LA Innocence Project takes on 2004 murder conviction of Scott Peterson

LOS ANGELES — The LA Innocence Project has taken as a client one of California’s most notorious convicted killers.

The group now represents Scott Peterson, the Modesto fertilizer salesman convicted of killing his pregnant wife, Laci Peterson, on Christmas Eve 2002, ABC News reported on Thursday.

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Attorneys for the LA Innocence Project confirmed that they are investigating Peterson’s claims of “actual innocence” but declined to comment further on the case, according to NPR.

Laci Peterson, 27, vanished from the couple’s home while her husband claimed he was on a Christmas Eve fishing trip. Her remains, and those of the couple’s unborn son, Conner, washed up nearly four months later on the shore of San Francisco Bay, a couple of miles from where Scott Peterson said he’d been fishing that day.

LA Innocence Project attorneys have filed court documents alleging that Scott Peterson’s state and federal constitutional rights have been violated.

“New evidence now supports Mr. Peterson’s longstanding claim of innocence and raises many questions into who abducted and killed Laci and Conner Peterson,” the filings state, according to ABC News.

The lawyers are seeking dozens of items from the original trial, including evidence from investigations into a December 2002 burglary near the Peterson home and a Christmas Day van fire that Scott Peterson’s supporters believe might be linked to Laci Peterson’s death. They also hope to interview several witnesses in the high-profile case, ABC News reported.

NPR reported that Peterson’s new defense team is also seeking DNA testing in the case.

Prosecutors argued at trial that Scott Peterson, who was having an affair, killed Laci Peterson because he wanted to be free from his duties as a husband and soon-to-be father.

Scott Peterson’s defense team has theorized, however, that Laci Peterson may have been slain after she witnessed a crime while walking the couple’s dog the morning she disappeared. They have pointed to witnesses who believe they saw Laci Peterson walking in the couple’s neighborhood the morning of Christmas Eve — after prosecutors believed she had already been killed.

Scott Peterson, who is now 51, has maintained his innocence since his April 2003 arrest.

The California Supreme Court in 2020 overturned his death sentence based on findings that jurors were improperly screened for bias regarding the death penalty, court documents show. He was resentenced to life in prison in December 2021, 19 years after the murder.

Peterson was removed from death row in October 2022. According to The Associated Press, a judge that December refused his bid for a new trial.

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