a member of the defense team.
Geragos said the woman's account supports the defense contention that police arrested the wrong person.
"It certainly would confirm my belief that Laci was abducted on the 24th and certainly debunks any leaks out there that this was someone else who was walking that morning."
Homer Maldonado, a 59-year-old commercial painter, said he saw Peterson between 9:45 and 10 a.m. Dec. 24, moments after he left the USA Gasoline station on Miller Avenue, about a half-mile south of the Peterson home at 523 Covena Ave.
"I slowed down and was taking a good look. What caught my eye was she was so pregnant," Maldonado said. "There's no question it was her."
Maldonado said he told police on Jan. 1 about the sighting as search teams fanned out from East La Loma Park. But an officer told him that search dogs indicated that Peterson went in another direction, Maldonado said. He said police never called him to follow up.
A bloodhound indicated that she left her home in a vehicle, not on foot, the dog's handler said Dec. 30.
Maldonado and his wife, Helen, said they left their Phoenix Avenue home at about 9:30 a.m. Dec. 24, dropped off a Christmas gift and then went for gas.
They said they saw a yellowish-tan van with dull paint at an adjacent pump. The van reeked of cigarette smoke, the Maldonados said.
"They weren't getting gas. They were just there," Homer Maldonado said.
According to Maldonado, a man came out of the gas station's store and a male voice from the van asked if the man had "got the cigs."
Maldonado said he saw Peterson about a block away from the gas station, walking in front of 211 Covena Ave.
Vivian Mitchell, who lives on Buena Vista Avenue roughly 10 blocks from the Peterson home and about three-quarters of a mile from the Maldonado sighting, has told police that she saw Peterson walk by between 10 and 10:30 a.m. Dec. 24.
"How can you duplicate a woman that looked like her?" Mitchell, 79, said. "She was so magnetic. She was so pretty."
She called police, and got no call back for several weeks.
Mitchell and her husband, Bill, said they were sure it was Dec. 24, partially because the sun had come out after several days of damp and foggy weather.
But data at the Western Regional Climate Center show fairly clear weather in Modesto on Dec. 22 and 23, with mist setting in about 6 p.m. Dec. 23 and lasting at least through Christmas.
Chief Deputy District Attorney John Goold said he could not explain, without discussing other evidence, why authorities discounted the witnesses' statements.
"Police were very seriously looking at whatever seemed credible," he said. "Modesto's a big town. I imagine there was more than one pregnant woman in it."
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Wiretap documents filed
By GARTH STAPLEY and JOHN COTÉ
BEE STAFF WRITERS
Published: May 24, 2003, 06:26:13 AM PDT
Scott Peterson talked with his girlfriend four weeks after his pregnant wife was reported missing, according to court documents filed late Friday.
The wiretap documents reveal that he called Amber Frey and discussed his hiring of a private investigator. The call came late at night on Jan. 20, almost a month after Frey had gone to police to tell them about her affair with Peterson, and four days before she went public.
The documents from prosecutors also reveal that authorities intercepted 69 calls between Peterson and his Modesto attorney, and two calls between Peterson and his private investigator. The prosecutors said they inadvertently monitored some of those conversations.
Because monitoring attorney-client and investigator-client discussions is illegal, prosecutors wrote that they immediately stopped listening in most cases and did not learn anything "substantive."
The attorney, Kirk McAllister, called the eavesdropping "worse than underhanded" and vowed to "pursue this fully and vigorously." He said Peterson's defense team will review the documents this weekend and consider asking the Superior Court to throw out double-murder charges against Peterson.
The 30-year-old is charged with murder in the deaths of his wife, Laci, and their unborn son, Conner. She was eight months pregnant when family members reported her missing from her Modesto home Christmas Eve.
The wiretap documents state that a judge referred to Peterson as a suspect, though police insisted that he was not a suspect -- nor had he been ruled out -- before his arrest April 18.
Stanislaus County Superior Court has sealed the original wiretap recordings, and a district attorney's investigator has copies.
But prosecutors in District Attorney James Brazelton's office say they have not listened to them, preferring to have the court sanction their release to the prosecution and defense. Otherwise, the recordings should be kept secret, prosecutors argue.
Judge Al Girolami is scheduled to take up the matter Tuesday morning.
On Jan. 20, while tapping Peterson's cell phone, investigators heard him tell Frey about his private investigator, and say that a tabloid newspaper also had tried to hire the investigator, according to the documents.
Authorities apparently disclosed the conversation to explain why they erroneously intercepted Peterson's discussions with the private investigator. They simply had not known before that he was working for Peterson's defense team, investigators wrote.
They also wrote that Peterson's mother, Jackie Peterson, offered to pay the private investigator and her son accepted. Authorities listened to that conversation as well.
Wiretapping laws allow investigators to briefly spot-check conversations between clients and their lawyers from time to time. But Superior Court Judge Wray Ladine "was not comfortable with the idea of any spot checks," federal task force agent Steven P. Jacobson wrote in an affidavit filed Friday.
"Judge Ladine said he felt monitoring or spot-checking any conversations between Scott Peterson and Kirk McAllister would be inappropriate and could cause problems," Jacobson wrote.
The newly filed documents state that investigators intercepted calls between Peterson and McAllister from Jan. 10 until Peterson's arrest, and monitored segments of only two of the 69 intercepted calls.
Agent Steve Hoek of the Stanislaus Drug Enforcement Agency once listened for 41 seconds before recognizing McAllister's voice, according to the documents.
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Laci's remains raise mutilation questions
Laci's remains raise mutilation questions
By GARTH STAPLEY and JOHN COTÉ
BEE STAFF WRITERS
Published: May 24, 2003, 06:26:13 AM PDT
EDITOR'S NOTE: This story contains graphic details that may be disturbing to some readers.
Laci Peterson's body was recovered without a head and feet, two separate sources close to the double-murder investigation said Friday.
One source added that significant parts of the torso were missing as well.
"There were no organs, no skin, nothing from the belly button up to the chest area," said a source familiar with the autopsy report, which a judge has sealed from public review.
Two forensic experts, however -- without having seen the autopsy -- offered differing opinions on whether the body might have been mutilated before being dumped in San Francisco Bay.
The body of Peterson, 27, and her unborn son were found along the bay's eastern shore in mid-April, about four months after the then-pregnant woman had gone missing from her Modesto home.
Divers, who had been searching the bay for evidence the last eight days, quit early Friday afternoon and were not expected to resume before Tuesday.
Authorities have said they will seek the death penalty against Scott Peterson, 30. He has been charged with two counts of murder in the deaths of his wife and their unborn son, Conner.
"The absence of parts of (Laci Peterson's) body says to me it was dismembered before being placed in the water," said Dr. Michael Baden. He is a New York forensic pathologist who worked on O.J. Simpson's defense team and helped Chandra Levy's family after the Modesto woman's remains were found in Washington, D.C.
Killers sometimes dismember bodies to make it easier to dispose of them, Baden said.
But Dr. Gregory Schmunk, Santa Clara County coroner, said news of the headless torso "doesn't surprise me at all." He said it is perfectly natural for tidal activity, boat propellers and feeding animals to break apart bodies.
"This is the normal type of thing we see," Schmunk said.
Baden disagreed, saying extremities are known to separate in water -- but not in four months.
In the past two weeks, he has presided over six autopsies of people who drowned or were killed in the winter, and whose bodies floated up as spring temperatures produce more decomposition gases. "None of them was dismembered," he said.
"Usually (a body) stays together pretty good," Baden continued, adding that marine animals normally do not chew through tough ligaments holding bones together. "After a while (separation occurs), yes, but not after four months -- not even after four years."
Schmunk said speculation of mutilation is not warranted until borne out by the autopsy report.
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Keeping track of McAllister's other pending case, not of Peterson
Arraignment postponed in dairy deaths
SNIP IT
The judge commented: "It doesn't seem you're moving along with any great speed."
Nunes' attorney, Michael Fagalde of Merced, said the appeal "blindsided" him. "We found out about it late (Thursday) afternoon," he said.
Faria's attorney, Kirk McCallister of Modesto, agreed to the delay because "there may be issues involved in this beyond what Mr. Falgalde and I have researched."
The grand jury's 500-page report alleged that Alatorre and Araiza had not been properly trained to deal with methane gas, did not have proper equipment and that the air in the pipe had not been tested.
The California Occupational Safety and Health administration has fined the dairy $126,650, in a decision the dairy is appealing.
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A case of murder got conviction in Mexico, scaughty, Mexico would of convicted ya? ;o)
http://www.modbee.com/local/story/6830914p-7768407c.html">Suspect in '98 killing is convicted in Mexico
excerpted:
Suspect in '98 killing is convicted in Mexico
By DARYL FARNSWORTH
BEE STAFF WRITER
Published: May 24, 2003, 06:26:21 AM PDT
A suspect in a 1998 Stanislaus County murder has been convicted of the crime in Mexico, the Sheriff's Department reported Friday.
Oscar Sanchez Mata, 28, was convicted May 18 of first-degree murder and received a 20-year prison sentence, Detective Mark Copeland said. Mata is imprisoned in Jalisco.
The Mexican government put Mata on trial under a law that allows prosecution of Mexicans accused of crimes against fellow citizens in other countries.
The killing occurred July 28, 1998, at a dairy on Crow Road between Oakdale and Waterford. Twenty-six-year-old Armando Munoz died from a gunshot wound to the head.
Munoz had been attending a barbecue at the dairy when he and his brother Cesear got into a fight with Mata and his brothers Ernesto and Celestino, investigators said.
The Matas left, only to return 90 minutes later and start fighting again with Cesear Munoz.
When Armando Munoz tried to break up the fight, Oscar Mata shot him once in the head with a handgun, detectives said.
The Mata brothers fled. Mexican authorities caught Oscar and Ernesto in Celaya, Guanajuato, and prosecuted both.
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(Excerpt) Read more at modbee.com ...
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