Attorneys for convicted killer Scott Peterson say they have uncovered “substantial new evidence” that they say proves he did not murder his wife and unborn son more than two decades ago.
The Los Angeles Innocence Project, a nonprofit legal group representing Peterson, filed a nearly 400-page petition to the California Court of Appeals on Friday evening, alleging the case against their client is “entirely circumstantial.”
In the petition, the group argues that the investigation was mismanaged, evidence was destroyed, and they also speculate that the murder is connected to a burglary that occurred across the street from the couple’s home.
Peterson was convicted in 2004 of killing Laci Peterson, 27, who was eight months pregnant with their unborn son, Connor, in Modesto, California, in a trial that transfixed national media.
Prosecutors say Peterson dumped his wife’s body in the Berkeley Marina on December 24, 2002, then reported her missing. The bodies of her and her unborn child washed up on a shore four months later.
The 52-year-old, who has always maintained his innocence, was initially condemned before his 2005 death sentence was overturned in 2020. He was resentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole in 2021.
According to the newly filed petition for a writ of habeas corpus, critical evidence was withheld from jurors during Peterson’s high-profile murder trial.
The petition argues that police and prosecutors mismanaged the investigation and even destroyed evidence. Peterson’s attorneys request that the court vacate their client’s sentence.
Much of the new material presented centers on a burglary that happened across the street from where the Petersons lived at the time Laci went missing on Christmas Eve almost 23 years ago.
It includes a witness who allegedly “overheard a conversation among the burglars about Laci seeing and confronting them,” according to the filing. “This evidence exonerates Scott Peterson because it shows Laci was alive when he left home on December 24, since the burglary took place,” it adds.
Peterson’s attorneys had previously argued that the victim was killed after she witnessed two men breaking into their neighbor's house while she was walking their dog, not by Peterson, who they say was alone on a fishing trip.
LAIP attorneys also connected the burglars to a burned-out van near the couple’s home, adding that information about a scorched mattress found inside the vehicle that contained bloodstains had been omitted and not heard by the jury.
The death date initially established for Peterson’s unborn child, Conor, was incorrect, the petition alleges. It claims that he was probably alive for several days longer.
The petition also challenges the prosecution’s timeline and their claim that Peterson dumped his wife and son’s bodies when he went fishing. Their remains could not have drifted from the point Peterson went fishing to where they were recovered, it states.
The evidence instead points to the bodies being placed in the water at the Albany Bulb, a location accessible by car or foot, not by boat from Peterson’s fishing spot.
Other evidence included “new science and medical research,” according to the filing.
“Every aspect of the prosecution’s theory as to how the crimes in this case were committed has now been shown to be false,” the petition concludes.
In a statement on Monday, LAIP’s Chair of the Board of Trustees, John Sonego, said: “Any injustice must be made right. The evidence in this case has been – and will continue to be – our guide.”
