Original subtitles

Let me show you what is marked as States Exhibit 72,

and ask whether you can identify that for me, please?

This is my blow poke.

You blow through it.

OK. And...

did you also purchase others that were similar to it? Yes, I did.

In Christmas of 1984,

I so enjoyed having my blow poke,

it was so useful and handy,

I decided to give it to family members,

and I gave one to my brother,

I gave to my sister Kathleen,

and I also gave one to my mother.

And, with respect to each of those items,

was it identical to what is marked here as States Exhibit 72?

Yes, they were.

With respect to this item, did you have the occasion to see it

in her home at various times when you visited?

Yes, I saw it in every home she lived in whenever I visited. OK.

Now, Miss Zamperini, did you ever say to the police that you

only saw the relationship between Michael and Kathleen as being

a "truly, loving, respectful marriage"?

I wrote that in a statement, dated January 10th.

At that time I felt that. I no longer do.

But you did state that the only relationship you saw between

Michael and Kathleen was as a "truly loving, respectful marriage".

Right? Those were your words.

They weren't my words, it's what I wrote.

I didn't verbalise it, if that's what you are getting at.

Well, they are your words in your statement.

At that moment in time, that's what I wrote.

That's all I have, thank you ma'am.

Mr Rudolf asked you whether, at some point, you had

indicated to police that Michael and Kathleen

had a "truly loving and respectful relationship".

At that time I felt that way.

I was not aware of all the other secrets that came out later,

not at all. So...

I object to that, Your Honour. Overruled.

When I wrote that statement barely a month after my sister's death,

I was totally unaware of private aspects of his life.

I had no idea.

Do you still feel that way? That there was a "truly, loving,

"respectful relationship" between them?

Sitting here today, I have no idea who Michael Peterson is.

None whatsoever. He is who he held himself out to be.

And who he has turned out to be. No, I have no idea who he is.

'10.17am.'

'Hello, Mr Rudolf. This is Brent Wolgamott.

'I'm the alleged male escort that is being talked about

'the last couple of days in the papers and on TV.

'If you could give me a call back to talk to me, OK.

'Believe me, I am on nobody's side.

'I'm not on the prosecution's side, I'm not...

'I'm trying to stay out of it. Call me back please. Bye.'

'End of message.'

Hello, Michael, how are you? 'OK, Sir.'

So, yesterday morning I went to Raleigh and met with Brad.

'Brad? Oh, Brad! OK.'

Soldier top. 'Yes.' Yes. 'OK.'

Brad is very freaked out.

'I bet to hell he is.'

What he's hoping is that we can convince...

He wants us to try to convince the DA not to call him.

I said that's unlikely,

but it may be that the judge will find that it's not relevant,

and I think, you know, he's not going to hurt us in any way.

The other issue is that other e-mail exchange in late November.

You know which one I'm talking about?

'I would really have to go back and refresh my memory.' OK.

'I've never met that guy.' That's... I just want to make sure.

'Absolutely not.' OK. 'Absolutely 100% not. No, no.' OK. 'No, no, no.'

OK, so whatever e-mail exchange there was in November did not

lead to any kind of personal meeting. 'No, absolutely not.' OK.

I mean, you understand that if it happened and I know about it,

I can deal with it.

'I haven't lied to you about one single thing

'because I know you get blindsided and it would just destroy me,

'and I'm not going to take that risk. I want you to know that.'

I think I know that. OK. I mean, I'm just asking the question.

'I understand that.

'I think I've been honest with you from day one,

'since you met me in the jail.'

I didn't meet you in the jail, I met you before you went to jail.

'Well, I mean... Right, that's correct.

'You didn't keep me out of jail, by the way!' Right, that's right.

I'm sorry, Michael.

I'm not even that concerned with the bisexuality

as a general proposition.

What I'm concerned about are some of the e-mails that are just...

They are going to turn people off to Mike.

They are completely irrelevant to the case,

but they are not irrelevant to who Mike is,

and whether a jury's going to be

willing to believe the worst about him.

I would very much like to keep this stuff out.

It seems to me that this is really going to tank some of the jurors'

views of Mike, so the question really is,

what increases the likelihood of winning the motion?

Well, clearly there's a distinction between the Vive guys

from 11 years ago and the e-mail.

There are distinctions, and I think we can make that distinction.

The easy argument that people had sex with him before his marriage

is just totally irrelevant. Right.

We don't need to spend time on that.

If those were women, it would be laughable. That...

The pornography and the, you know, fantasy or escort stuff,

isn't really related to infidelity.

Yes, and I think your argument about sort of taking out the gay stuff

and making it heterosexual, is exactly right.

Yes, if they're smart they do a couple of things.

One is they say, "Well, in assessing the motive,

"you assess how much he loves her." I mean, somebody...

A motive is more believable

if you aren't that committed to your wife, than if you are.

OK, but these e-mails don't show lack of commitment.

I think their positions...

Devil's advocate is, anybody who is willing to spend money for sex

you know, during their marriage,

a jury could decide that shows a lack of commitment to the marriage.

So you're telling me that if a man contacts a prostitute,

never has sex with her, just contemplates it,

that that indicates a lack of commitment to the marriage?

I think a judge could find that a jury could make that conclusion.

Such a lack of commitment that it's relevant to a murder charge?

If one were to think about this, if those were women,

if Mr Peterson's only sexual orientation was heterosexual,

and the state had located two prior girlfriends that he had

had some physical relationship with before his marriage,

I don't think any court would think there's any relevance.

It would be ridiculous to suggest that that somehow reflects

upon the state of your marriage to the extent that it would be

relevant to whether you would commit a murder years later.

So, the only question then,

is whether adding the layer that this was sex with other men

somehow increases the relevance to the point

that this court should allow a jury to hear that testimony.

I think it's clear that adding the layer of sexual orientation

decreases its admissibility, as opposed to increasing it,

because if even only one juror starts looking at Mr Peterson

differently, not because they think there is a connection

to what happened to Kathleen,

but they look at him and say, "God, this guy's gay!"

If even one juror does that,

Mr Peterson has been denied a fair trial.

Obviously there are two main grounds where all these items,

or most of these items are relevant, obviously.

Number one it goes to motive.

It does go to motive, as to why this act may have been committed.

And number two, it goes specifically to rebut some issues that

were raised in the defendant's opening statement,

information about the idyllic relationship that this couple had.

Well, this does not jive with that kind of statement.

Why doesn't it jive?

If it's an idyllic relationship, then why is he e-mailing

somebody else to meet for sexual relations outside marriage?

You know, you're talking about a potential love triangle type

of thing here, and clearly, that's a motive for murder.

If it's not a motive for murder, then the entire soap industry dies

because that's what they base all their stories on. Um...

That'd be OK! Yeah!

You're talking specifically about e-mails with a person that

has been identified as Brad. Is that correct? Yes, sir.

Now, Mr Maher says

there's no evidence that they had relations or that they actually met.

I don't see anywhere in the law,

either in the rules or in the case law

that says they actually had to meet for this to be a motive for murder.

The bottom line is, he is looking for this outside the marriage.

All this stuff is on that computer.

She could easily have found out that night what was going on.

Clearly, I think a motive for murder.

All right, counsel. Mr Maher, I agree with the States presentation.

The court is going to find that this evidence proffered by the state

is relevant.

It goes to the issue of motive,

and it also goes to attack the idyllic marriage

that the defendant has set forth though his counsel

in his opening statement.

State your name, please. Brent Wolgamott. How old are you, sir?

I'm 28, ma'am. All right. Tell us, back in 2001, where were you living?

I was living in Fayetteville, North Carolina. Doing what?

I was an active duty soldier in the United States Army.

I did live off post though.

During this time period back in 2001, did you have a website?

My image and information about me was on a website, yes.

A website, all right. And what was the purpose of that website?

It was a male for male escort review site. OK.

Tell us, please, when you say a "male for male escort site",

what types of services did you perform?

Basically it's companionship for other males of legal age.

All right.

And did that involve sexual activities? Sometimes it does. OK.

What types of sexual activities, sir?

Oh, just about anything under the sun.

I mean, I didn't know how much exactly the court wants

me to go into detail, but...

The court just wants you to answer the questions. That's my answer.

Just about anything under the sun? Yes, ma'am. OK.

Safely. Safely, I might add.

Now, do you remember when you were contacted

by a person with the name MP Ryder? Yes, ma'am.

Approximately when would that have been?

I believe it was in August 2001.

Did you discuss anything,

other than just trying to get to know each other?

It was basically the same as many other clients who contact me.

They want to be safe,

so they want to get to know me to make sure I'm a... straight...

A "straight" guy. OK, what does that mean?

Well, I'm not a gangster, somebody who's going to rob them.

I'm a clean cut professional

who they're going to have a good time with.

Look at 170a.

Do you recognise that?

Yes, I'm the man in the middle. OK.

And do you know how this photograph might have come into

Mr Peterson's possession?

I would have had to send it to him. OK.

During the course of your conversations with Mr Peterson,

whether it be by phone or by computer,

did he ever mention his wife?

I believe he did, yes, ma'am.

Right now, did you have any type of communication about how it

was you were going to hook up together without his wife knowing?

I object to that. Or whether his wife would know? Overruled.

I don't remember any discussions about whether his wife would

or would not know.

It may have been in e-mails, but I do not recall that.

We were to hook up, I believe, on September 5, 2001.

Tell us, please, did you actually discuss what you were going to do

when you were to get together on September 5th, 2001? Yes, ma'am.

And what were y'all planning on doing? Having sex.

What type of sex, sir? Do you know?

Can I say it, I guess. Anal sex.

Did you get together with him on September 5, 2001? No, ma'am.

Well, what happened?

The only reason I was coming up to Durham was because I was

leaving on a flight the next morning to Palm Springs, on September 6th.

I'd had a very long day and when I got up there that night,

I just said, you know what? I'll talk to him when I come back.

I'm just tired and I want to go to Palm Springs so I didn't go.

Was that an unusual occurrence for you to have,

or plan to have sexual relations with married men? To the contrary.

Married men are in the majority of most of the clients that I saw

when I was a escort.

With regard to the kind of man that you tended to have escort

relationships with,

can you give us some indication of their professions, for example?

Sure.

Usually they are professionals because my fees were quite high.

I saw doctors, attorneys...

One judge.

LAUGHTER

It was not this judge.

I think we can stipulate to that.

Is...? Is it...?

Is it fair to say that the men who you would see were bisexual

as opposed to being homosexual?

In my opinion, I would go so far as to even say

that they were predominantly straight,

with minor homosexual tendencies.

All right. And did a number of the married men

who you had sexual relations with

have wives who knew they were bisexual?

Most of them did, from my experience.

In your experience, was it unusual for a wife

married to a bisexual man to know that he was bisexual?

Not at all. Did Michael Peterson ever do or say anything,

either on the phone or in an e-mail,

that indicated he was not in love with Kathleen Peterson?

To the contrary - in his e-mails, unlike most of my clients,

he indicated that he had a great relationship.

Most clients don't want to say anything about their relationship.

He indicated he had a warm relationship with his wife

and nothing would ever destroy that.

Sir, do you know anything about the death of Kathleen Peterson?

I know diddly. Diddly.

"Brad, we talked on the phone yesterday and I checked out

"the website you gave me."

"I would like to get together with you.

"Daytime is best for me. I was in the Marines."

"Love to fuck, never been fucked, and not sure I'm interested.

"I've never done escort, but used to pay to fuck a super-macho guy

"who played lacrosse at NC State."

"Mike, I really enjoyed your e-mail.

"You sound very cool, and it's rare

"that I find a client who wants..."

"Brad, obviously, I'm not looking for a relationship,

"and neither are you."

"Mike, I am coming up there Wednesday night,

"because I have to be on a plane at 6am.

"You got a big dick, guy? Just wondering."

"Brad, evenings are not great for me, anyway.

"I'm married, very happily married, with a dynamite wife.

"Yes, I know, I know. I'm very bi, and that's all there is to it."

'The question about the bisexuality, I don't know,

'is that probative or is that inflammatory?

'I tend to think the jury is going to look at that...'

'Yeah, I think that what it does is show the jury'

this was not a happy marriage -

in fact, it was far from a happy marriage,

when you're attempting to pay for sex with a hooker.

'So, this idyllic relationship that Mr Rudolf portrayed

'is simply not true.'

But the good thing about how disgusting the media is

is that when it's over, it's over.

Nobody cares. There is a new story, yeah.

Yeah, there's a new story, nobody cares any more.

New lies. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

I could commit a crime and take the attention off you guys.

"Martha's best friend turns killer."

Just kidding. Oh, my God.

Did you know...?

Hi!

Maybe my puppy shouldn't hear this, either.

Come on... come on.

Bye, Portia!

Were you shocked that he was bisexual?

No, we already know. Oh, you did? Well... yeah.

After Mom died, when Dad was in jail

and we were going for the bond hearing,

Caitlin was going to talk, so they were, like, worried,

because they'd found all the pornography,

and so Rudolf was worried about,

like, Caitlin going up into the stand

and being surprised at the whole bisexuality thing.

And so... so they told us, you know?

And I remember Todd was the one, he sat me down, he was like,

"Margaret, I just need to tell you, you know, Dad's bisexual."

And I was like, "Oh, OK, that's fine."

It was one of those things that he was, like, "No, no, he's bisexual."

And I was like, "OK, that makes sense.

"Like, is there anything else?

"Is there something more important that you wanted to tell me?"

He's like, "No, are you OK with that?"

I was like, "Yeah. It doesn't matter. I don't care."

It was just one of those things that...

I mean, we already knew and... so what?

It was not a big deal. No. Yeah.

I don't...

Like, he's so strong.

You know, he's... They're bringing everything,

like, the deepest, darkest secrets of him out,

and... putting them on display for the nation

and making a mockery of him, and...

Well, could you imagine?

They could take your whole life, as of right now,

take everything you've ever done out of context,

and blow it up there on a huge poster

and bring in people to talk about it and how the experts talk about it,

and... it's disgusting.

They can do that to anyone. You can't judge someone

by what the media points out as their shortcomings, you know?

You know what Craig Jarvis from the NNO told me today?

He said when he was trying to figure out the cost of the trial,

he got the impression that Michael just pays a flat fee.

It's not by the hour.

We could ask our host that tonight, if she knows how it works.

I don't know if it's just a flat fee for just the trial part,

or a flat fee for the whole murder case.

I don't see how they could do that,

because they didn't know they would end up going to Germany twice.

I mean, talk about a... I don't know, I'll have to...

..you know, unpredictable expense.

Cos I'm sure Michael didn't say, "By the way, there's something

"that happened in Germany you might have to defend me about."

"Oh, and by the way, I'm gay and, oh, by the way,

"there's another dead woman", and... yeah.

There's the cemetery.

Doing this for you, Kathleen. Doing this for you.

Um... this is obviously the headstone and, Lori,

you said she goes this way, right?

No. No. Her head is here and her feet are there. OK.

So this is where she is and that's it, but I'd kind of like...

Depending on what you suggest, a...

I don't know, what do you suggest?

What I can do is maybe draw up a sketch

and give you an idea of what the plannings would be.

You know, we're here right now, but once the trial is over, I mean,

we'll be coming some, but not all the time, to tend it.

The only thing I can share with you is that my sister loved roses and...

But I don't know if you have a breed

that can, without a lot of tending, make it.

There are some. There is a variety called Carefree

that may not need as much spraying and maintenance as the normal ones.

I don't know if it'd get enough sun underneath this big oak tree...

That's kind of tough.

I don't know - maybe we could do something...

Something there and then, you know, like this, like a U-shape.

Some kind of thing...

I don't know if there are any good perennials.

I was thinking of Bleeding Hearts, but...

If we can agree on this, how soon can you do it?

Probably within the next week or so. It's not a huge job,

but I've got enough guys that I could do that.

Well, I didn't want "Peterson" on there,

but nobody would listen to me, so...

Well, what's done is done.

She was happy when she married him.

Mr Sachs. Your Honour, obviously,

we believe that this evidence is clearly relevant

and clearly should be admissible.

In a lot of ways, even giving the defendant

the benefit of the doubt, and saying he had nothing to do with this,

this evidence would still be admissible

simply as relevant circumstantial evidence.

Even if this was an accident over in Germany, in 1985,

he has seen the scene and seen what an accident may have looked like,

knowing what a model -

using it as a model, or a blueprint, so to speak -

when this case is committed now in 2001.

When you look at the similarities between the two, they are striking.

Obviously the most striking thing about it is that we have here now

this defendant who's involved with a case where two women are

found at the bottom of the stairway, dead.

There is large amounts of blood present,

there is splatter high up on the wall next to the stairway,

the blood is dry on the wall, there are small spray patterns

of blood that are identified on the wall.

Both of the victims, obviously,

are female and had close personal relationships to the defendant.

The are both in their mid-40s when this occurred.

They actually look alike -

the physical similarities between the two are amazing.

They're both later determined to be homicides,

after subsequent autopsy, by blunt force trauma.

Scalp lacerations - how coincidental is that?

That it is the same number of scalp lacerations on each of them,

and both severe, down to the skull.

The presence of defensive wounds on the bodies.

The defendant was the last person to see them alive.

The defendant is on the scene when the authorities arrive

each time and he reports, both to authorities and to others -

to friends and people who come -

that each of these persons died by falling down the stairs.

So, what we've got, here, on the bottom line,

is the detectives who came to the house saw nothing suspicious -

and this was before any clean-up.

Steve Lyons, the Army agent who came to the house,

saw nothing suspicious.

The German doctor who came to the house saw nothing suspicious.

There was no evidence that Mrs Ratliff

had any personal relationship with Michael Peterson

or anybody else that would have provided a motive for murder

and there was no financial gain -

in fact, he ending up raising her two children to adulthood,

the initial estate was worth about 35,000,

including pine trees in Australia.

And from all of that, you have a situation where, in essence,

there is no substantial evidence

from which a jury could reasonably find

that Michael Peterson was responsible

for the death of Elizabeth Ratliff.

Anything else? No, your Honour.

All right, then, thank you, Counsel.

The court does agree with the State, Mr Sachs,

that the evidence of Mrs Ratliff's death is admissible

under 402 and 404b.

State's motion is allowed. The defendant's is denied.

The prosecutors are going to try and tell this jury that

Michael Peterson was responsible for that woman's death,

and was responsible for Kathleen Peterson's death,

and they are going to say both women died in a similar way,

at the bottom of the staircase.

Now, another note, ironic, on the bottom of all this,

is that the two daughters that were adopted by Michael Peterson

where the daughters of Elizabeth Ratliff,

that woman that died 18 years ago in Germany.

They were raised by Michael Peterson,

raised as his own daughters, and they refer to him as Dad

and, as I told you before, those two girls,

who are now grown-up and in their 20s,

are supporting Michael Peterson.

So, while prosecutors, on the one hand,

say Michael Peterson is responsible for killing their biological mother

and for killing their stepmother,

who was helping to raise them, they are saying, "No."

All right - any further evidence?

On the morning of November 25th, did you go to Miss Ratliff's house?

Yes, I did. And how did you arrive there?

I arrived by taxi.

So, after you actually put the key in the door and opened the door,

what happened next?

I see all the lights are on and I see this body lying there.

Did you see blood?

Oh, yes.

Where did you see blood?

All the stairway, up the stairway, there was blood.

Liz was lying in a pool of blood.

Can you recall where, if anywhere, you saw blood on her?

I don't remember - I'm sure I did really look at her,

but I don't remember if she was... where blood was on her.

It was just everywhere. What next did you do?

I ran over to the Peterson house. What happened?

I told Patty that something terrible had happened, they have to come.

Did you see Michael Peterson at that time?

As I was talking to Patty, he came to the top of the stairs.

Was he dressed or not? He was...

No, he wasn't dressed. He was in his T-shirt and boxer shorts.

What next did you do?

Michael came running over with me.

What did you do? I ran upstairs to see if the babies were OK.

And when you went there, what did you find concerning the children?

The babies were still asleep.

So, what did you do?

I wanted to go in the toilet and vomit.

All right. What happened next?

I was in the toilet and Michael came upstairs and he is telling me

to get a sheet, to get a blanket, and I said, "Why?"

He said he wanted to cover Liz up.

And he said she was dead.

And I said, "No, no, I felt her. She's warm."

And he says, "She's not warm, Barbara."

He took me by the arms and he said, "She's not warm, she's dead.

"The warmth comes from the floor heating."

What then did you do?

I walked in the door.

I saw Michael in the corner,

and he was standing like this.

And then I turned and I looked at Patty,

and Patty was really slumped over, staring into space.

She was really in bad shape.

What then do you do?

I asked what had happened and I looked around.

There was a lot of blood on the floor.

And I looked up the walls

and there was a lot of blood on the walls.

Now, Liz was covered, I couldn't see her.

There was a coat, I think it was a coat, over her.

And I couldn't see even her head, but her hair was, like,

down over her face, like this.

All right, now, you say you enquired as to what had happened

and did anyone give you any information at that time?

Michael said that she had a brain aneurysm,

she had had this and that she must have fallen down the stairs.

What is the next thing that you remember happening?

I saw a bloody footprint down the bottom of the stairs and I said,

"This is a crime scene and somebody needs to investigate it,

"so please don't walk up the stairs."

Did anybody make any comment to what you had said?

Barbara said, "That's my footprint, that's when I went to get Martha,

"Martha baby and Gigi, and I carried them out."

So, what happened then?

Well, there was a lot of commotion.

Barbara was hysterical, the nanny was hysterical,

she was shaking, visibly shaking.

She was very loud, crying, sobbing,

I think I was crying and sobbing, I think...

I think a lot of people were crying and sobbing.

While you were there in her home, did you notice any blood?

There was blood all the way down the wall

that is adjacent to the staircase.

There's blood over on the wall, on the other side of the foyer,

and there was blood on a little,

this side of the wall over on the foyer too.

While the investigators were there, was the blood still on the wall?

The blood was there until we moved Liz into the side bedroom.

And who was cleaning the blood?

In my memory I am sure that Tom and I cleaned the blood off the walls.

And over what period of time did you clean?

It seems like we cleaned blood most of the day.

You know, Rosemary, I've said many, many times,

there is no coincidence in criminal law and I'm just wondering

how Todd and the other two Ratliff girls don't see these similarities.

Maybe they don't want to see the similarities, Rosemary.

I believe they don't want to see the similarities.

They can't believe that

the person they've known since

they were babies and that has raised them, it just is not possible.

It happened to my sister in 1985

and the same thing happened to Kathleen in 2001.

It was... Oh, boy, is she fucking... ..on purpose. They were murdered.

Rosemary... And I have seen personally Michael Peterson's fury,

which is scary.

It really scared me into not wanting to go down there again.

Two times in my whole life I've seen that stupid woman

and she says I have a terrible temper.

It's just awful.

Yeah, here it is.

And, Caitlin...

Yes, vicious temper.

Grr! Temper! Grr!

Grr!

SHE LAUGHS

PHONE RINGS

Shit.

HE CLEARS HIS THROAT

Hello?

Yeah.

Well, no, they're going to lose the case for a lot of reasons, Mike.

Duh - I didn't do anything. Number two, there's no murder weapon.

Number three, there's no motive.

Jesus!

Ah, OK.

Oh, you know what? That's another one. Rosemary...

You know how many times I've seen Rosemary in my whole life? Twice.

Once 15 years ago and then

one time she came down for Margaret's graduation. That was it.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. He's hired, yeah.

Well, as I have always cautioned, never underestimate anybody.

It's a good way to lose football games and wars.

I don't know, I just, I found myself a couple of times, like,

sitting up straighter in court when people were talking about my dad

and I'll just, I'll be really, like, indignant,

I'll just be like, "This is my father you're talking about,

"you know, like I have a lot of pride in him, this is our family

"you're talking about," and the fact that I know he's innocent

and the fact that, like, hopefully people can see it through me now,

people can see it in me that he is innocent and...

I don't know, I think, I think that helps, sometimes, to get through it.

You know the DA's trying to say basically that our dad

killed our birth mother and our mother, but where are we sitting?

We're sitting behind our dad.

Now, shortly before she died,

I think it was the Thursday of the week before Thanksgiving,

you talked with Liz and she talked about suffering severe headaches.

She came to my room about three o'clock on that Thursday

and she was pale.

She looked bad and she held her head like this

and she said... I asked her

what was wrong and she said she just had the most severe headache

and that she did make an appointment to go to the medical facility

and that she had an appointment on Tuesday. The following week. Yes.

So she never actually got to see a doctor about these severe headaches.

No.

Now, your husband, what was his rank in the military at the time?

I believe he was a major at that point.

I'm not sure if he was promoted.

He never went up to any of the authorities and said,

"We're concerned that this is a crime scene", did he?

No, because he was very concerned about it and

he was waiting to see what they would say.

His example to me was,

if I was flying a plane and someone reported a fire on it,

would you trust me to put out the fire?

Would you trust my expertise to put out the fire?

And he trusted their expertise that day.

OK, well, ma'am, if you were on a plane and there was fire

and it continued to burn and continued to burn and nobody

did anything, at some point you would say something, wouldn't you?

I would be waiting for a day that I could put the fire out

and I guess that's why I'm here today, to help put the fire out.

And this is 18 years later. Yes.

They have telephones in Germany, don't they? Yes, they do.

And you could have called somebody the next day.

It's a scary thing to go to the police and say,

"I think that there's foul play here."

In fact, during all of 1985, you didn't call anybody. No.

No, we've had to live with this all these years.

The first time you actually ever gave a statement about these events

to anybody in authority was in the year 2002. That's correct.

And you actually wrote out a statement to... Detective Holland?

Uh, yes.

OK, and this statement contained all the significant memories

you had about how Elizabeth Ratliff died and Michael Peterson's

involvement in that. Correct?

It contained every significant thing that I could remember at that time

until I began to remember more things.

OK, well, let's go through what you could remember

when you wrote to Detective Holland.

Nowhere in this statement did you say that Michael Peterson

said anything about there being a cerebral haemorrhage

before the German police arrived. Did you? No.

In fact, although you knew this statement was about

Michael Peterson, an investigation of Michael Peterson,

you didn't say anything about him at all, did you? No.

Didn't even mention his name. No, I didn't.

Didn't mention this bloody footprint you now recall.

No.

You talk about the fact that Miss O'Hara, now Miss Malagnino,

summoned you. She was frantic at that point?

She was upset. "Come quick."

By the way, the girls, it says here the two girls were still in bed?

Yes. That's Margaret and Martha.

They didn't stay there the whole time?

No, Barbara had removed them.

I didn't remember that until later when I saw the footprint.

When I remembered seeing the bloody footprint on the stairs,

then I remembered that she had gone upstairs and taken them away.

That was one of my flashbacks. So...

Flashbacks? Have you been having flashbacks?

Flashbacks of the scenes in short pictures.

Flashbacks come as short memories, very short memories.

You arrived in Durham a week or so ago?

Almost two weeks ago. OK.

And you've been in contact with other witnesses?

I've seen other witnesses, that's correct.

And just seeing people has caused you to have flashbacks

of new memories that you didn't have in March of 2002?

Hearing their voices has brought back some memories.

The messages, the images are very, very vivid.

Some of them are in colour.

The things you've been testifying today that you didn't write

in March of 2002 are the result of these flashbacks, correct?

A lot of memories came before I even arrived here.

And those were also flashbacks?

Yes.

I don't know if this is...

I don't know if this is ours or your mother's. Porcelain de Paris.

I don't know. I mean, it's been...

I have no idea.

Can I take one of the pie plates to school?

Yeah. We own about ten of them.

I like the blue one better. Yeah, I don't think this was your mother's.

That's too ugly to be your mother's. I don't think that one is hers.

I believe... Yeah, this is your mother's.

Because there used to be a Rosenthal outlet...

..not far from where we lived.

And your mother would go and buy an odd piece, you know,

seconds or every now and then a piece of Rosenthal. This was one.

There are a couple of them, but over the years

around half of them have been broken or lost or something.

But literally anything... Oh, this would be hers. Yeah. Anything.

This is a Rosenthal, I'm sure it's Rosenthal.

Yeah, anything that says Rosenthal... Is our birth mom's.

Is your mother's, yeah. I was with her when she bought it.

Sometimes we'd go by a bunch of it, so if you go through,

if it says Rosenthal, it's...

So we know what not to break.

GIRLS LAUGH

I hope I'm not breaking anything. I'm just joking.

Yeah, one of your favourite things to do after dinner would be

walk us around the house and show us everything that was going to be ours.

I mean, you always did that. We always knew.

People are just ignorant, that's all.

Oh, my God. Portia!

Baby, Portia! Where...

Portia, Portia!

Look, baby.

You know how everyone in Germany is saying that they cleaned up

so much blood and didn't your dad say there was no blood?

Well, there's a... What?

The CID agent who went, who came after the scene,

he wrote a report and it said that...

The only blood was under her head.

Yeah. Just where she was... had hit her head. And so...

And so are they making that up?

I don't know. It's hard to tell.

I mean, maybe they did. She was saying...

She had seven lacerations, they had to clean up blood, right? Yeah.

And she had a bleeding disorder. Right. Yeah.

Maybe there was more blood than people want to remember but...

The bottom line is, I just don't care.

Like, it happened 18 years ago and our dad had nothing to do with it

and there's nothing that they've said

that ties Dad to anything negative, so it just doesn't make any sense.

It's just what you would think. Yeah. It just pisses me off.

But it still feels like a big deal

because, I mean, saying that there's that much blood,

it makes it similar to the... to our stepmom, and so...

Not only our stepmom. Well, I mean... To Mom.

To Mom, yeah. And...

I don't know.

Oh, my God.

Did you have the occasion to become involved with the autopsy of

Elizabeth Ratliff?

Yes, I did.

Do you have an opinion as to her cause of death? Yes, I do.

What is that opinion?

In my opinion the cause of death of Mrs Ratliff

was blunt trauma of the head.

Do you also have an opinion as to the manner of Mrs Ratliff's death?

In my opinion... Objection.

Overruled. In my opinion,

the manner of death in Mrs Ratliff's case was homicide.

When I think about Elizabeth Ratliff's death, the question

that strikes me as the most important one is, when did she die?

And no-one has really addressed that.

Deborah Radisch apparently hasn't even thought about that issue.

But if she died at 11pm at night,

which is what the state would have you believe,

we know as a matter of science that by eight o'clock the next morning

when her body was found,

it would have substantial signs of rigor mortis.

It would be stiff, and people don't forget that.

When you move a body that's stiff, you remember that.

You can't do a spinal tap very easily

on a body that's in full rigor mortis,

or even substantial rigor mortis,

so we know that she wasn't in rigor mortis.

We know that she couldn't have died at 11 o'clock at night.

Barbara Malagnino told us that her body was still warm to the touch,

and so, the physical evidence is much more consistent with

her having died some time that morning

than when the state said she died,

late in the evening the night before.

One of the things that forensic pathologists sometimes do is

to determine a time of death.

Yes.

Rigor mortis, or "rye-gor" mortis, is something that medical examiners

use to at least get an estimate of time of death, right?

Yes, generally a rough estimate, that would be correct.

And rule of thumb is

it develops pretty much over about a 12-hour period,

give or take some time... Yes.

And it remains, and when we're talking about rigor,

we're talking about stiffness to the touch, right? Yes.

If somebody is found on a step in a particular position

and rigor has started, you take them off the step,

they're still going to be in that position. That's correct.

And so for example, if someone died at 11pm, one would expect

by eight o'clock or nine o'clock or ten o'clock the next morning,

certainly by 11 o'clock the next morning,

to see some significant rigor, right?

Yes.

And do you know whether or not

anyone who was with Elizabeth Ratliff's body that morning

from 8am till, say, 12 noon when her body was moved into the next room,

do you know whether anyone reported any kind of rigor?

No, I don't know if anyone made that observation.

And you know, do you not, that Michael Peterson was at home

with his then wife Patty when Elizabeth Ratliff's body was found?

Are you aware of that?

No, I don't know.

That's all I have. Thank you, doctor.

The state of North Carolina does not intend to call additional witnesses

and with that, the state of North Carolina would

rest its case in chief at this time.

All right, Mr Rudolf. Will there be evidence for the defendant?

I'm not sure, Your Honour.

We'll make a decision about that tonight and if there is evidence,

we'll certainly be prepared to go forward on Monday morning.

We will see you Monday morning at 9:30.