Bad Jurors: 114 And Counting

114 and counting: That's the number of men released from death rows in the United States in the past 12 years, after DNA forensic science proved they could not have committed the crimes the jurors said they did.

I've just been tallying up the responses to my article, "Laci Peterson's Murderer: A Look Back At The Zodiac", in which I presented facts that bring into question the seemingly "given" guilt of husband Scott Peterson.

Now, it isn't that I believe Scott Peterson is innocent or guilty. That is not the issue. The problem is that, based upon the facts known in the public realm today, there is no way I could send Scott Peterson to a lethally injected death, because as a responsible citizen and potential juror, I am required to assume innocence unless proven guilty to the extent that there is simply no question about it.

46% of the respondents to my article disagree with that "stupid" legal principle. (Several used the term, "stupid" to describe my article) Without actually coming out and writing it, they believe it better to let one innocent man hang, than for ten guilty to go free. According to them, the circumstantial evidence against Scott Peterson is so overwhelming that, if they had the opportunity, they would vote guilty and sentence him to death today, and based only on the existing evidence known to the general public.

That's the kind of citizens and jurors we've got to choose from nowadays: They are completely immoral, irrational, angry and vicious and just want to see someone most likely to have done it, killed. Scott Peterson's guilt doesn't need to be proved beyond a reasonable doubt; close is good enough, and the problem with that attitude is what constitutes real evidence of a person's guilt in their tiny little minds. That alone should scare the bejeebers out of 54% of you! You don't ever want to be in the same shoes as those 114 innocent men that these jurors flippantly condemned to death. These jurors are a people devoid of wisdom and of principle and they are extremely dangerous sitting in judgment of others to the extent of being criminally negligent.

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A bill about unborn children entangles Peterson murder case in thick of abortion debate

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Adding fuel to the already fierce debate over abortion, Republicans in Congress are evoking the Laci Peterson murder case as they try to enact the first federal law to endow a fetus with legal rights separate from the expectant mother.

Laws similar to the federal bill already are on the books in more than half the states, and with Republicans in control of both chambers of Congress, the federal measure has a good chance of passing.

President Bush has pledged to sign the act, which sponsors have renamed "Laci and Conner's Law" in honor of Laci Peterson and her unborn son. Laci's husband, Scott Peterson, has been charged with double murder by prosecutors in California, which has a fetal homicide law.

"In the Peterson case, I've heard no one go on radio or TV and say there shouldn't be an indictment for the death of that child," said Sen. Mike DeWine, R-Ohio, the act's chief Senate sponsor. "The fact is there are two victims -- it's a fiction to say there aren't."

Abortion-rights activists counter the gruesome murder case is being exploited callously as part of a broad strategy to undermine the Supreme Court's 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion.

Read literally, the pending Unborn Victims of Violence Act is not an anti-abortion measure. It explicitly exempts abortion while making murder or injury of an unborn child a separate offense during the commission of certain existing federal crimes.

Abortion-rights groups nonetheless are alarmed that Congress might, for the first time, recognize a fetus as a potential victim independent of the expectant mother.

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Medical examiners have finished their examination of Laci Peterson's remains, as well as those of her unborn child, but are not releasing the details of the autopsies.

The results of their investigation will be turned over to prosecutors in the next few days, said Jimmy Lee, spokesman for the Contra Costa County coroner's office. Lee said the agency will adhere to a judge's order not to disclose its findings to anyone other than the Stanislaus County district attorney.

Peterson's body and that of her unborn son were discovered last month along the Richmond shoreline. Peterson, 27, was 7 1/2 months pregnant when she disappeared from Modesto just before Christmas. Her husband, Scott Peterson, 30, was arrested April 18 and charged with two counts of murder.

Police have not said what evidence they believe connects Scott Peterson to the slayings, nor have they disclosed how or where they think Laci Peterson died.

Scott Peterson has pleaded not guilty. He is being held at the Stanislaus County jail without bail.

Specially-trained divers from New York joined Bay Area investigators Friday in another search for clues in the Laci Peterson case.

The team was working in the waters of the San Francisco Bay, just east of Angel Island and south of Brooks Island -- not far from where Peterson's body was found.

Investigators from Modesto, Marin, Contra Costa, and San Mateo joined the divers from New York City's FBI office, who are trained in underwater evidence recovery. Modesto police were heading up the search, but they would not comment Friday.

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WASHINGTON -- Adding fuel to the already fierce debate over abortion, Republicans in Congress are invoking the Laci Peterson murder case as they try to enact the first federal law to endow a fetus with legal rights separate from the expectant mother.

Laws similar to the federal bill already are on the books in more than half the states, and with Republicans in control of both chambers of Congress, the federal measure has a good chance of passing.

"In the Peterson case, I've heard no one go on radio or TV and say there shouldn't be an indictment for the death of that child," said Sen. Mike DeWine (news, bio, voting record), R-Ohio, the act's chief Senate sponsor. "The fact is there are two victims — it's a fiction to say there aren't."

Abortion-rights activists counter the gruesome murder case is being exploited callously as part of a broad strategy to undermine the Supreme Court's 1973 Roe v. Wade decision legalizing abortion.

Abortion-rights groups nonetheless are alarmed that Congress might, for the first time, recognize a fetus as a potential victim independent of the expectant mother.

"This is one of their strategies — to ascribe legal rights to the fetus separate from the woman," said Kate Michelman, president of NARAL Pro-Choice America. "Their intent is to do whatever they can to contribute to the ultimate goal of overturning Roe v. Wade and taking away a woman's right to control her reproductive life."

Law enforcement divers returned waters of San Franciso Bay on Saturday to search for more clues in the Laci Peterson murder case, however it is not clear what, if anything, they have found.

Police will not say specifically what they are looking for but did confirm it is related to the Laci Peterson murder investigation.

Published reports said that not all of Laci Peterson's remains were found, and that they may have been wrapped in plastic and held down by heavy material.

On Friday, divers from Contra Costa and Marin counties and an FBI dive team from Washington worked from five boats in the Bay. Search teams used side-scan sonar to search for evidence, then sent divers to investigate any items of interest

The search area was just south of the Richmond Marina and Point Isabella, where the bodies of Laci Peterson and her unborn son Connor were found in April.

Scott Peterson, 30, is facing two counts of murder in the deaths of his wife and unborn son. Laci Peterson was 27 years old and eight months pregnant when she disappeared on Christmas Eve.

Scott Peterson (news - web sites) is writing letters to Laci's family and friends.

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more on KPIX news

Bay Search Has 'Certain Objectives' in Peterson Case

Divers searched San Francisco Bay Friday.

Tony Russomanno

As investigators wrapped up an underwater search Friday in the Laci Peterson case, Modesto police remained vague about the details.

Divers searched the area in the San Francisco Bay near where Peterson's body was found. But the only thing anyone directly connected with the search would say is that police have "certain objectives."

"The fact that they're suddenly re-dredging the bay again for the third time makes me wonder possibly do they have some information that there's something else there," said criminal defense attorney Maureen Baldwin.

There may be a weapon, or a weight used to hold down Laci Peterson's body.

"Part of the reason for putting a body in the bay is to obscure the cause of death," said San Francisco coroner Boyd Stephens. "So the way to resolve that is to spend the time and effort and pick up any trace evidence that's present."

But it's not like finding and picking up evidence on land. The divers are working in zero visibility. A technique commonly used was seen last year in a search for evidence in a creek by the Santa Clara County Sheriff's Department dive team.

"We use a tether line and we have up to four divers," said Lt. Dale Unger, dive team commander. "We're basically feeling hand to hand, crawling on the ground hand to hand, and if it's a body they were trying to find that by bumping into him."

Human remains found in the water could help determine the time of death. San Francisco coroner Boyd Stephens placed donated cadavers in different parts of the Bay in the 1970s to see how changes in tides and water temperature affected decomposition and how long it took the bay's small marine life to attach itself to bones.

"Those can be pretty good markers," Stephens said.

But the search's "certain objectives" mentioned by police may not be an object at all. It may be an attempt to block a charge of police bias against Scott Peterson. Baldwin says Peterson's attorney may be attempting to show that police did not look for evidence that could clear Peterson.

"Sometimes an attorney may play a card, may make a suggestion and see whether or not the police follow up on it," she said.

EXCERPTED........

Here is an old story back in the news.

Diane Downs case changed lives of many in Oregon
TOOLSEmail this story to a friendPrinter-friendly Version

PORTLAND - Twenty years ago Monday,

Elizabeth Diane Downs drove up to a

hospital in Springfield with her three
dying children in her car, the start

of a case that riveted Oregonians and

changed the lives of a doctor, a

detective, a judge, a writer, a lawyer
and Downs herself.

Emergency room Dr. John Mackey

remembers the horn blaring outside the
ER door of McKenzie-Willamette

Hospital in Springfield and the woman

with a bullet wound in her left

forearm exclaiming, "Somebody just

shot my kids."

The woman was Downs, a 27-year-old

Postal Service worker and divorcee who
had moved to Oregon from Arizona only

a couple of months before. In the car

were her 7-year-old daughter, Cheryl;

her 8-year-old daughter, Christie; and
her 3-year-old son, Danny.

"To see these three kids moribund in a
car that pulls up outside your door .

. . ," Mackey begins. "Initially we

didn't know how many there were. I was
just horrified - there's another one -

it was just too horrifying."

Nothing could be done for Cheryl, shot
twice in the back. Surgeon Steven

Wilhite stopped the internal bleeding

and miraculously saved Christie, shot

twice in the left chest. Danny, shot

near the spinal cord survived, but is

paralyzed from mid-chest down.

It was the first homicide case Lane

County detective Doug Welch had ever

faced. His task that night was to

interview Downs, who told her story in
clipped fashion.

She and the children had visited a

friend in the Marcola area, northeast

of Springfield. On the way back, she

said, a shaggy-haired man appeared out
of the darkness. She stopped and got

out of her car, keys in hand, to see

if he needed help. He demanded her car
and opened fire on her children, then

on her, when she refused.

The detectives pressed for

information; if a desperate killer was
on the loose in the rural countryside,
they needed all the details they could
get.

"It was probably an hour, maybe a

little more, into the interview . . .

when I began to have some serious

doubts about her story," Welch said.

"Her demeanor was really odd. She was

not nearly as interested in talking

about the suspect, than in talking

about her boyfriend in Arizona and

what a great lover he was, and how she
missed him."

Welch and detectives Kurt Wuest and

Richard Tracy took on the

investigation. They established a

motive: Downs wanted her children out

of the way to reunite with the Arizona
boyfriend, who didn't want kids.

At first they had only their

suspicions. They had no murder weapon,
and the only known witnesses were

badly injured children.

Two months after the shootings, Welch

and Wuest met with Downs for what came
to be known as the "hardball

interview," when Downs' story changed.
Now she claimed that the shaggy-haired
man knew her, called her by name.

Downs became increasingly hostile as

the detectives challenged the

inconsistencies.

When the case finally came to trial,

in front of Judge Gregory Foote and

using then-revolutionary forensic

evidence, emotions were high.

Downs faced a count of murder, two

counts of attempted murder and two

counts of first-degree assault.

The case began in May 1984 and lasted

six weeks, with 500 pieces of

evidence.

Christie Downs, by then 9, was the

state's key witness. She had spent

much of the past year meeting with a

psychologist, Carl Peterson. At his

suggestion, she wrote the name of the

person who shot her and Cheryl and

sealed them in envelopes.

On the witness stand, Peterson opened

the envelopes. "My mom," the notes

inside said.

Finally, a jury convicted Downs of all
charges. She was sentenced to life in

prison plus 50 years.

Author Ann Rule attended much of the

trial, then wrote a book about the

Downs case called "Small Sacrifices."

Rule, who lives in Seattle, is now a

true-crime institution with 20 books

to her name and three in the works.

"That book sold enough so that since

then I've never had to really worry

about bills," Rule says. "It was my

crossover book from hanging on by my

fingernails."

Downs also kept herself in the news.

In 1987, Downs scaled the razor-wire

fence at the Oregon Women's

Correctional Center in Salem and

escaped. She was caught 10 days later;
she'd been in a house a half mile from
the prison, sleeping with one of the

men who lived there.

She is now at the Valley State Prison

for Women in Chowchilla, Calif. It's a
maximum-security prison, with an

electric fence around the perimeter.

California law prohibits the release

of much information, such as her work

assignments, behavior or visitors.

Her two children were adopted by

Joanne and Fred Hugi, the prosecutor

who put their mother away.

Christie and Danny, who now goes by

Dan, are 28 and 23, respectively. Both
graduated from college and are

employed. Last year, Christie married

the son of a former police officer.

Rule says the Hugis adopted Christie

and Dan for the most basic reason:

They loved them.

"I think they bonded with those kids

from the first night," she says. "They
never particularly planned to have

children. They saw those kids, and

that was it."

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