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Scott Peterson's Murder Trial Starts

Posted on: Tuesday, 1 June 2004, 06:00 CDT

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. - Prosecutors began Tuesday to present arguments they hope will prove beyond a reasonable doubt that former fertilizer salesman Scott Peterson murdered his pregnant wife Laci and dumped her body in San Francisco Bay.

Prosecutors have had more than a year to prepare for the high-profile double-murder case, which California Attorney General Bill Lockyer called a "slam dunk" on the day authorities arrested Peterson more than a year ago.

But the trial's opening statements started with prosecutors facing their own obstacles - the absence of a murder weapon, a cause of death or an eyewitness to the alleged crime.

They allege Peterson killed his 8-months pregnant wife on or around Christmas Eve, 2002, in their Modesto home because he was having an affair, then drove her body nearly 100 miles to San Francisco Bay and heaved it overboard from his small boat.

The bodies of Laci Peterson and her fetus, a boy the couple planned to name Conner, washed onto a bay shore in April 2003, near where Peterson told authorities he set out on a solo fishing trip the morning his wife vanished.

Prosecutors will use many of Peterson's nearly 3,000 telephone conversations that police recorded after his wife's disappearance. Likely among the most damaging, experts say, are calls with his mistress, Amber Frey, who cooperated with authorities soon after Laci Peterson vanished.

Prosecutors hope that once jurors consider all the circumstances implicating Peterson, they will have to conclude he committed murder.

On Tuesday, Judge Alfred A. Delucchi gave jurors the standard admonishment that circumstantial evidence cannot lead to a finding of guilt unless the facts "cannot be reconciled with any other rational conclusion."

Defense attorney Mark Geragos has countered that Modesto authorities unfairly targeted Peterson, ignoring important leads that didn't fit their theory.

Geragos has offered innocent explanations for the behavior of his client, who was carrying more than $10,000 cash and his brother's driver's license and had dyed his hair blond at the time of his arrest, not far from the Mexican border.

He also has floated a series of explanations for the crime, including that members of a satanic cult abducted Laci Peterson and that the "real" killer framed Scott Peterson after learning his alibi, which was scrutinized in saturation media coverage.

It took more than two months to find 12 jurors and six alternates in this county just south of San Francisco, where the trial was moved because a judge didn't think Peterson could get a fair hearing in the couple's hometown.

Peterson, 31, could face the death penalty or life without parole if convicted in a case that is expected to last up to six months.

Defense attorneys have indicated that prosecutors plan to call nearly 500 witnesses. As part of the case, authorities have turned over to the defense more than 40,000 pages of written material, hundreds of photographs and dozens of audiotapes and videotapes.

Defense attorneys have revealed 35 pages of written reports, one audio tape, a videotape, and a list of just 18 witnesses, according to a prosecution filing last week.

It's unclear who many of the witnesses are for the prosecution or the defense, as the list is sealed and attorneys are working under a sweeping gag order.

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