| CONTINUED FROM PAGE 4 AFTERNOON SESSION Thursday, November 6, 2003 1:20 p.m. MR. DISTASO: Your Honor, I had like two more questions. THE COURT: Everyone's present. You may continue your direct, Mr. Distaso. MR. DISTASO: Thank you, Your Honor. Q. Detective Brocchini, regarding the car purchased from Michael Griffin, did Mr. Griffin tell you where that took place, what city? A. Yes. Q. Where was that? A. The city he lives in. I think it was -- I'd have to look. San Diego, I think. But can I look? Q. Yeah, why don't you take a look at your report just to be sure. A. Yeah, took place at 2666 Worden, W-O-R-D-E-N, Street, Number Seven, San Diego. Q. And the arrest -- the arrest of the defendant took place in San Diego as well? A. Yes, it did. MR. DISTASO: Nothing further, Your Honor. THE COURT: Mr. McAllister? MR. MCALLISTER: Thank you, Your Honor. CROSS-EXAMINATION MR. MCALLISTER: Q. Do you know where Mr. Peterson's parents live? A. Yes. Q. Where is that? A. Solano Beach. Q. Somewhere near San Diego? A. Yes. Q. Now, Detective Brocchini, when you got this call, you were the on-call detective; is that correct? A. Modesto Police Department, all detectives are on call all the time. I was the detective that got called. Q. Who got called? A. I got called. Q. Okay. And when you got that call, you obviously had no idea at that point what this case would become; is that right? A. That's correct. Q. And in terms of what it became, other than being a tragedy, would it be accurate to say that it was the most publicized case that you ever investigated? A. Yes. Q. And you have -- can you give us an estimate, just a rough estimate, about how many hours you have yourself worked on this case? A. I could tell you I came to work on Christmas Eve and pretty much didn't go home for four and a half months. I went home in the middle of the night, changed, took a nap, and came back to work and had no days off. So it was a lot of hours I put in. Q. Okay. And would I be also correct in saying that when you did try to get some sleep in this case, it was so consuming that there were times when you couldn't sleep? A. There was time when I thought about the case when I should have been sleeping, yeah. Q. Right. And pretty hard to turn off--turn off the gears when you're working on something like this, isn't it? A. Yes, it is. Q. So when you say four and a half months, would that --that period of intensity, is that --does that --is that book ended by the time when Laci was reported missing to the time of Scott's arrest? Is that what we're talking about, roughly? A. Well, we continued after Scott's arrest, but, yeah, that was the main portion of time. Q. And when you -- sometimes when you would try to go to sleep or you'd wake up before your allotted wake-up time, were you still thinking about the case? A. I thought about the case a lot. I can't say I woke up because of it, but -- Q. Were there times when you'll just drive by 523 Covena, you know, just to drive by after Laci's disappearance, maybe to see if that generated a new idea about the case, maybe a new lead? A. No. Q. Now, you've got in front of you two awfully big binders. Now, those represent the police reports in this case; is that right? A. The police reports I wrote. Q. Okay. Those are just the police reports that you authored? A. Yes. Q. Is that correct? A. There might be a few pages in there that I didn't author, but yes. Q. Okay. Okay. Now, give me your estimate, again, just an estimate, of how many pages that would be, police reports which you authored in this case. A. 800, 850, maybe around there. Q. And in any of the questioning here, if I'm asking you a question, with that volume of police reports and work that you did, feel free to stop me if you need to resort to the report to refresh your recollection, okay? A. Okay. Q. I mean, you had to do that some when Mr. Distaso was talking with you, right? A. That's right. Q. And you probably had some preparation time with Mr. Distaso before you got on the stand; is that right? A. That's right. Q. So you had a rough idea of the questions that he was gonna ask you off that page, right? A. I knew where he was going, what witnesses I was gonna be asked to Prop 115. Q. Okay. And even so, you needed to resort to the pages sometimes to refresh your recollection, right? A. Right. Q. Now, you told us that you were working -- your assignment, pardon me, is crimes against the person, is that -- that's your -- part of the police department that you work? A. Yes. Q. Is that correct? A. Yes. Q. And would that be true for all the period that we've been talking about from December 24th to the present? A. Yes. Q. And, in fact, your being a detective in the Crimes Against Persons Unit goes back earlier than simply December 22nd of '02, right? A. Yes. Q. How long have you been working in that division? A. November of 2000. Q. Okay. So -- and when you're working crimes against the person, you're working exclusively -- maybe not exclusively murders, but you're working murders, assaults, things -- serious batteries, those kinds of things, right? A. Yes. Q. And is it accurate to also say that when you're working in that unit or division -- what do you call it, just so I have the nomenclature down? A. I call it robbery/homicide when I answer the phone. It's called Crimes Against Persons. Q. Okay. But when you're working robbery/homicide or crimes against the person, is it also accurate to say that you're not doing double duty as a person -- as a detective working child molests or crimes against property or economic crimes, other stuff like that? A. No, that's not accurate. Q. Are you working other things than crimes against the person when you're working in this robbery/ homicide detail? A. Sometimes. Q. And how does that happen? A. You get a case like--that somebody specializes in something, like gangs, for instance, and I was-- worked in the gang unit for many years, and so I still will sometimes pick up a gang case or testify as an expert in criminal street gangs, and that really maybe--homicide, usually they are a violent crime, like a robbery, a 245 or something, but I just might be there as a gang expert. Q. Okay. Well, and up to 2000, that -- wasn't that your area of specialty, gang work? You testified and investigated a lot of cases in this county relating to gang work. A. Yes, I did. Q. And how about in the area of, for instance, economic crimes, that kind of thing? Have you ever worked in that area? A. I've investigated cases as a patrolman, but I've never specialized in it as a detective. Q. I see. So most of your work has been in the assaultive range, the robbery/homicide, the essentially Crimes Against Persons, right? A. A lot of work in narcotics also. Q. Okay. Narcotics. Probably that blends in also with the gang stuff that you did, right? A. That's right. Q. Now, when -- so when -- so as a detective, you get called out, as you did in this case, and then you get initially briefed by the on -- the officers who are already there at the scene; is that accurate? A. Yes. Q. And then you get a -- you get an overview, a mental overview, and then you start doing what you have to do, right? A. Yes. Q. And then from that point on, you're gathering facts, right? A. Doing my best. Q. Evaluating evidence, right? A. Doing -- yes, I do that. Q. And, obviously, also generating reports, right, like you've done 850 or so pages here? A. Yes. Q. Now, how does that work? When you've got reports to write, what do you -- it may be different in every department. You type them up yourself on a computer? Do you dictate them? How -- what is your style of doing it? A. I dictate most of them. Some of them are handwritten. I've typed a couple. Q. Okay. And then once having dictated, then somebody else presents them to you that this is your report, right? A. It's given back to me, I review it, make corrections, give it back to them, and they print it out. Q. Okay. And just as a way of operating, when you're doing a report, when you're doing reports, do you try to put out all the information that you've gathered, whichever side it may seem to help, whether it's the prosecution's side ultimately or the defense side? A. Yeah. Q. What you want to get out there is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth in your reports? A. Well, you can't put everything that's the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, or you'd be giving a verbatim -- Q. No. A. But you put in -- you put in your report what will help refresh your memory when it comes time to being up here. Q. Sure. And to give, you know, fairly -- alert the DA who's going to have to review it, the DA isn't there seeing the witnesses and collecting evidence and evaluating it, to give them a clue what the case is about, right? A. I also do that verbally, but yes. Q. And you have cases where a long time, even a longer period of time than we have now elapses before you have to come to court, and it helps preserve your memory of these things, is that also accurate A. Yes. Q. So I've got some questions from the questions you were asked this morning by Mr. Distaso. When you went to 523 Covena, the information that you had -- I mean the general information or the type of call was, what, a missing person? A. Suspicious missing person. Q. And you told us it was around 9:30 when you got there, right? A. Yes. Q. And then you conferred with, what, Officer Evers? A. Sergeant Byron Duerfeldt, Officer Evers, Letsinger and Spurlock. Q. Okay. And did you do that before you went in the house? A. Yes. Q. Now, when you went --so the --and I'm just asking you about your --the impression that you got at that point before you entered the house. Did you get the information from them that they'd already been through the house and nothing -- and nothing seemed to be missing, ransacked, turned over, anything like that? A. I got the impression that there was nothing missing, ransacked or turned over. Q. Okay. Now, when you -- so then what did you -- and you knew that they had been through the house before you had; is that right? A. Yes. Q. So when you go in the house, who did you go in with? A. Evers walked me through first and pointed out some things that were suspicious to him, and then I went through with Evers and Scott. Q. Now, were you shown by Evers the bucket and mop by the front pathway? A. Yes, I was. Q. Now, that would be something that would be right over here, if we're looking at Exhibit Number 79 (indicates). Looks like you've got an X there. Is that where the mop bucket was when you saw it? A. Yes. Q. So it's right outside the door, and that would be the door to this converted garage we've heard it called? A. Yes. Q. Is that right? A. Yes. Q. But that is adjacent to a walkway right up to the front door of the house, right? A. Yes. Q. So once you go through a gate here up at the -- near the front border of the house, to get to the front door, you have to walk right by that bucket? A. That's right. Q. And was that where you saw the bucket? A. Yes. Q. Is that something that Evers pointed out to you? A. Yes. Q. And so once inside, did you -- when you went through those two -- was it two times only that you went through the house? A. On the 24th? Q. Yeah. First with Evers, and then with Scott and Evers, or was it more times? A. Just those two times. Q. Okay. And how long -- let's say, how long, roughly, were you inside the house the first time with simply Officer Evers? A. About ten minutes. Q. And then roughly how long were you in there with Mr. Peterson? A. About 45 minutes. Q. And when you concluded that approximately 45-minute period with that, had you had sufficient time to go through the house as far as your purposes were at that time with Mr. Peterson? A. Yeah. The 45 minutes too might have been counting the time in the car also, but -- Q. Okay. A. Yeah. Q. But, I mean, I guess what I'm asking you is nobody hurried you out of there either to go to another scene or Mr. Peterson trying to hurry you out of there, anything like that; is that correct? A. That's correct. Q. Okay. So in the time that you were in there, whether it was 45 minutes or a little bit less, was the mop bucket, mop and bucket, rather, was that one of the first things that you had seen? A. Yeah. Q. So you were on the lookout for any signs inside of any floors having been recently scrubbed down? A. I looked. Q. Okay. Did you see any sign of any moisture on any floor inside the house either of those two times that you were there on December 24th? A. No. Q. And you were looking? A. I was looking. Q. Okay. How about the smell? I asked Officer Evers this, but let me ask you it also. Did you smell any kind of agents, cleaning agents in the air inside, bleach, ammonia, a pungent odor, chlorine, another pretty pungent odor? Mr. Clean I offered before. I don't know if you could smell Mr. Clean. But could you smell any kind of cleaning agents inside? A. No. Q. Now, you got there about 9:30. Did you have an idea of what the original time of the reported missing call was? A. I got called at 7:30, and I -- I don't think anybody told me, but I think it was around 5 o'clock or 5:30, from what I remember in my reports. Q. Okay. Well, this -- do you have any idea how many people had been walking through the house on the 24th prior to your getting there? A. After the police arrived or before the police arrived? Q. Well, let's say after the police arrived, did you have any information on that? A. Yeah. Q. What? A. Three. Q. And those would be -- A. Three or four. That would have been the first officers and Scott. Q. And you have no clue how many people would have been through -- through the house prior to the arrival of the first officer? A. That's right. Q. Were there -- while you were there, were there civilian people, people in not --not police officers coming and going and looking and knocking on doors and things like that? A. The street had a lot of family and friends out there, but nobody was allowed into the house. Q. Well, I didn't ask you about the house, officer. I just asked you if there were a lot of people out there during the time that you were there who were not police officers? A. I answered it. There was a lot of people there. Q. And were they doing things like searching and calling and trying to find Laci? A. They were going door to door. They were contacting media outlets. A group of them were -- were like -- went to Dittos and were making fliers with her photo on it. Q. Now, you were asked a question by Mr. Distaso, remember, he asked you several questions about Scott Peterson never withdrawing consent to be in the house, agreeing to take you over to the warehouse, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera? And then there was a point where this morning, I think you told us that Mr. Peterson had -- you had asked his permission, and you'd gotten it, about collecting some evidence. Do you remember that? A. I do. Q. Now, when did that take place? A. After we finished the walk-through, after we finished the search of the truck, and right before we left to go to Trade Corp., I asked him if it would be all right if our ID officer came over, went in the house, photographed it and collected any evidence that he found. And I also told Derrick Letsinger, Officer Letsinger to -- Scott said I -- he could, he consented, so I told Letsinger to wait at the house, don't let anybody go in, when Lovell gets there, tell him what I -- give him my instructions. Q. Okay. Well, can I show you page 7 of 12 of I believe it's your initial report. The first full paragraph under search, does that reflect your conversations with Mr. Lovell and Scott Peterson? A. That's what I said. Q. Is there something there that addresses the question of taking anything from his house? A. Look for evidence. Q. Look for evidence, but not collect evidence. A. Well -- Q. Right? A. Yeah. Q. He had no objection to -- and this would be in his absence, right? A. That's right. Q. Because you were gonna go over to the warehouse with Scott, right? A. Yes. Q. There's nothing in your report to reflect any consent to take anything by Mr. Lovell; is that right? A. Nothing in my report. Q. Uh-huh. Was there a receipt given for that mop and bucket? A. No. Q. And you told Lovell specifically to take the mop and bucket? A. I did. Q. And where was Mr. Peterson when that happened? A. Standing in the driveway. Q. Okay. And where were you and Lovell at that point? A. Well, I never told Lovell, because he wasn't there when I was there. I told Letsinger to tell Lovell to take the bucket. Q. Ah. And where were you and Letsinger then? A. Close by, but I was talking to Letsinger, not to Scott. Q. Right. It was out of earshot for him? A. That's right. Q. Now, was there a reason you didn't want Scott Peterson to hear that you wanted that bucket seized and seized right then? A. I didn't want him to hear. I didn't want him -- I didn't want him to know I was taking it yet. Q. Okay. He agreed to you -- to your going through the house, right? A. That's right. Q. He agreed to -- for Lovell to come and take pictures, et cetera, in his absence -- A. That's right. Q. -- right? He hadn't done anything to indicate any withdrawal of consent, was Mr. Distaso's phrase, to anything the police officers wanted to do at that point, right? A. That's right. Q. But you wanted to be surreptitious about this and in his absence get that bucket, right? A. Not just the bucket, but, yes. Q. Okay. What else did you instruct Letsinger to tell Lovell? A. To take the towels that were on the washing machine and to look for any other -- I wanted him to use a alternate light source to look for any type of blood or anything and collect it if he found any. Q. Okay. So these are all things you're telling Letsinger out of earshot of Mr. Peterson, and that is triggered by your original suspicion about the bucket by the walkway going to the front door? A. No. Q. No? When you went through the house with Mr. Peterson, do you remember how you did it, what -- where you started, what rooms you went through? A. Yes. Q. Okay. Could you just -- you don't have to get up, but can you just, you know, look at that board, or not look at the board if you don't need to, and tell us what route you took through the house? A. Came in the -- the front door, which leads into the dining room, went to the right, and I went into that little kitchen area, and I went out the French doors and introduced myself to McKenzie, the dog. We came in -- I came in, I went into the dining room area where the -- I mean the sitting room area where the TV was and the washroom. I went over to the washroom area, and I looked in the washing machine and removed the damp clothes that had been through the spin cycle. Then we went down the hallway and went into the master bedroom, went into the spare bedroom, looked -- went into the nursery, went back to the little sitting room where I looked at his phone, and I documented all the numbers, the outgoing, incoming numbers. Then I went outside. That's the best I can -- Q. Okay. A. That's the best I can recollect. Q. That's fine. Let me take a look at some pictures here. Like the other officers' information before you went in there, what you saw was you didn't -- et me strike that. You did not see any evidence of overturned furniture, things in disarray, that kind of a scene when you went through the house; is that correct? A. That's correct. Q. Let me show you a picture of this purse. Showing you -- it's Exhibit Number 75. Sorry. And do you recall seeing that in the house? A. I do. Q. Now, did somebody point that out to you as Laci's purse? A. Yes. Q. And who pointed it out to you? A. Evers. Q. Now, this is certainly a -- at this point, it's a suspicious missing persons case; is that correct? A. Yeah. Q. That's what you -- A. That's what it is. Q. Is that the category you would put it in or that you were told that it was in? A. I was suspicious. Q. Okay. And while you haven't seen anything to show that there was some kind of altercation in the home -- let me first ask, you didn't see any evidence of some forceful altercation in the home, such as overturned furniture, that kind of thing, right? A. No, I didn't. Q. You were still interested in what valuables would -- of Laci Peterson's would have been present; is that an accurate statement? A. I don't think valuables is the accurate statement. Q. Well, maybe not -- A. Personal property? Yeah, I was interested to see if her personal property was there. Q. I mean, important papers, like the stuff we don't leave home for long without, such as driver's licenses, keys, that kind of stuff; is that accurate? A. Purse, yeah, that's accurate. Q. And for a woman, a purse is the usual receptacle for those things, right? A. Yes. Q. So when you first saw the purse and it was pointed out to you, one of you then took the purse off of the hook and looked in it, right? A. No. I mean, it was already done. When I first saw -- you're asking did we take it off the hook? No. Q. Did anybody look in the purse while it was still on the hook while you were present? A. I did. Q. Okay. So it's left on the hook, and then what do you physically do with the purse? A. No, I -- I took it off the hook, but not when it was me and Evers. I didn't take it off the hook then. Q. Okay. A. Evers told me the stuff was in there. I took it off the hook when Scott was with me, and I flopped it open. Q. What did Evers tell you was in there? A. Her wallet -- her -- her -- her wallet, her keys. That's all I remember. Q. Okay. Now, I mean, you knew that others had been in -- inside the wallet -- strike that. You knew that others had been inside the purse before you arrived on the scene? A. That's right. Well, no -- yeah, before I got there, yeah, I knew. Q. Right. A. I was told. Q. Because Scott -- I mean, Officer Evers is not blessed with ESP, right? A. Right. Q. I mean, you knew that when he and the other officer are talking, that they had actually gone into the purse to see what's in there, right? A. He told me that the wallet and keys were in there, so I assumed he went in the purse. Q. Right. Okay. And this isn't like one of those kid's purses that's see-through plastic, is it? A. No, it isn't. Q. I mean, this is some sort of a fabric bag? A. It's some kind of a plasticky-looking leather or something. Q. Okay. Looks like it's got some kind of a pattern or something on it, but do you remember the texture of the outside of the thing? A. Plasticky leather kind of thing. Q. Okay. And so then -- so first time you're through there, you get this information from the officers, and then you don't do anything with it, or you don't touch the purse, and then when you go through there with Scott Peterson, that's when you take a closer look yourself and go inside the purse; is that correct? A. I didn't go in it, but, yeah, I did, I took it off the hook. He told me there was a Louis Vuitton wallet in there. And, I mean, I don't know what that is, but I wanted to -- okay. So I looked, and there was a wallet in there. I closed it, and I hung it back up. So I know there was a wallet in there. Q. But there's more -- there's more than a wallet there -- A. Oh, there was contents in there. NEXT PAGE PRELIMINARY HEARING INDEX ALIBI-WITNESS LIST EVIDENCE-NEWS AUTOPSY INDEX HOME INDEX LACI SCOTT AMBER WIRETAPS LACI'S HOME |
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| LACI & CONNER May Justice Prevail |
| PRELIMINARY HEARING - DAY 6 Thursday - November 3, 2003 Testimony of Detective Brocchini - PAGE 5 |
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