All language subtitles for Scott.Peterson.The.New.Evidence.S01E02.720p.WEB.H.264-BeechyBoy track1 [und]

(Transcribed by TurboScribe. Go Unlimited to remove this message.) Questions swirling around Scott Peterson, the husband of

missing Lacey Peterson.

It's one of the most famous cases in

this country's history.

The remains of Lacey Peterson and her baby

washed ashore in San Francisco Bay.

If you ask people about this case, they'll

just tell you that Scott did it.

But what if everything we knew about the

case was just wrong?

The Los Angeles Innocence Project has taken on

the case, and they are arguing that Scott

Peterson is absolutely innocent.

Chris Pixley, what was your reaction to what

was learned today?

I've always felt that there's more to this

case than the public realized.

But within the LAIP's new filing, there's an

abundance of new evidence that simply can't be

ignored.

The goal is to advocate, not for an

outcome, but simply to stress test the evidence.

There was not enough evidence to make that

conclusion.

We've already retraced Scott's footsteps on the day

of Lacey's disappearance.

It's a really risky endeavor to come down

here with a body.

We examined critical evidence that was ignored and

mishandled by the Modesto PD.

To take a gun without consent is not

legal practice.

We found major holes in the prosecution's use

of title science, thanks to new developments in

hydrodynamic models.

The bodies couldn't have ended up where they

were found.

And we re-evaluated eyewitness accounts saying that

Lacey walked her dog after the prosecution says

that Scott Peterson had already killed her.

The consistency is pretty remarkable.

So if Scott didn't kill Lacey, who did?

If you see a mattress in the back

of a van with blood, the inference is

something bad happened.

There is so much investigation that needed to

be done.

Dog scent evidence was a really big red

flag.

DeVore was the walking, talking incarnation of junk

science.

The LAIP is putting forward evidence that the

most likely theory of her abduction has to

do with this burglary that happened right across

the street from the Peterson home.

When the new evidence holds water and exonerates

Scott completely, that's what I intend to find

out.

Investigators are now calling Lacey's disappearance a case

of foul play.

Lacey, who was eight months pregnant, vanished on

Christmas Eve while walking her dog.

This Modesto neighborhood has been searched by air

and on horseback.

This is the Peterson home.

Directly across the street is the Medina house.

The Medinas were the neighbors of Lacey and

Scott Peterson.

They went out of town for Christmas to

Los Angeles to visit family on December 24th,

the same day that Lacey Peterson went missing.

When they returned home, they found that their

home had been burglarized.

His name is Stephen Wayne Todd.

You see, Todd, along with his partner, are

accused of breaking into this home across from

the Petersons.

Around the time, Lacey was reported missing.

It recovered quite a bit of property.

They found a safe that had been stolen

from the home, and they ultimately made arrests.

We are confident they are the ones that

committed the burglary.

It's not disputed that there was a burglary

that occurred across the street from the Peterson

home.

The issue has been, when specifically did that

burglary occur?

The Medinas left to go on vacation on

December 24th, around 10.30 a.m. Clearly,

at that point, Scott had already departed his

home.

So, if Lacey in any way has any

connection with the burglary that's going on at

the Medinas' house, she's alive, and Scott couldn't

have killed her.

In the initial criminal complaint, the Modesto Police

Department said that the burglary occurred at some

point between December 24th and December 26th.

We do not believe that, at this time,

that there's any connection with the missing of

Lacey.

The police justification for everything they did with

respect to the Medina burglary was that it

happened on December 26th, two days after Lacey

Peterson went missing.

The burglary occurred between 0400 hours before a

.m. and 0630 hours on the 26th, the

day after Christmas.

The problem with that story is the fact

that when Lacey Peterson went missing, it immediately

became huge news.

There were television crews and television vans up

and down the street by December 26th.

Now, during the burglary across the street at

the Medinas' house, this large safe was hauled

out of the house, onto the street, and

removed.

So if you believe the Modesto Police characterization

of what happened, that the burglary was after

she went missing, then these reporters just see

people hauling a safe out of a house

across the street, and nobody noticed it.

I think what happened was the Modesto Police

changed the date of the burglary, because it

certainly would have undercut their theory on Scott.

Because if it had happened on the 24th,

it's the definition of reasonable doubt.

The media siege goes on as police continue

to search the home of the missing Lacey

Peterson.

She went on her walk, and the neighbor

found the dog at 1030.

The Medina burglary became a thing.

The Los Angeles Innocence Project believes that the

burglary of the Medina home happened on December

24th, the same day that Lacey Peterson went

missing.

In recent years, new witnesses have come forward

connecting Lacey's disappearance with the burglars in the

airport district.

The fact that the LAIP has found nine

new witnesses, identified only by their initials to

protect their identities, who connect Lacey Peterson's disappearance

to the burglars, only further reinforces the fact

that police should have been investigating the burglary

as related to Lacey's disappearance.

It was very clear to most people discussing

it that it was an alternate theory.

And the only thing that the state could

say about it is it had nothing to

do with the crime that happened on December

26th.

People came up with this idea that Lacey

was abducted by these burglars.

And for those of us that did this

for a living, I mean, it makes for

pretty good TV drama.

I mean, I could see putting it in

a fiction show.

But in real life, it just seemed like

such an enormous stretch.

As a former LAPD detective, do you have

a problem with the idea of this being

a random crime?

That there's no relationship between Lacey Peterson and

the burglars who burgled the Medina home?

Coincidences happen.

But with that said, based on the proximity

where the Peterson property is and where the

Medina property is, and the fact that you

have a woman that goes missing, to not

consider that there might be a correlation, I

feel is investigatively negligent.

As an investigator, you want to throw in

the biggest net possible, right?

And so this is part of the net.

I believe that the reason why they were

dismissive or ignored the Medina burglary is that

they felt, at that time, reasonably sure that

they already knew what had happened.

The confirmation bias and tunnel vision are so

powerful that they essentially overwhelm people's beliefs.

Almost immediately after Lacey Peterson's disappearance, two of

her neighbors reported to police that they believed

the day before, December 23rd, that their homes

were being cased by burglars.

This home right here on the corner, just

a few houses down from the Petersons and

the Medinas, the LAIP says that the owners,

the Urquidas, said that they had a visitor

knock on their door that evening with some

story about a missing dog.

They didn't believe the story.

They thought the man was suspicious.

And there was another neighbor just down the

street that also had the same kind of

visit.

One of the two witnesses that reported to

police they believed their home was being cased

by burglars the day before Lacey's disappearance was,

in fact, a judge.

Also on the stand today, Ricardo Cordova, a

neighbor of the Petersons and currently a superior

court judge.

Judges know how criminal justice works.

They know the importance of making a report

early in the process.

So I find it to be highly credible.

He testified that a suspicious person went door

to door in that neighborhood asking for money

the night before Lacey Peterson disappeared.

Maybe these are the same guys that ultimately

chose the Medina home.

Maybe they're trying to figure out who's going

to be around for the holidays, who's not.

There are no eyewitnesses that saw Lacey Peterson

confront the burglars in front of the Medina

home.

But we know that Lacey was a member

of the neighborhood watch.

And she was known as being very vigilant.

And Lacey was just the type that if

she saw something happening to her neighbor she

would go to help without thinking of her

own safety.

There were people that said if you knew

Lacey you would know that if there was

somebody untoward in the neighborhood she would have

let them have it.

But if the Medina home was burglarized the

same day Lacey went missing what that means

is there's an entirely plausible explanation for her

disappearance that has nothing to do with Scott

Peterson.

I highly suggest you get out of the

water, sir.

You're being detained.

He's in the water.

Hands up, now!

Watch your crossfire.

Surrealist!

Sorry you got wet, but fantastic job.

Swamp Patrol, watch now.

Part of Crime and Investigation on A&E.

And you knew.

I did not know.

She knew what had happened.

You're not denying it.

Interrogation Raw.

New episodes.

Watch now.

Part of Crime and Investigation.

Only on A&E.

On the one hand you can't expect criminal

investigators to constantly be connecting the dots between

the various crimes and events that they're looking

into.

But there are eyewitnesses that put a van

in front of the Medina's home on December

24th which was the same day the Los

Angeles Innocence Project believes that the burglary happened.

The Los Angeles Innocence Project is arguing that

there is more than enough circumstantial evidence to

suggest that the van was related to Lacey

Peterson's disappearance.

In the prosecution's case, Scott Peterson premeditated

this perfect murder of his wife.

The other timeline is that on December 24th,

men in a van burglarized the home across

the street from Lacey Peterson.

That she confronted those men and they somehow

took possession of her.

And that they are responsible not only for

her disappearance but for her death.

Both of those stories are sort of wild.

And yet the reality of murder is that

it's often that way.

And that alternate timeline aligns with seven witnesses

who saw the suspicious van.

Witnesses who came forward in the days and

weeks after Lacey Peterson's disappearance.

The fact that the van sightings were not

investigated by the Modesto police does not mean

that they're therefore immaterial.

The conversation that we had with Dr. Wicks

was fascinating because he pointed out that the

time when a witness statement is most reliable

is in the days or weeks immediately following

the event that they witnessed.

During the Peterson investigation, there are multiple witnesses

talking about an unusual van on the morning

of the crime.

We've got Kristen Denfenwolf.

She makes a statement about seeing a van

in front of the Medina home directly across

the street.

And then you have Diane Jackson describing the

van at the house across the street from

Lacey's with three guys that made her uncomfortable

because they weirdly stared at her as she

drove by.

And then we've got Homer Maldonado.

We've got Tom Harshman.

Tom Harshman spotted a woman matching Lacey's description

on Scenic Drive, roughly three and a half

miles from her home.

This one's interesting to me.

He describes a pregnant woman who appeared to

be in distress being pushed into a van

by a homeless-looking person, and there was

another man on the van who, like, pulled

her in.

No one's ever been able to really nail

down what the color of the van was.

Diane Jackson says it's a white van.

Description of the van varies.

Sometimes it's white, sometimes it's beige.

That's not that surprising to me.

The van itself isn't what you're going to

stare at, you know, especially if there's guys

around.

But its existence, that it is a van,

and what's it doing there, I wouldn't expect

it to be there.

And then when you have multiple pieces of

information overlapping in key features repeatedly, it's like

I can't see why that isn't telling a

story that you think might be true.

Independent eyewitness accounts.

It's not crazy to think that there's a

van in this story of what happened to

Lacey.

But Diane Jackson is maybe the only witness

that had repeated follow-up in a very

short period of time with the police.

She calls in her report within a matter

of two or three days, and then several

weeks later, she's asked to come down to

the police station and undergo hypnosis.

The hypnosis was undertaken by someone who didn't

have the credentials to do police hypnosis, and

her testimony was rendered inadmissible at trial.

In my 25 years in law enforcement, never

have I ever considered using hypnosis, nor have

I ever heard of a colleague using hypnosis.

There are so many problems with hypnosis in

general in terms of trial.

What the LAIP is focusing on is the

impropriety of the hypnosis and the impact that

that had ultimately on the evidence that the

jury heard.

Once you have put somebody under hypnosis, they're

done as a witness in California.

Modesto PD committed the bonehead move of apparently

not reading the evidence code.

You cannot hypnotize witnesses in the state of

California.

It was astonishing to me.

It's a reflection of how the legal system

thinks.

If it's been tainted by hypnosis, they think,

oh, no, you can't testify.

And I'm going, what the hell?

She gave reports from memory before she was

hypnotized, and that's where the truth is.

Eyewitness memory is considerably more reliable early on,

shortly after the memories are formed.

Definitely gets decreasing reliable over time.

And so whether or not she's hypnotized, her

memory's going to be different at the time

of trial.

Don't listen to her memory at that time.

Just have that witness testify.

Did you say that early on?

Yes, I said that.

There you go.

That's reliable.

You have to conform your practices to the

way memory was designed to work, not the

way you want it to work.

And not the timing of trials that come

along years later.

If you have anyone that has seen a

pregnant woman being put into a van, you

got to put that witness on.

Even if we're dealing with some inconsistencies, even

if people, you know, don't remember the right

color, this or that, we have more than

enough people that are saying they saw this

van within the neighborhood.

There's certainly merit to these claims.

There were so many witnesses that saw this

van.

Why weren't they taken seriously?

And why weren't they called to testify?

This is one of the big mysteries in

the case.

And there's no clear answer why these witnesses

were never called.

Did the defense, for some reason, believe they

weren't credible?

Was the defense drowning the discovery and not

aware of them?

Or did Scott Peterson's attorneys believe they had

already made their case and these witnesses simply

were not necessary?

Hi, I'm trying to reach Diana Campos.

Your call has been forwarded to an automated

voice message.

Hi, I'm trying to leave a message.

This is Chris Pixley.

I am a legal analyst.

At the time of the Peterson case, I

was waiting patiently for you and other eyewitnesses

to have an opportunity to testify.

Your call has been forwarded to voicemail.

I would really love the opportunity to talk

to you.

Give me a call back at this number.

You can call anytime.

Thank you.

Witnesses report seeing a white van in front

of this home on the morning of Christmas

Eve.

The journalists were all attacking the people who

had eyewitness sightings at the time.

That speaks to the power of the narrative

that the police were putting out very early

on.

The bias against any other alternate theory started

really early on.

Hi, this is Chris Pixley calling.

I'm trying to reach Diane Jackson.

Can you tell me really what you remember

seeing outside the Medina home?

And, um, saw this van and two or

three people out there.

And I noticed it only because they noticed

me.

And I thought, those are not yard workers.

I mean, yard workers don't turn up their

heads and look at you when you're doing

your yard work.

What the hell's going on here?

So I told the police what I knew.

There's something that's going on across the street

from her house at the same time that

she reportedly died.

And you didn't think it's a coincidence?

No, I don't think it's a coincidence.

How can you have two major crimes across

the street from each other?

Do you remember the police asking you to

come in to be hypnotized?

What did they do to hypnotize you?

Do you recall that?

No.

Do you remember what kind of questions maybe

they asked you?

And you're aware at some point later that

the court looked at that alleged hypnosis and

said, this hypnosis wasn't conducted by someone who

was qualified to do it.

You seem to be saying you don't, you

didn't feel like you were hypnotized.

Do you realize how bad this has been?

All my friends in Modesto were, oh my

god, he's a monster.

Like I was trying to get him off.

And I wasn't, I was just telling the

truth.

I understand, I do.

Thank you, thank you.

He did not do this, and I don't

even know him.

I never met either of them.

But this is crazy to think he did

it when that was going on across the

street at 11 something in the morning on

Crystal Street.

We just want to get to the truth

and we want to do what's right.

And we're not convinced with all of the

eyewitnesses like yourself that justice was necessarily done.

So thank you so much for taking my

call, and I'm grateful for it.

You're welcome.

Bye now.

All right.

I didn't expect her to say half of

that.

I didn't know how convinced she was that

you do not have a burglary across the

street from the Peterson home on the same

day that Lacey Peterson goes missing without the

two of them being related.

If she's saying that over 20 years later,

then she was saying that to the police

at the time.

And the thing that makes me very uncomfortable

about that is it suggests to me that

the police knew that she would blow up

or certainly do great damage to the theory

that Scott Peterson was responsible for Lacey's disappearance

and death.

You have to wonder whether police took the

step of hypnotizing Diane Jackson because they wanted

to render her testimony inadmissible.

It, I think, sheds a lot of light

on reasonable doubt that could be put before

the jury to show them, hey, this wasn't

Scott.

The defense was never told that a van

was in fact found, and the van they

found had been set on fire.

Watch now.

The day after Lacey Peterson's disappearance, Christmas Day,

2002, a van is found by police burning

in an alleyway in the airport district a

mile and a half from the Peterson home.

That van was not the subject of any

discussion related to the Peterson case at the

time.

Subsequently, the evidence that's come out about the

van fire and its potential relationship to the

Medina burglary and to the Peterson home is

alarming.

It raises a lot of questions about who

abducted and killed Lacey.

Fire investigators arrived in the airport district, and

it was clear from the jump that it

was arson.

This van, it clearly had been burned to

conceal some kind of evidence.

That van fire was investigated, and ultimately that

investigation was closed without connecting it in any

way to the Peterson case.

That is a huge coincidence, that there was

a burglary that occurred across the street, that

this van potentially is tied to the burglary

that's found burning not too far from the

Petersons' home.

Modesta Fire Investigator Brian Spitalski investigated the van

fire the morning after Lacey Peterson's disappearance, and

he connected the two.

This was much more important than just a

burned vehicle that somebody was just wanting to

get rid of.

The investigators responsible for Lacey's disappearance decided not

to make the connection.

It kind of sits in the back of

your head and kind of bugs you a

little bit, and you kind of wonder why

this didn't happen or why it wasn't brought

up.

The Los Angeles Innocence Project is arguing that

the van fire should have been viewed as

being potentially related to Lacey Peterson's disappearance, that

it should have been viewed as being related

or potentially related to the Medina burglary, and

that the van fire, along with the Medina

burglary, should have been investigated as part of

Lacey Peterson's missing person case, but was not.

I wanted to take us to the airport

district now, specifically to Thrasher Avenue, where the

van was found a mile and a half

away from the Petersons' home.

You know, although Modesto sort of has the

image of being kind of a sleepy town,

the airport district, it comes across as a

very rough neighborhood, based on everything that I've

read about the airport district, and the crime

problem seems very consistent with that.

Does it raise any concerns for you, given

the proximity to the Peterson home?

It does seem to me that a Peterson

neighborhood is a vulnerable place because of its

proximity to the airport district.

This is the alleyway where the van was

found on fire on December 25th.

You know, I'm familiar with some rough neighborhoods,

and I gotta say, it does seem unusual

to me that you have a van set

on fire.

Intentionally set on fire.

Intentionally, you know, it's an arson.

I mean, even in Los Angeles, van fires

are not necessarily a daily occurrence.

And then you add in the Peterson case.

To not explore this as an investigative possible

lead is a little strange to me as

an investigator.

This was for me one of the strongest

pieces because this is the area where I'm

starting to see, like, the police and the

prosecution start to play games.

There has certainly been information that the Innocence

Project says corroborates that there was a van

in that immediate area, and you had witnesses

who had described seeing a van, a van

that stood out.

You got a current reserve police officer saying

he saw her put in the van.

One of the most disturbing witness statements in

the entire case was given by Tom Harshman.

It is galling to think that there is

an eyewitness who is credible, a reserve police

officer, who saw a pregnant woman being shoved

into the back of a dated van, and

it somehow didn't make its way into the

investigation, didn't receive any follow-up by the

police.

And it's reported at a time where she's

still a missing person.

The failure to follow up on leads like

Tom Harshman's further undermines the credibility of the

police investigation of Lacey Peterson's disappearance.

One of the things that needs to be

pointed out is that the defense never received

any information about the van fire on December

25th.

That came out only years after Scott was

convicted.

Can you imagine if we had found out

that the van had been burnt, the van

we were looking for?

Go back and just take a look at

how many times I talked about the van

on the record.

Peterson's defense team has said the van was...