| Detective: Vaccuming suspicious
REPUTED 'SLOB' VACCUMED HOUSE AFTER REPORTING WIFE'S DISAPPEARANCE By Julia Prodis Sulek - Mercury News September 20, 2004 The lead detective investigating the murder of Laci Peterson and her unborn son testified today that several things made Scott Peterson appear suspicious in the first days after his wife disappeared. Modesto police Detective Craig Grogan testified that he saw a flatbed trailer at Peterson's warehouse that was covered with cement dust and circular patterns, where it appeared a bucket had been used to mix concrete. He said he was dubious of Peterson's explanation for the cement debris scattered on the flatbed trailer in his fertilizer warehouse. Peterson told him he made a single anchor for his fishing boat. The anchor, recovered from the boat, weighed a little more than eight pounds. "It seemed like a tremendous mess for making one 8-pound anchor,'' Grogan said. The prosecution is hoping this "mess'' will help convince the jury that Peterson didn't just make the one anchor that police found on his new fishing boat, but also made several others to weigh his wife's body down before throwing it in San Francisco Bay. Under questioning from Chief Deputy District Attorney Birgit Fladager, the detective said he saw "circular voided areas" in the dust. Prosecutors have hinted that the rings reflect additional concrete weights Peterson used to sink his wife's body to the bay floor. In his opening statement, prosecutor Rick Distaso told jurors Peterson acknowledged buying a 90-pound bag of cement mix. He said police found no cement mix when they searched Peterson's property. Peterson told his brother-in-law that he used some cement mix to patch his driveway, but a concrete expert testified last week that samples taken from the drive did not match the cement mix used in the anchor. Grogan also said he was suspicious when Peterson told him that on Christmas Day 2002 -- the day after he reported Laci Peterson missing -- he vacuumed the living room floor of the couple's Modesto home. During the course of the four-month trial, Peterson has been described as a "slob,'' and Grogan testified that Peterson's warehouse office was "very disorganized'' compared to the house he shared with his wife. In an interview Grogan conducted with Peterson on Christmas day, Peterson presented his own theory of what happened to his wife, Grogan said. Peterson reportedly said that when he left for the day to go fishing on San Francisco Bay, his wife took their dog for a walk in the nearby park. He theorized that because she was wearing valuable jewelry recently inherited from her grandmother, that "a transient had robbed her for her jewelry and taken her.'' However, that same jewelry was found in the home on Laci's dresser. The detective also said he quickly became suspicious because he believes Peterson was the last person to see his wife alive and was the first person to discover her missing. Moreover, Grogan noted that Peterson had spent the day by himself -- in a place he had never been -- and had no one to confirm his alibi. Laci Peterson's mother, Sharon Rocha, sat in the front row of the courtroom as Grogan testified. Rocha and the victim's stepfather, Ron Grantski, did not attend court last week to avoid graphic autopsy photos and Peterson's parents, with whom they have clashed. DETECTIVE GROGAN'S INDEX HOME INDEX LACI SCOTT TRIAL ALIBI-WITNESS LIST WIRETAPS |
| LACI & CONNER "Your heartfelt pain is felt deep into the Heart of Texas, May Laci and Conner have Everlasting Peace." LARRY ~ TEXAS ~ GUESTBOOK |
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| JOE AJA & GROGAN |
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