Crime Weekly - S3 Ep175: Crime Weekly News: LA Innocence Project Takes Scott Peterson Case!

Episode Date: January 24, 2024

The Los Angeles Innocence Project has recently decided to take up the case of Scott Peterson, who was convicted in 2004 for the murder of his wife, Laci Peterson, and their unborn son, Conner. Scott Peterson has maintained that he is innocent for the past two decades, and the LAIP argues that there may be new evidence to explore. The Murder of Laci Peterson: Tainted Love (Part1): https://audioboom.com/posts/7939547-the-murder-of-laci-peterson-tainted-love-part-1 Try our coffee!! - www.CriminalCoffeeCo.com Become a Patreon member -- > https://www.patreon.com/CrimeWeekly Shop for your Crime Weekly gear here --> https://crimeweeklypodcast.com/shop Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrimeWeeklyPodcast Website: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com Instagram: @CrimeWeeklyPod Twitter: @CrimeWeeklyPod Facebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod ADS: 1. StitchFix.com/CrimeWeekly - Get 25% off when you keep everything in your Fix!

Hey everyone, welcome back to Crime Weekly News. I'm Derek Levasseur. And I'm Stephanie Harlow. And we're going to waste no time. We're going to get right into it. This is a big headline story this week. Everyone's talking about it, so we obviously have to cover it as well, especially considering that we covered this in long form on Crime Weekly. What was it, last year? Oh, I feel like- Maybe two years ago? Yeah. We talked about Scott and Lacey Peterson, it feels like over a year ago, but we're around that time. I think it was late 2022 or early 2023. Yeah, it was one of our big long-form series that we did, had a lot of engagement on it. A lot of people had strong opinions on it. So we definitely have to cover this. So for anybody who doesn't

know this story already, an eight-month pregnant Lacey Peterson went missing on Christmas Eve in 2002 for months. Everyone looked at her husband, Scott, with suspicion until their worst fears were confirmed in April of 2003 when Lacey's remains were discovered in San Francisco Bay. The body of her unborn child, Connor, was also recovered. Scott Peterson was arrested and found guilty of murdering his wife, but has always maintained his innocence,

filing several appeals over the last two decades. Now the Los Angeles Innocence Project has taken up the case, saying new evidence supports Peterson's claim of innocence. Stephanie Harlow, what do you think about all this? So remember when we covered Scott Peterson? Oh yeah. So even while we were going through that, I mean, I did a three- part series on my channel, which basically the whole point of it was like, could Scott Peterson possibly be innocent?

And I kind of really went deep into mean, I guess there is reasonable doubt. But in my heart, like in my gut, I still feel like he did it because he did have a motive. And there was plenty of evidence. He had the affair with Amber Fry. He was talking about not wanting to, you know, become a father. They were young. Like looking at it now, I think at least he was 27. They were in their like late 20s.

And so it's hard seeing that because Scott Peterson's in his 50s now. But you kind of have to wrap your head around that they were so young. And he wanted to be free. He wanted to have an affair. He wanted to not be a father. He didn't want to be tied down. He went fishing on Christmas Eve. But then Lacey's sister said she had been told by him that he was

going golfing. So just things didn't add up. The concrete anchors, Lacey's hair in the boat, all of these things that, you know, the defense, Scott's defense is going to refer to as circumstantial. And it was, you know, quite circumstantial. But just like Casey Anthony, a lot of that circumstantial evidence piles up to make something very compelling. And the jury thought so, which is why they found him guilty in his original trial, which I think was in 2004. But still, you know, I understand. And Scott's been going so hard, man, for this I'm innocent thing. You know, there's a website.

There's a Facebook page. His family contributes to it. He still contributes to it from prison. They're constantly filing appeals and none of them are going through. He did get his death sentence reversed. And so now he is sentenced to life in prison without parole. But he wants to get out. He says he's innocent. Do I believe him? No, I don't. But the Los Angeles Innocent Project appears to think that he could be. So according to the Guardian in court filings this week the Los Angeles Innocent Project said it was seeking evidence from the 2004 trial that it was unable to find among trials from Peterson's former

attorneys. Now the Los Angeles Innocence Project to be clear is a completely separate entity from the Innocence Project which I think a lot of people were not clear on, which is why the actual Innocence Project had to, you said they put out a tweet? Yeah, they put out a tweet and actually said, listen, any questions regarding the Scott Peterson case, please go over to, and they had tagged the handle of the Los Angeles Innocence Project to show them, hey, there's a clear difference here. But it sounds like they do around the same thing. So it says, the Los Angeles Innocence Project's mission is to exonerate the wrongly convicted, free the wrongfully incarcerated, uncover and remedy past misuse of forensic and other

scientific evidence in the courtroom, improve standards for the use of forensic and other scientific evidence in the courtroom, and improve the dialogue between scientists and stakeholders in the criminal legal system and reform the criminal legal system to prevent future injustice. Wow. They've got a they got a long mission. They got a lot of work to do. Yeah. Through its work, the Los Angeles Innocent Project educates the public scientists and stakeholders in the criminal legal system about the contributing causes of wrongful convictions and incarcerations. So here we have them there. They're picking up Scott Peterson's case. And Paula Mitchell, the director of the LAIP, said, quote, In the course of the LAIP's review and after some preliminary investigation, it became apparent to me that numerous items referred to throughout the police reports in Mr. Peterson's case were not included in the discovery that was provided

to the defense at the time of the trial, end quote. So it seems that some items not found in the trial files were information about a watch that Lacey wore, which was pawned on December 31st. And remember, she went missing on Christmas Eve, December 24th, and then all of a sudden her watch is being pawned. And they said, you know, this was a watch she was always wearing. Now, they were never able to prove that Lacey was wearing that watch on Christmas Eve. And I think it's very likely that Scott Peterson could have found somebody or paid somebody or, like, coerced somebody to pawn that watch for him. But that's a course of the investigation they have to take. They also have items from a van that was set on fire the day Lacey disappeared, which was just about a mile from her home that this orange van

was caught on fire. Reportedly, there was a mattress in this van with apparent bloodstains on it. The LAIP is also asking for documents relating to witness interviews, and these are going to be witnesses who saw Lacey outside and walking her dog after Scott had left to go fishing on Christmas Eve. We talked about these witnesses at length during our series. If you haven't seen our series yet, by the way, we'll link it in the description box here. But we talked about this at length and we talked about how not super reliable eyewitness testimony is, especially people like Lacey's neighbors who see her walking her dog on a daily basis. You know, when she was pregnant, Lacey wanted to

keep herself in shape. And so she went out and walked their dog every morning. So if a neighbor sees Lacey walking her dog every morning, they might say, yeah, I think I might have saw her that morning, but they might be confusing it for a different morning. But either way, those are the kinds of things they're looking for. The filing also requests evidence and documents from the investigation that they be turned over to Scott Peterson's attorneys. Now, what this newly discovered evidence is, it's not completely clear exactly what they're looking for, but many speculate it has something to do with two men, Stephen Todd and Donald Glenn Pierce, who were robbing a house across the street from Lacey and Scott's home around the time that Lacey went missing.

And remember, we talked about this as well. They were robbing the house across the street. The people, the neighbors of Lacey and Scott were out of town for the holidays. And I know based on what the LAIP is looking for, that this is probably the route they're taking. The New York Post reports that Scott's attorneys are requesting items from that burglary investigation, but there was a juror from one from Scott Peterson's original trial in 2004, Mike Bellamissieri. He told News Nation that law enforcement working the case in 2002 had found no connection between the robbery and Lacey's murder. They questioned those two guys. Those two guys were like, no, we have no involvement. But Scott Peterson's attorneys and the Los Angeles Innocence Project

are basically asking to be provided with the alibis of these two men. And I don't think there's anything wrong with that. The Los Angeles Innocence Project has also filed a motion requesting DNA testing of evidence from the investigation. So they got a lot of stuff going on. They want a lot of stuff. This is going to take a while to get through all of these things. But if you remember correctly, during the original trial, Scott's lawyer, Mark Garagos, he put forth an alternate theory about what had happened to Lacey had been abducted by these burglars or maybe even like a homeless person who spent a lot of time in that park near the Peterson home where Lacey would walk her dog sometimes. Garigow said in his closing statement, like, listen, yeah, Scott's a piece of shit. He's a creep. He's a cheater. But he's not a murderer. And the evidence the

prosecution has is purely circumstantial. The LAIP motions also include a statement from Scott Peterson himself that he wrote from prison in November of 2023, and it says, quote, I believe this additional information will assist in determining what happened to my family and prove that I am innocent and had nothing to do with these horrible crimes that were committed against my wife and son. In 2004, I was wrongfully convicted of murdering my wife, Lacey, and our unborn son, Connor. I have discovered that critical exculpatory evidence was ignored, overlooked, or never investigated at all and in other instances was suppressed at the time of my trial. During the search to find Lacey, the police continually ignored evidence, including eyewitnesses reports that Lacey was alive and

walking our dog the day she disappeared. Peterson has said that he contacted the Innocent Project himself last summer to ask for their help. So once again, these headlines are a little misleading because it makes it sound like the Los Angeles Innocence Project was just like, man, we've really been looking at the Scott Peterson thing and we think he was wrong. So we're taking it on. No, Scott reached out, kept sending them information, you know, probably kept linking to his website, which just proclaims his innocence left and right. And finally, they were like, OK, let's look into this a little bit. We see some glaring inaccuracies. We see some things that could possibly be considered reasonable doubt for a jury. And we would like to focus on this. Now, I don't know if it's going to do anything. Once

again, still, I will say maybe there is some reasonable doubt here. However, I just don't see what these robbers, like what motive they would have to murder a pregnant woman because she maybe saw them robbing a house. Like maybe she saw them robbing a house. I don't know. And then they're like, hey, let's make our situation worse. Let's snatch her. Put her in this orange van. Drive her to the bay. Kill her and toss her in the bay van, drive her to the bay, kill her, and toss her in the

bay, set the van on fire. And they're talking about, oh, there's bloodstains on the mattress in the van. Lacey wasn't stabbed or caught up or anything as far as I know. It looks like she did come. Her body did wash up dismembered, but they believe that's because she had been weighed down by those anchors. And so as she was underwater for so long, obviously like the muscle tissues and things like that began to loosen up and degrade. And then, yeah, her body just floated up and away from those anchors. So I don't know what blood on a mattress would have to do. It didn't look like she'd been

brutalized in any way. I don't think that the coroner found any evidence that she had been stabbed or caught or anything like that. It feels like a lot of reaching. I wish he would go away because I'm sure there's a lot, a lot of other cases, especially in L.A., that the Los Angeles Innocence Project could take on that are really in need. And then there is, you know, people who have been wrongly convicted or who are sitting in prison, even though they're innocent. There's probably a ton of them in L.A. because the LAPD notoriously sucks. OK, so but why are we focusing on Scott Peterson, who's had his share of appeals, who seems to have never ending money to continue fighting this? I'm not sure. But I do believe also that Scott's like Chris Watts in that way where it'll just never be his fault. So what do you think? Are you case. I think he is. I think he's guilty. I think

he killed Lacey. And we're not doing it here where we're going over the seven or eight part series. Like you said, we'll link it. There's a lot. There's that. It's like 17, 18 hours worth of footage you can go watch or listen to. We really went deep with that one. But I just think surface level stuff. I agree in the sense of all alternate theories should have been investigated if they weren't, especially if it could be exculpatory in nature. We talked about the burglary theory. We talked about all of that. Again, you can go check it out. I just think for me, the real nail in the coffin, again, not disagreeing that it's

circumstantial by itself, but in totality, based on everything we know about the case, based on the behavior that morning, based on when the inactivity of Lacey's phone and based on the fact that Scott Peterson made four or five different concrete anchors that were never recovered. And he went out swimming, fishing the morning after or the morning of lacy's yeah last known contact and just coincidentally she washes a you know on shore after being in a body of water for an extended period of time months yeah so it's just very coincidental so if a if a bunch of robbers did this um damn they really got lucky by killing her and then disposing of her body in the water and having it not come to shore until months later. And have her husband happened to be having an affair. Right, right. And so there's just, there was, for me, that's just where I fell on it.

And just to piggyback on, on what you said. Well, first off, the fact that Scott Peterson has always claimed his innocence and he's been really gun-ho about this means nothing to me. Because if you're guilty and you have nothing but time, you're in prison for life. Yeah, I mean, it's a lot of free time to do what you need to do in there while you're behind closed doors. And you have honestly nothing to lose. And you not only that, but they don't have an open and shut case against him. Right. So he understands there's this gray area that that people who have good hearts and empathy and who want to believe the best in people and also who know that there's so many wrongly incarcerated people are going to look at that and be like, oh, it's possible. Like he knows that he's taking advantage of it. If this was an open and shut case, we wouldn't even be talking about this.

It's not. It was a video. It'd be over a video or some sort of like, yeah, some surveillance of him like pulling Lacey's body in a tarp out of the boat or into the boat or something like that. And there were people there were people, by the way, who saw him like struggling to get something into his boat that morning. He went fishing. If everybody remembers, he pulled his truck up. They were like so surprised at how close he pulled his truck up to the boat. And people didn't normally see that. So They were like so surprised at how close he pulled his truck up to the bow and people didn't normally see that. So they were like, that's weird.

And they kind of paid attention because it just wasn't a normal thing to do. Yeah, he did the anchors. Like we've got the anchors he made, the outlines for them. What'd you do that for, dude? Oh, he kept messing up, kept messing up, had to keep making anchors.

Come on, man. Who knows how to mix concrete? It was so hard. It's so hard. It's not like the directions are on the bag or anything. If you have any questions, you definitely got to go over and watch the series or listen to it if you're listening on audio. But yeah, for all those reasons, I definitely think he's guilty. And as far as the defense attorneys concerned, Garagos, or how do you say his, Garagos?

Mark Garagos, Garagos. Yeah. I mean, I know he's a big prominent attorney, but that's what they do. That's what they're supposed to do. And there's nothing wrong with that, by the way. I don't even think that's his attorney. I don't even think he's representing him anymore, but he did a good job in his trial. I'll say that. But that's what they're supposed to do. Yeah. They're supposed to pose. They don't have to investigate those alternate theories. That's the job of law enforcement. All their job to do is go to a jury and say, well, what about this scenario? What about that scenario? It's the same thing your boy Jose Baez did with Casey Anthony. Stop calling him my boy.

You know I hate that. That's what they do. They try to raise questions in the minds of the jury members. It doesn't have to have any substance. I mean, it works for Casey Anthony, right? It did, and it works for a lot of other people. All they have to do is throw out other scenarios that are possible and see if, they don't even need all of them to stick,

they just need one. But I think it also comes down to how like, how like empathetic you can be with the person on trial. And Scott was just never like a relatable person. Like he just always had this like cocky, like superior, you know, holier than thou era. Like he kind of sat there kind of grinning like he always just looks like he's got some like smug duper's delight kind of expression going on in

his face he was not like a person that the jury could look at and say oh we kind of feel bad for him like they really just didn't like him yeah could that have gone against his favor yeah but he's an unlikable guy like we heard people that's why we went so deep in our series. People who knew him when he was a kid and said like, this guy was like eerily calm and kind of really like kept himself like in a very psychopathic way in the whole relationship with his mother and his father and how they treated him. You have to look at the totality of things and the context. This dude's guilty in my opinion, But let's take a poll. Can we take a poll and have people tell us in the comments what they think? Yeah, tell us in the comments. I mean, there's been a lot of people, experts who've looked into this, people who are experts in

how the water movements would be, the currents, all these things. So much. Many of them. Most of them have come to the conclusion that where she was found in relation to where Scott Peterson was that day, it all lines up. It all lines up. So, you know, don't take our word for it. My takeaway is kind of what you hit on a little bit there. I have no issue with the Innocence Project taking this case up if that's what they want to do. Yeah, if that's what they want to spend their resources on. Well, that's the thing. I just hope that they truly believe there's something there

and they're not doing this as a marketing tool to get more money. To get more money. Yeah, yeah. That's what I'm saying. Because they're a nonprofit. So all the money they're spending on Scott's case is coming from people who donate money to them.

That's right. And I'm sure that there's a lot of people in that community who are donating money to them who did not think, oh, this is going to go to Scott Peterson. They probably thought there's somebody who's less because Scott Peterson is a big name. It's going to draw attention to the L.A.I.P. Me and Derek didn't even know who the hell they were before this. Now we do. Right. So it's going to draw attention. Even the Innocence

Project had to, you know, put out a statement. So instead of people who actually need their help and need their resources, Scott's family's got money. This don't make no sense to me. If they want to keep fighting and appealing, then let that come out of their own pocket. Taxpayers and people who are making donations in good faith, hoping that they go to somebody who does not have the resources or the power to fight their wrongful conviction. This should not be being used for Scott Peterson. That's just my humble opinion. And I hope the LAIP knows what they're doing because this could go very poorly for them.

I'm just going to say that because there's lots of people out there who need that money and it ain't Scott Peterson. That's all I'll say. Is that all you'll say? That is all I'll say. I'm just like annoyed by it.

I'm annoyed. Like there's so many people in LA sitting in prison right now. It's not all she was going to say, guys. I'm just, I'm blown away by it. And that's who should be talking now. The families of those people who can't get a lawyer, who can't get a public defender, who can't get money for an appeal, they should be writing to the Los Angeles Innocence Project and they should be making their voices heard and saying, my son, my brother, my daughter, my wife needs this. Not some freaking guy who's had 8 million chances

to prove his innocence and 8 million appeals and still wasn't able to do it. I mean, those appeals that went to the Supreme Court, okay? Getting turned down, getting turned down. The same shit that they're saying now, they've already said in these appeals. So this is just a reach. It's a waste of money. It's a waste of resources that could be going to people who really need it. And now that is all I'll say. Is that all you'll say? Yes. Okay. So you'll say? Yes. Okay. So we'll see how it goes.

We'll see how it goes. And to your point, oh, they're using their money and resources for Scott Peterson. Well, we don't know what their money and resources are. And maybe this is an attempt to gain more of that, right? We don't know. When I saw their Twitter account, they had under a,000 followers.

They're non-profit, though. So isn't that public where their resources are coming from? I think it's got to be public somewhere. Yeah, their money and all that stuff. Yeah, it has to be accounted for. I don't know how robust their bank account is. And maybe this is an opportunity where they're saying, hey, we definitely see something here. And we all do.

We all agree. There's definitely questions that we have there. But at the same time, could it be better utilized their resources somewhere else? I think they probably maybe agree, but there is an angle here where potentially they could be doing this because of the media attention that it's going to garner. And that may lead to more donations coming in for other cases. So it could be a business strategy where they're saying, hey, listen, this one's a coin flip. It may not go anywhere, but the amount of media attention we're going to get about our organization is worth us at least looking into it because then we will be able to help out in those other cases

where the people haven't had the amount of money or resources poured into their case that they needed, which could potentially exonerate them. So listen, it could be for a good reason. They could all be part of a bigger plan. So we're going to follow it. We're going to keep you guys in the loop on it. If something develops, we will absolutely cover, especially if Scott Peterson is somehow exonerated from all of this. Could you imagine imagine we'll have to do a part 10 on it. At this point, I feel like he's just hoping like he just appeals enough where people are just sick of him.

And they're like, fine, let him out. We don't want to hear from this idiot anymore. My final word for sure on this one is not everyone who's found guilty of a crime is actually guilty, But the same can be said for those who are found innocent. For a perfect example, in my opinion, OJ Simpson, he's never been found guilty of the crime against Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman.

I think he killed both of them, hands down. Everybody knows he did. So my point being, regardless of what happens in this case with Scott Peterson, if they raise enough reasonable doubt where he gets out, does it change my thought that my idea that he killed this woman? No, it does not. No, no, no, no. But that's the way the judicial system works, right? It's not necessarily about what you think or what you think you know.

It's about the facts and circumstances surrounding the case. And does a jury of his or her peers feel there's enough evidence there to support a guilty conviction? And those two don't know the truth and the facts of the case don't always line up. So just keep that in mind. It works both ways. And I mean, there's even there's even people who've been convicted of crimes like murder who get like 10 years and then get out and people still look at them sideways you know they're like you killed somebody like how did you get such a sweet sentence so it's just like even if he gets out that suspicion's going to follow him no one's gonna want to have anything to do with scott peterson unless he gets like his own talk show or something which these days anything could happen him and gypsy him and

gypsy rose can go on tour together. What's another great case? You know, Adnan Syed, right? I mean, people, he was found guilty. I can't even believe you said he who shall not be named. He was found guilty. Now he's out. Now they're saying there's issues with it. But then they took back his, didn't they take back his like-

They did. Technically, he's now guilty of murder again, although he's a free man. So it just kind of drives home the point I'm making. I think they're just hoping you don't notice that he's still free, you know? He's still guilty, but he's free. He's guilty, but he's got to wear an ankle monitor. He's guilty, but he's a professor or he's speaking at school. He's on the circuit. He's on the speaking circuit.

So it's one of those, and that's again, driving home the point, there's the judicial system and the court of public opinion, and then your opinion, what you believe, everyone's entitled to it, right? So we'll see how it all goes. We're going to keep following it up. And if there's a big development, we will let you know. As always, we appreciate you guys being here. Make sure if you haven't already, you like this video,

you subscribe to the channel because we're putting out new Crime Weekly News updates every single week. And we also have this little thing called Crime Weekly where we put out a new audio episode on Fridays and a new YouTube video on Sundays. So please subscribe to the channel, comment down below, let us know what you think about Scott Peterson

and this whole situation. We will see you this Friday on audio and this Sunday on YouTube for Dan Markell part five, The Bump. If you don't know what that means, you will. It's a great episode. Make sure you tune in. And we'll see you guys very soon. Also, can I say one more thing?

Can I say one more thing? I'm interested. I'm actually interested in doing an actual poll. So we're going to put up a poll on Instagram after this Crime Weekly News has gone out both audio and video. We'll put up a poll on Instagram. Okay. So we're going to put up a Scott Peterson poll on Wednesday. I'm writing this down as we do this so I can make sure we do it right. Because I said like, we're going to do it, but. No, I'm going to do it. Stephanie has this keen ability to like say, hey, we're going to do these things with no pre like planning for it. So then as she's saying it, I'm trying to type it all, write it all out.

I mean, that's actually because that's our dynamic. Like I'm the ideas person and then he's the execution. I'm the idea. I'm the brain and he's the brawn. I have the idea. I'm like, this will be cool. Let's do this. And he's like, let me execute that for you.

Everyone stay safe out there. We're going to go because Stephanie's going to keep talking. I'm like, this would be cool. Let's do this. And he's like, let me execute that for you. Everyone stay safe out there. We're going to go because Stephanie's going to keep talking. I'm cutting her off. Call me rude. We're out of here. Crime Weekly News is done. No more promises. We'll see you guys on Friday on audio and on Sunday on YouTube.

Everyone stay safe out there. Have a good night. How rude. Bye. Thank you.