Scott Peterson Sentenced to Death

[innerSpaceman]

Originally Posted by scaeagles

I note you say he is "not guilty" rather than innocent. Do you believe he committed the crime but that there was not enough evidence to convict,, or that he did not commit the crime?

Both. I don't believe the case against him was proven at all - with the priviso that I was certainly not in the court room every day. It was all circumstantial evidence - - which is fine, but I found it rather flimsy and prejudicial. The only physical evidence was a hair of his wife found on his boat. Um, yeah, they were married. Her hair should be everywhere he went. I think the jury succumbed to the same sentiment that struck most of America, namely, that he must be guilty because he's a lying, cheating scumbag.

But I also believe that he's innocent - because he did not any any time evince nearly the smarts necessary to pull off this particular crime with zero physical evidence. The crime was done by a genius, and Peterson is an imbecile.


In any event, his place on death row means he's protected from the inmate population, and chances of being executed in this state are slim ... though his notoriety may make him one of the prime candidates.


By the way, I think he has a good case on appeal: The judge made a huge and prejudicial blunder in allowing the jury to go unsupervised to examine the boat. Big mistake, huge. Reversable.

[Chernabog]

Originally Posted by innerSpaceman

Both. I don't believe the case against him was proven at all - with the priviso that I was certainly not in the court room every day. It was all circumstantial evidence - - which is fine, but I found it rather flimsy and prejudicial. The only physical evidence was a hair of his wife found on his boat. Um, yeah, they were married. Her hair should be everywhere he went. I think the jury succumbed to the same sentiment that struck most of America, namely, that he must be guilty because he's a lying, cheating scumbag.

I do think that he killed Laci. However, I do NOT think that the prosecution proved that beyond a reasonable doubt. When the prosecution's case is based entirely on circumstancial evidence, the coincidences have to add up a little better than what I read about the case. Here, I think the prosecution got lucky for two reasons:

1) He was a lying, cheating scumbag. Yeah, you arent supposed to convict someone based on this but juries are made of human beings.

2) Mark Geragos had no evidence showing an alternate theory -- that Peterson was "stone cold innocent". His defense was based entirely on coincidence as well. I was reading an article about that issue this morning. Usually, the defense has to prove that the prosection has not made its case beyond a reasonable doubt. The defense does not have to try and show anything beyond that. However, Geragos made it a point that he was going to "prove" an alternate theory or Laci's death... which was never really "proven". That may have been in the jury's mind as well.