Geragos: Transients could have deposited bodies in bay
October 20, 2004

Scott Peterson’s attorney this morning suggested that transients camped by Interstate 580 near
Albany could have deposited Laci Peterson’s body in a channel whose mouth to San Francisco
Bay isn’t far from where her remains were recovered. Also this morning, Judge Alfred Delucchi
stretched the trial’s gag order to cover a
legal analyst who spent several hours Sunday with
Scott Peterson conducting mock interviews in case the defendant takes the witness stand.


Though Hoffman Channel has figured in some of the four-months-plus of trial testimony,
defense attorney Mark Geragos only this morning made clear that it could have
provided a water route from illegal encampments a few hundred yards away.


Geragos long has contended that transients in Modesto’s Dry Creek Park
kidnapped Laci Peterson as she walked her dog on Christmas Eve 2002 and
placed her body to correspond with her husband’s well-publicized alibi, fishing.


Scott Peterson told police he fished alone that day, less than two miles
from where the remains of mother and son
washed ashore four months later.

East Bay Regional Park police officer Timothy Phillips testified this
morning that he found plastic sheeting with
duct tape and a metal
rod on the day Laci’s remains were discovered about 1,000 feet away.


“To me, the (plastic’s) odor was similar to the odor of the remains,” Phillips said.

A detective previously testified that he thought the odor was consistent with
ocean debris. And a scientist has testified that the duct tape on the plastic
was different from tape adhered to tatters of Laci Peterson’s maternity pants.

Geragos wants to convince jurors that someone other than his client wrapped
her body in the plastic. That could present an alternate explanation for
why Laci’s remains were much more decomposed than her baby’s.


A pathologist has testified that Conner Peterson was protected in his mother’s womb until just
before being released by advanced decomposition shortly before the bodies were recovered.


But Phillips, when questioned by prosecutor Dave Harris, also acknowledged that a specially trained
cadaver dog did not respond when asked to scent the plastic sheet. And advanced rusting suggested
that the metal rod could have been exposed to the elements for
quite some time, Phillips agreed.

Authorities did not forensically test other fabric found within hundreds
of feet of Laci Peterson’s remains, according to previous testimony.


But Phillips acknowledged that one was comparatively new women’s panties that could not
reasonably be connected to the Modesto woman, whose torso had tattered maternity panties.


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