Scott Peterson’s death penalty reversal a gut punch to those seeking justice for Laci
In taking the death penalty off the table for Scott Peterson on a technicality, California Supreme Court justices never said he didn’t kill his wife.
In fact, it’s clear they think he did.
In Monday’s ruling, Supreme Court justices pointed to “considerable circumstantial evidence incriminating” him in the Christmas Eve 2002 disappearance of his pregnant 27-year-old wife, Laci. The bodies of mother and fetus washed ashore in San Francisco Bay nearly four months later near the spot Scott said he fished that day, and jurors in Redwood City two years later deemed him worthy of death for double murder.
Monday’s ruling agreed with the prosecution’s version of events on nearly every point of contention, from dog-scent and ocean current evidence to Scott’s odd behavior consistent with guilt, both before and after Laci vanished. Justices said Scott received a fair trial and agreed with trial Judge Al Delucchi at every turn. Except one.
Justices canceled Scott’s death sentence because Delucchi had improperly excused 13 prospective jurors among 1,500 who filled out written pretrial questionnaires. The 13 had professed themselves opposed to the death penalty, but should have been verbally questioned instead of summarily dismissed, justices ruled.
Many seeking justice for Laci and her unborn son, Conner — here in Modesto, her hometown, but also throughout the country and beyond — will find this a bitter pill to swallow.
“My heart is broken for Laci’s family. It made me cry,” said juror Richelle Nice on the telephone Monday. She was nicknamed Strawberry Shortcake by media observing the blockbuster trial stretching most of 2004.
“I can only imagine how they feel,” juror Mike Belmessieri said in a separate conversation. He felt a kinship with Dennis Rocha, Laci’s father, after the trial, partly because of similar military services decades ago.
“The sonofabitch killed (Rocha’s) daughter,” Belmessieri continued. “I would squeeze the trigger to end his life, if it was going to ease the pain of my brother.”
It wouldn’t. Rocha died in December 2018, only eight months after the death of Ron Grantski, the longtime companion of Laci’s mother and a prominent father figure in her life.
Scott’s mother, Jackie, died in 2013, and the trial judge, Delucchi, died in 2008.
Death does not appear on the horizon for Scott, now 47 and incarcerated in San Quentin Prison.
Stanislaus County District Attorney Birgit Fladager, who led the prosecution team back in 2004, has not said whether her prosecutors might try to hand Peterson a sentence of capital punishment again in a new proceeding. Meanwhile, California has not imposed a death sentence in 14 years, and Gov. Gavin Newsom says no one will be executed as long as he’s in charge.
Meanwhile, Scott’s team retains hope for a new trial in the second of his twin appeals, called a habeas corpus petition, which the Supreme Court has yet to rule on.
In their ruling this week, Supreme Court justices almost seemed almost apologetic: “We have no choice but to reverse the death sentence,” they said. Delucchi and Fladager’s team should have known better, justices said, because the Supreme Court was forced to reverse another death verdict for the exact same reason only a few months before Peterson’s trial.
Monday’s ruling should be required reading for any judge or attorney involved in any death penalty case, in hopes of avoiding these kinds of mistakes that add even more heartache to unspeakable tragedy.
This story was originally published August 25, 2020 at 5:00 AM with the headline "Scott Peterson’s death penalty reversal a gut punch to those seeking justice for Laci."