Body parts still a puzzle
Officials say bones found in Davis are human -- but whose?
"JAMES HATTORI, NBC NEWS CORRESPONDENT: Good evening Catherine. Let’s start with a development today in Davis, California, which is less than an hour northwest of here where some of Scott Peterson’s defense team was there today looking into the possibility that some human remains that were found there last week may have a connection to this case. Some remains were found in a dumpster in a plastic container in a trailer park in Davis last week.
They are unidentified so far. They include at least one human-at least one female, that is. And perhaps as many as four different individuals are involved in these remains. Now, they have not been identified. Obviously, there is no sign or evidence at this point that it has any link to the Peterson case.
Nonetheless, Scott Peterson’s attorneys are there checking it out. There will be a DNA test to try and establish whether or not there is any connection to the case. And that obviously will take some time for them to complete based on what the assistant coroner out there is saying today.
Now let’s look at some developments that we’re looking at court wise here this week. One thing that could happen, just about any time, is the possibility that a gag order could be issued by Judge Girolami. He had a hearing last week and talked about that. He has expressed concern about this before, too much information, perhaps, compromising Scott Peterson’s ability to get a fair trial. The prosecutor favors some new limited - limitations, rather, on investigators and lawyers.
But the defense, however, is opposed to that because they feel that that would make it hard to correct what information is out there, if it is erroneous. The judge will make a ruling any time, and we’ll look for that sometime maybe this week. Also, another judge in the case, the judge that handled the pre-arrest search warrants for Scott Peterson’s property, is expected to rule on whether or not those search warrants and materials will be made public based on a request by the media.
The-again, the defense is opposed to that coming out right now. They believe that it would hurt their own independent investigation. They are looking into the possibility that someone else killed Laci Peterson and they say they’re making progress and they don’t want that information to interfere with that.
One also-one other thing that may come out this week is wiretapped conversations between Scott Peterson and his attorney that were intercepted by police investigators. The defense is concerned that those were improperly intercepted in violation of the client/attorney privilege. They’ve asked the judge to consider sanctions potentially against the prosecution for this. That will be taken up at a hearing sometime later this month-Catherine.....