I'm better at predicting elections. I believed O.J. would be found guilty. I do think Peterson will be found guilty, however.
In my opinion the poll is flawed in that it should differentiate between first and second degree murder convictions. I think that a second degree murder verdict is very possible, at least as a compromise between not guilty and first degree. My personal opinion is that he's probably guilty. The evidence that is most convincing to me is her hair on the pliers in the boat, him buying the boat and its maiden voyage being a hundred mile drive to the coast which is coincidentally the same place that her body is later found. I'm glad I'm not on the jury though because it would be tough decision.
Yes, I know. I started to have more choices but wanted to keep it simple feeling people would offer their opinions about first and second degree convictions.
Strictly speaking, the answer to the question posed must be "yes." He will be found either guilty or innocent (not guilty.) Perhaps a better question would be "Will Scott Peterson be found guilty?"
All sides have made this more of a show that what it really is, a man on trial for alledgly killing his wife and unborn child. What most people out of the area might not know is that there are 2 unsolved cases very simular, (pregnant women found dumped in the bay). One of them was also from Modesto. I haven't seen all of the evidence, but from what I have read, I don't see that the prosecution has presented a strong case. All circumstantial. And you really don't know what kind of person Lacy was or if she fooled around like her scumbag husband as well.
I agree with Bill but for a different reason. If I believe him to be guilty , do I answer "yes" or "no?" The choice of answers does not correspond to the question. The choices should be: 1) Guilty 2) Not Guilty (which is different than "innocent" 3) Hung jury Sorry Jimmy, but the Yes/No answers indicate experimenter bias. As it is, my own opinion, based soley on network TV coverage of the case...guilty. Jack
Boy, I did [/`] goof up this poll. Just goes to show what staying awake three days in a row watching the returns can do to one. Gotta go to bed tonight. It's all over now.
May I chiime in? I've been busy on a huge project (actually two huge projects) for over two months and have not had time to post here, as most of you know. I still intend to circle back and bring closure to the now-mostly-forgotten threads that I was right in the middle of... including the religious one in which Bill Grover had just dealt me a near-fatal blow to which I was preparing to respond (and to which I still plan on responding) when I got pulled away. I still don't have time to post here, but my interest in this particular subject drew me back for a moment... for reasons that should soon be clear. Lemmee get this out of the way first: Yes, the poll, as worded, is flawed... but I don't think there's a person here who, nevertheless, didn't figure out what Jimmy meant and, therefore, how s/he should respond. But that's not what brought me back here. I know more -- and, believe me, I don't necessarily consider this to be a good thing -- about the Laci Peterson case than anyone here. Notice that I didn't qualify that explicit claim, as I usually do, with hedging words like "probably" or "possibly." I am, indeed, daring to say that I know more about the case than anyone here, period. I'm certainly, I dare say, the only person here who has ever actually met or communicated with Scott Peterson and/or his family; or with Laci Peterson's family and/or friends; or with any of Scott's attorneys; or with police or prosecutors. You see, among the several "15 minutes of fame" that I've had in this life is that I just happen to be the person who built the official (Laci's-family-owned) Laci Peterson missing person web site back in late December of 2002; and I ran said site through the first quarter of 2003 until about a week before Laci's and Conner's remains finally washed-up at Point Isabel in mid-April of that year. I donated my time to build and run the site (and to write all its articles, etc.) -- to the tune of an equivalent value of over $15,000 at my normal hourly rate -- ostensibly because I thought it was a good cause; and also because the webmaster at the time literally begged me to do it. As an aside, I ask of everyone here: Please do not judge my web site building skills based on the now-dysfunctional, aesthetically stomach-turning, unforgivably amateurish-looking web site debacle -- a mere remnant, today, of what I built then -- that one sees when one visits the Official Laci Peterson Web Site as it appears now! Since I left that site, whomever has been running it (and I'm pretty sure it's still John, the original webmaster who asked me to take the three-page mess that he had originally built using a Yahoo web building tool and turn it into something really special; and who, in part because he's a busy sales exec for a big computer chipmaker, clearly knows even less about web site building than he does about... oh... let's say... brain surgery, for example) has made an unholy mess of it with which I'm ashamed, today, to admit that I was once ever even remotely involved. But I digress. Those of you who followed the case closely may (but probably don't) remember my seemingly countless appearances back then on Greta Van Susterin's (and other) show(s) on the FOX NEWS CHANNEL; or on various shows on CNN, MSNBC, and Court-TV; or on all but two or three of the local TV stations in Sacramento, San Francisco and/or Fresno; or in various newspapers, magazines, etc. It was a nightmarish merry-go-round, actually. At the peak of public interest in the case I was getting from several hundred to, literally, several thousand emails a day; and to this day, though I've had nothing whatsoever to do with the case or the web site in a year and a half, I still get from 20 to 200 emails a day... most of it from bona fide nutjobs; and I still hear from reporters and producers wanting anything new that I might have to tell them either privately or for the record. It's a stink, I tell you, that I just can't seem to get off me, despite the fact that I've been publicly silent about the case since April of 2003. Perhaps it is a testament to my respect for degreeinfo.com that I have curiously chosen this time and place to essentially break my public silence. Go figure. One of the only two things regarding any of it about which I'm genuinely proud is that after the site had been up for a little while I began to hear from people who sort of "live" in the "missing persons" world (i.e., cops, investigators, prosecutors, executive directors of non-profit missing persons foundations, etc.) who told me that they had, necessarily, seen alot of missing person sites in their day; and that what I had built was, by far, the most effective and generally best missing person web site they had ever seen -- a standard, several of them said, by which all other missing persons sites should be measured. One of the producers from John Walsh's "America's Most Wanted" was the first of several to encourage me to write a book or build a site telling others how to build an effective missing person web site that gets alot of needed attention; and Court-TV's Nancy Grace (whom I personally despise, I should point out) verily gushed over the site one evening back then when she was guest-hosting on CNN's "Larry King Live." The other thing I'm proud of is that between the "viral marketing" techniques that I shamelessly (and, to hear Laci's mother tell it, inappropriately) implemented on that site; and my frequent appearances on TV during which I insisted that the site's URL appear continuously in the chiron across the bottom of the screen during my segment, I helped drive more people to that site in a typical afternoon than any other high-profile missing person site (such as Elizabeth Smart's, for example) was typically able to garner in an entire month... or even several months, in most cases. You see, at the time I believed that someone out there knew something, but didn't know they knew it. I needed to get them to the site -- kicking and screaming, if need be -- so I could jog their memory. That's why I was so unapologetically shameless. At any rate, though I believe that Scott probably did it, I have been troubled from very early on by the public rush to judgement; and by the concomitant police and prosecutorial incompetence (and even misconduct) as their weak and completely circumstantial case against him (which included no physical or forensic evidence, whatsoever) was hurriedly built. Please remember that I know things about the case that none of you will probably ever know... that is, unless I write a book or something (which has never been in my plans... and still isn't). My inevitable falling-out with Laci's family and the countless others in the then-ever-growing angry mob that was trying to hang Scott Peterson from the nearest tall oak began, in part, when I refused to declare him guilty before he had even been arrested; and, especially, when I appeared on the FOX NEWS CHANNEL's "Hannity & Colmes" program in April of 2003 and expressed my grave concerns over the rush to judgement, and whether Scott could receive a truly fair trial; and I said, and I quote, that "I'd rather see Scott Peterson go free than to have even one juror enter the courtroom already knowing how he or she was going to vote." That, as you can imagine, did not play well with the swelling "there he is... let's get him" throng that had, by then, become literally millions-strong across the nation -- many of them sending me hate mail -- and with Laci's anguished mother having become their ex officio leader and poster child. When Mark Garagos told the jury that there were good and strong leads left inadequately explored by police; and which suggested alternative scenarios that did not fundamentally defy logic -- as much of the state's case does -- that, believe me, was an understatement. If you only knew. All that having been said, I reiterate that I believe Scott probably did it; and that he's a cad, in any case. But it is my opinion that the state failed to make its case here; and I wonder (and I stress the word "wonder") if I could vote "guilty" were I a juror. Considering the state's having so strongly argued premeditation to the exclusion of all other possibilities, I think that the judge's having granted the state's request to allow the jury to convict on the lesser charge of second-degree murder borders on (and may, in fact, be) reversable error. Prior to the judge's having done that, I was predicting a hung jury; but since the jury now has a way to convict Peterson -- whom they hate, as a person -- of a lesser crime, I am now predicting a guilty verdict... and by no later than Tuesday afternoon... possibly (but not likely) even Monday. Sadly, under every state's theory, second-degree murder just doesn't fit here; and there is, in my opinion, no way on earth that, short of an unimpeachable eye witness having actually seen him do the deed, Scott Peterson (nor anyone else, for that matter) should ever be convicted of capital murder on such a weak state's case. I know it's an unpopular position for which I'm sure my many detractors will roundly trounce me in the world's anti-Scott forums and web sites (where, incidently, I have been handily trounced several times already), but it is, nevertheless, my position... and I stand by it. But then, again, I'm a bleeding-heart liberal who categorically opposes and abhors the death penalty (and has, without exception, for my entire adolescent-thru-adult life... pretty much ever since I was old enough to truly understand the issue); and who is a staunch supporter of The Innocence Project and other similar groups and movements. So... maybe I'm not the best person to ask.
Re: Larry King Show Actually, I've never completely understood the obsession, period -- be it on CNN's "Larry King Live" or anywhere else! But when one looks back at the server logs of the Official Laci Peterson Website that I built, and sees the sheer numbers of people who visited it in any hour or two immediately following one of my appearances on TV back then, there's no question that I had at least a small hand in creating the obsession... ...a distinction of which I'm thoroughly unproud (notwithstanding that "unproud" isn't actually a word). I've been asked many times -- both on and off the record -- why this case and not others? Why, when so many other women go missing every year in California, alone, did this case get (and continues to get) so much attention? And why has it caused such a passionate -- even hysterical -- public response... a veritable furor? And my answer is: I don't completely know... ...but I suspect it had a lot to do, firstly, with its being yet another missing woman from Modesto, from where the earlier-missing, and well-known Washington, DC intern Chandra Levy also hailed. And I suspect it had a lot to do with the fact that the pixie-faced Laci, with her irresistably-dimpled smile, was arguably gorgeous... or at least appeared so to most people in all of her photos. So was her husband, to many; and they made a picture-perfect couple, too. We we all know that America responds to beautiful people. Look at the more recent Lori Hacking case: Hacking was, arguably, every bit as attractive in her photos as Laci Peterson... and just look how the press glommed onto the case... summarily ignoring the plight of all the other, perhaps less attractive women who have gone missing in Hacking's state both before and since. Or look at the Elizabeth Smart case: Though she was just a child, even in those early photos and video tapes one could see that she already had "the look," and was clearly going to become a beautiful woman someday... that is, if she was even still alive back then. The press jumped on Smart's case with a bloodlust... summarily ignoring the plight of thousands of other, perhaps less-attractive missing children that year, both in her state and across the country. One only need look as far as one's television, movies or virtually any magazine: Beautiful people get lots and lots and lots of attention -- and inordinate breaks in life, too, I might add... at least according to several studies of the subject that have been conducted in the past few years. And, unlike the vast majority of other of California's missing women that year (and since), Laci was white and middle class and wasn't a drug addict or prostitute (as many of them are); and it was probably much easier for America's women to identify with her; to say to themselves, "There but for the grace of God go I." After all, statistics show that many such woman are in terrible relationships, themselves; in which they're routinely battered by some creep they don't know how to get away from; and they know, deep down, that it could go too far some day; and that the same fate could befall them because, after all, they, too, watch all those late-night, real-life crime TV shows on A&E and Court-TV wherein it's always the mean ol' husband who ends-up being the killer of the hapless and unsuspecting housewife. And Laci was pregnant -- and nearly full-term, to boot... let's not forget that tantalizing factor. While that, alone, probably wouldn't have done it, I suspect that, when piled atop the foregoing, it helped more than just marginally to pump-up the nation's obsession. And, it all happened on Christmas eve. News of a beautiful, white, middle-class, pregnant woman's disappearance at a normally peaceful and highly-family-oriented time like that tends to be somewhat more publicly startling and attention getting. Again, while that factor, alone, would probably not have done it, when piled atop the foregoing it helped to tip it in nicely. It has always been my theory that, collectively, these factors uniquely combined in this particular case to somehow make the Laci Peterson disappearance inordinately interesting to the world -- especially to the women of the world... that is, if the typical gender of the senders of all that email I received while running the Laci Peterson web site (and since) was(is) any indication. And, believe me, it really was the entire world that took an interest. While running that web site I received email from every single country... still do. At any rate, according to my theory, if you take all of the foregoing, and then allow to descend upon it a generally bored, ratings-craving, pathologically opportunistic, and highly-sensationalized press in a competitive, reality-TV world, then, voila, suddenly you've got a bona fide national obsession on your hands! Then there's one more thing that helped, alot, to create America's weird obsession with this case, and that is the pure, masterful and unapologetic manipulation of the press at the time by both the Modesto police and that city's Carole Sund/Carrington Memorial Reward Foundation which had effective "mind control" over Laci's family, who uttered neither a public or private peep without both having the permission of, and then being carefully scripted by, those two covertly conspiratorial entities. And you know the media: What it can't have, it fights even harder to get. Tantalize (but refuse to completely satisfy) the media on a big enough story, and you effectively control it. In the Laci Peterson case, the police and the Sund/Carrington foundation controlled the media deftly and with aplomb. The Sund/Carrington Foundation had, you see, been the pivot point of the entire public relations aspect of the earlier Chandra Levy missing person case; and had, by so doing, learned a thing or two about media manipulation and general underhandedness. It was, in fact, the unabashely manipulative and conspiratorial nature of it all, and the uneasy feeling I got every time I was asked to leave out something from my articles on the Laci Peterson web site -- things which I felt the public had a right to know, and which, because of my closeness to the case, I knew for a fact would not hurt the investigation, as both police and the Sund/Carrington Foundation were constantly warning us all would happen if we dared say anthing about anything -- that contributed, as well, to my wanting to get the hell away from them all in the days and weeks before I finally left. As for why it became such an obsession on "Larry King Live," I happen to know the answer to that one because I've spoken about it, at length, with a couple of that show's producers. In largest measure, it was because of Court-TV's Nancy Grace's occasional guest-hosting appearances. At first Larry gave the case just a few minutes of his show's time every now and then -- and mostly only when something new and noteworthy had actually happened. But then Nancy Grace, whose deafening and often irrational anti-Scott Peterson shrill has, in my opinion, neither a historical or hysterical equal -- started devoting entire of Larry's programs to the case whenever she occasionally guest-hosted. CNN took one look at the resulting Nielson ratings and... well... you do the math. Now, "Larry King Live" is under virtual orders from CNN to talk about the Laci Peterson case as often and for as long as both the story stays hot, and Larry can stand it... and, believe me, he's sick to death of it. Hope that helps.
Nutjobs abound. And here I thought I'd have to travel all the way back to Indiana and attend one of your church services in order for me to ever have the opportunity to say this after something you've said: Amen, Preacher!
The DesElms-Coolidge Loquacity Spectrum (DECLSPEC) A woman once bet that she could get more than two words out of President Coolidge, and told him so. "You lose," he replied. Welcome back, Gregg. Really. Nuff said.
I've removed several tastless and inappropriate posts (and the responses to them) and dealt with the individual making said postings. Just wanted everyone to know. Thanks Chip
DesElms, I'm pleased that you're still popping in to DegreeInfo every now and then, I for one had missed your posts.
yes, thanks Chip. they were beyond the bounds of good taste. this is not a carnival show kids - it is someone's life we are talking about. The jury will decide his fate and the cards will fall from there.
