By Michelle Durand, Daily Journal Staff
Claims that an elderly “stealth juror” tried sneaking her way onto the Scott Peterson double-murder trial jury in hopes of convicting him have “no factual basis,” District Attorney Jim Fox said yesterday.
On Monday, Fox hinted at his findings to the Daily Journal but only officially said yesterday he would not file criminal perjury charges against Dawn O’Dell, the 66-year-old woman accused of trying to undermine the jury.
“There is insufficient evidence,” he reported.
O’Dell told others on a bus trip to Reno that she planned to be picked and become the foreperson in the sensational trial, according to a man who alerted Peterson’s defense team. O’Dell allegedly felt Peterson is guilty of murdering his pregnant wife and wanted him to receive the death penalty, said the man who was reportedly sitting in front of O’Dell on the bus......
>>On Greta last night they said that the cement anchor, the only one Snott had left, was brought into court today. Fieger said it was a very chilling moment....it was a small, 8"x8" homemade anchor. He said it was painfully obvious that this along with the other missing ones were made to weight a body down. He said it was much too small to anchor a boat of that size in the tides of the bay.
His words sent chills thru me.<<
Good Morning!!
You know I used to dislike Feiger, BIG TIME, but I'm liking him more and more.
"NE EXCLUSIVE LACI MURDER TRIAL COVERAGE
KEY DEFENSE EXPERT REFUSES TO TESTIFY
CYRIL WECHT WILL NOT TESTIFY ON SCOTT'S BEHALF
BY David Wright and Don Gentile
SYNOPSIS
The difference between life and death for Scott Peterson may be the ability of his attorney Mark Geragos to prove his claim that Laci's baby was born alive.
But one of the experts hired by the defense won't support that claim, The, NE has learned exclusively. And top experts have told the NE flat-out that the child died while still in his mother's womb!
snip
Cyril Wecht will not testify in Scott's trial, "Although Wecht told the NE the matter was still up in the air." "The obvious conclusion has to be that he doesn't agree with the defense theory," said a source.
Geragos stunned the court in his opening statement by asserting that Scott could not have murdered his wife and unborn child Christmas Eve 2002 because the child was born alive. "The evidence will show that the baby lived beyond the 24th of December." "If that happened, then Laci was alive, or the baby was born alive and kept alive, one or the other."
Geragos' claim is one of the most crucial elements in his defense strategy. He bases it on a comparison of Conners' estimated age on Christmas Eve 2002, the day Laci vanished, with the baby's estimated age after he washed ashore four months later on April 13, 2003.
DR. Brian Peterson, who conducted the autopsy on Laci and Conner and testified at Scott's preliminary hearing, stated that the infant was between 33 and 38 weeks old, approximately the age of a full-term baby.
"Although he strongly believed the baby was not born alive, he could not rule it out, Dr. Peterson said under questioning from Geragos.
On the day Laci vanished Conner's age was 32 weeks, according to her gynecologist, said Geragos. The attorney intends to point to the difference between the 32 weeks and the 32 to 38 weeks as an indication that Laci and her cild where alive for some time after she disappeared. In that case Scott, who was fishing at the Berkeley Marina that day, could not be the killer, he said.
But Dr. Lawrence Kobilinsky, professor of forensic science at New York's famed John Jay College of Criminal Justice, told the NE: "his argument is horse crap!' "There's no way he can prove the baby was born alive.
"What he's really saying is that when the dead infant was looked at, the impression was that the fetus was older than the fetus would have been had Laci been killed December 24 and dumped in the water."
"That's based on physical characteristics of the fetus, but any knowledgeable medical person knows that's an imprecise science.
"You have variants such as state of nutrition of the mother, her health, the date of conception. The correct age of the fetus, can vary by weeks."
Forensic scientist Dr. Werner Spitz added that a fetus does not grow all that much after 31 weeks. "This baby was not born alive," Spitz told the NE.
While Geragos may be able to bring in experts to replace Dr. Wecht and muddle the issue, he won't be able to explain away a key factor about Conner's body, according to Kobilinsky and Spitz.
The infant's corpse was in a much lesser state of decomposition that his mother's corpse. In, fact, Dr. Peterson's autopsy estimated the baby had been exposed to underwater elements for no more than two days. There were no signs of animal feeding, he said.
The baby's skin appearance was identical to that of a child who dies in the mother's womb, a condition known as "maceration," Dr. Peterson noted.
Laci's body was obviously in the water for months. It was nearly skeletal, missing the head, hands, feet and most major organs, but her uterus was present.
"With time and tidal actions and animal feeding, as the abdominal wall wore away, eventually the upper part of the uterus wore away. At that time, the fetus was released," Dr. Peterson testified at the prelim.
Dr. Spitz explained that the uterus is the last organ to decompose in a woman.
Conner was protected from the elements inside his mother until the very end. "There is no other explanation," said Spitz.
snip
Geragos also told the jury he will prove that tape or twine found knotted around the infant's neck had to be deliberately placed there by someone, another indication the baby was born alive.
But Dr. Spitz, who has examined numerous bodies found in water, said all sorts of debris can become attached to the body in strange ways. He added: "The loop of the tape could have possibly floated onto the child's feet and worked its way up to the neck with tidal action."
OK TO COPY TO OTHER FORUMS!"
Thank you RickAMorti1