Death on the Staircase: The Last Chance Storyville

This programme contains some strong language and scenes which some viewers may find upsetting.

INAUDIBLE

After a sensational five-month long trial,

Michael Peterson will soon learn the fate that awaits him.

The 12 members of the jury are now in their fifth day

of deliberations.

Will they find that Michael Peterson

used a blow poke to brutally murder his wife Kathleen?

Or will they instead believe the defence's theory, that she

fell down the stairs in the couple's Durham mansion?

A verdict is expected in the next few hours.

Has the jury reached a unanimous verdict

on the issue that was submitted to them?

-Yes.

-All right. If you will give that sheet to the deputy, please.

Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, you have returned the following verdict -

State of North Carolina versus Michael Iver Peterson.

"We, the twelve members of the jury,

"unanimously find the defendant to be guilty of first degree murder."

This, the 10th day of October, 2003,

signed by foreperson Christian Lion Jones.

Is this your verdict, so say you all?

-ALL: Yes.

-Juror number one, Mr Harrison, would you please stand.

Mr Harrison, your foreperson has returned

for your verdict that the defendant is guilty of first-degree murder.

Is this your verdict and do you still assent thereto?

-Yes.

-Thank you. Juror number 12, Mr Hall.

Mr Hall, your foreperson has returned for your verdict that

the defendant is guilty of first-degree murder.

Is this your verdict and do you still assent thereto?

-Yes.

-Thank you.

Ms Clerk, the defendant is imprisoned in the North Carolina Department of Corrections

for the remainder of his natural life without parole.

When the jury came in, it didn't just disappoint me.

It shook the foundations of my beliefs in the justice system...

..in human beings, in my own abilities...

..in, erm, my judgment...

..in my sense of reality.

I think that what happened today is that an innocent man was

found guilty based on speculation and conjecture and feelings

and that is so incredibly troubling to me.

I didn't do anything. I am innocent. I was wrongly convicted.

I didn't harm Kathleen and I didn't believe,

until the jury clerk read the sentence, that I would be convicted.

My immediate reaction was, "Let's end it."

And I told David that I didn't want an appeal.

I wanted to just end it right now. Forget it.

Enough was enough. We had all suffered enough.

That wonderful - awful - line from Romeo and Juliet,

"All are punished."

I don't know what we were being punished for.

I don't why my children had to suffer what they did.

Why they were being punished.

But I did feel that, "Let this end right now."

I have been here almost 3,000 days, over eight years.

When I first got here, I thought, "I'll be out in a couple of years."

We appealed and we kept appealing and every one of them failed.

And after eight years, I'm still here.

And I began to think I may die in here.

It's been almost ten years since Kathleen died.

But... Well, there's this wonderful photograph in my locker of her.

Every time I open it I see it. And, er...

it's of Kathleen in the Imperial Gardens in Tokyo.

And she's looking for Japanese, because there aren't any...

in downtown Tokyo, because it's not cherry blossom time.

And that's how it always was with her. We were always joking.

And we were always laughing.

So, even though it's been ten years, it's just like yesterday.

She's just as alive to me,

and I love her as much today as I did ten years ago.

-'911, what's your emergency?'

-'1810 Cedar Street. Please!'

-'What's wrong.'

-'My wife had an accident. She's still breathing.'

'What kind of accident?'

'She fell down the stairs. She's still breathing, please!'

-'Is she conscious?'

-'What?'

-'Is she conscious?'

'No, she's not conscious.' Please!'

-'How many stairs did she fall down?'

-'What?'

-'How many stairs?'

-'Stairs!'

-'How many stairs? Calm down, sir. Calm down.'

'No... 15, 20, I don't know. Please!

'Get somebody here right away, please!'

'OK, somebody's dispatching the ambulance while I ask you questions.'

'It's at Forest Hills, OK? Please, please!'

REPORTER: Durham Police, this morning, are investigating

the death of a prominent city resident.

Officers called this morning to the home of Nortel executive

Kathleen Peterson, who was found dead in her Forest Hills

mansion after apparently falling down the stairs.

Kathleen Peterson's husband, Michael Peterson,

is a former columnist for the Durham Herald-Sun newspaper.

He also ran an unsuccessful mayoral bid in 1999 and just last month

failed in a bid for a seat on the Durham city council.

We believe that she was beaten, that she was stunned and was bleeding.

That she probably recovered

and struggled in the doorframe with Mike Peterson, to a degree.

And that he then had to bludgeon her on multiple

occasions after that.

And that she, basically, bled to death.

REPORTER: Michael Peterson's supporters can't believe

he's charged with the murder of his wife Kathleen.

Kathleen Peterson's biological daughter Caitlin Atwater

served as the main spokesperson for the Peterson family.

She stood shoulder to shoulder with Peterson's biological sons

and their sisters, adopted by Kathleen and Mike Peterson.

My mother and Mike had an absolutely loving relationship

and there is no way that either of them

would ever wish any sort of harm on the other one.

In my mind, if Mike finds Kathleen at the bottom of the stairs,

it's a reasonable assumption on his part that she fell down the stairs.

REPORTER: Peterson's attorney, David Rudolf, says the authorities seem to

have jumped to conclusions about Kathleen's death.

Kathleen and I were in here watching a movie.

I'd gone to Blockbusters and rented a video

and we were watching American Sweethearts.

And I think it was probably around about 11 o'clock that

the movie ended and we took our glasses and we came in here.

I think there was...

I'm not sure...we probably had another bottle...

I know we were drinking two bottles that night.

It was a nice night. I guess it was 55, 60 degrees.

Very nice night. And I'd gone outside.

We were just talking and finishing our drinks and then she said,

"I gotta go in because I've got the conference call in the morning."

I stayed right here. Don't think I said anything special to her,

certainly not thinking this was the last time I was going to see her.

And the last I saw her was when I was there

and she was just walking here.

And...that's it.

That was the last time I saw Kathleen alive.

No, she was alive when I found her, but barely.

'OK, is she awake now? Hello?'

(SOBBING)

'Hello?'

It's impossible for me to believe,

if that's the back of her head, that that could be caused from a

series of missteps, or fall, down 15 flights.

I mean 15 different stairs.

I can't see that happening.

The medical examiner doesn't believe that it was possible either.

This had to occur from multiple inflictions of blunt force trauma.

It just never occurred to Michael Peterson that people wouldn't

believe him when he said that she fell down the stairs.

That's really what this is all about.

He thought he'd get away with it.

I remember Dad actually explaining it to us

and he was just like, he was in shock,

and he was just shaking, and he was like,

"I didn't do it. You have to believe me."

And we were like, "Dad, we believe you. This is horrible.

"How can we not believe you?"

We didn't even know any details yet and we were just like,

"We believe you, we believe you.

"We know it's not true. This is horrible."

It was just so upsetting. I couldn't believe it.

But it was so hard to think about that

because, at the same time, we were thinking about our mother.

It was like two bombshells, I guess, hitting us.

We had a wonderful life.

There were five children, Kathleen, and myself.

Two of the children were mine from my first wife, Clayton and Todd.

There were two wonderful girls, Margaret and Martha,

who came to me when their father and their mother died.

And then there was Kathleen's child, from her first marriage, Caitlin.

We lived together for 14 years,

and we were happy every one of those years.

I started to have doubts, of course. I mean, how can you not

when you're hearing all these rumours going around

and things like that.

But it was the physical evidence that allowed me

to actually go back and look at the situation as a whole.

Because reading the autopsy report, I think was the point at which

I was convinced that my mother had been murdered.

Obviously the horrific intensity of the wounds and the fact that I just,

to me, could not physically come up with a way that you could get seven

deep lacerations on the back of your head by falling down the stairs.

And she goes, "Margaret, did you look at the autopsy report?"

And I said, "Yes, I looked through them thoroughly."

And she said, "There's no way Mom

"could have just fallen down the stairs.

"There's no way." And I was like, "You're not a doctor, Caitlin."

One of the hardest things to deal with was losing Caitlin.

And so quickly too. Just like that. Just never see her again.

It's never just Caitlin,

it's Margaret, Martha, Caitlin in a picture.

And it never was anything different than that.

We just had just a long history, and she's our sister.

I did consider Martha and Margaret my sisters

and my mother considered them her daughters,

but my goal, my strength in life is completely opposite.

It's in seeking justice for my mother. That's what I'm here for.

-Good morning, to each of you.

-ALL: Good morning.

In a very real sense, this case is about pretence and appearances.

It's about things not being as they seem.

The defendant says that Kathleen Peterson's death was

caused by a tragic accidental fall down stairs in their home.

And we say, on the other hand, that she died a horrible,

painful death at the hands of her husband, Michael Peterson.

This is one of the first photographs taken of her

as she's lying on a steel gurney in the Medical Examiner's office

after they've shaved her head

so that they can determine where the wounds are.

This is where the rubber meets the road, ladies and gentlemen.

They say it's an accident that was caused by a couple of falls

in that stairway and we say it's not.

We say it's murder.

Agent Duane Deaver is the blood spatter expert who's going to

talk about how he contends Kathleen was impacted in this area.

Duane Deaver finds what he will call are several points of origin.

And what he will also say is that, from his perspective, this was

very, very important because it was above the floor.

It was above the step area.

He will say that it's positioned in such

a manner that these can't be due to an accidental impact on the stairs.

Can you imagine somebody beating somebody over the head,

whacking them as hard as they can - because you don't whack

somebody like this when you're trying to kill them.

Imagine that there's no skull fracture.

There's no brain contusions.

There's no swelling of the brain.

There's none of the internal haemorrhages, subdurals,

things like that, that you would see from that kind of injury.

No, none of them.

Because the truth is not that Michael Peterson decided to

beat Kathleen Peterson to death with a blow poker

in the stairway of his home after spending a quiet evening.

That's not the truth of what happened.

The truth is that Kathleen Peterson, after drinking some wine

and some champagne and taking some Valium, tried to walk up a narrow,

poorly lit stairway in flip flops and she fell and she bled to death.

Everyone who really knew that relationship...

Everyone... knew that they loved each other.

Everyone who knew them knows that Michael Peterson had nothing

to do with the death of Kathleen Peterson.

One of the most awful things that could ever befall somebody is

to think to yourself,

"The only way I'm ever going to get out of here is in a coffin."

And that thought - I won't say it occurred to me often -

but every so often it would flit across my mind.

And I would think to myself, "Boy, he's there until he dies."

And it was only when all this publicity started coming out about

Deaver that I started feeling like maybe, maybe there was a chance.

The decision... Judge Calvin E Murphy rules that Gregory F Taylor

has proved by clear and convincing evidence

that Gregory F Taylor is innocent of the charge of first degree murder

of Jacquetta Thomas on September 26, 1991.

A Wake County man, who spent 17 years in prison, has been

exonerated by the North Carolina Innocence Commission in Raleigh.

Greg Taylor, who had been condemned to life in prison in 1993,

is now a free man.

The commission's three-judge panel centred around the testimony

of one SBI agent - Duane Deaver.

Deaver admits to having misrepresented blood test

results in the Taylor case.

The SBI has announced plans for an internal investigation.

Deaver is a major character in the emerging story

of the SBI's troubles.

At the bureau's crime labs, where Deaver had been a key agent

and trainer, analysts charged with using science to solve crimes

have hidden test results or concocted bizarre experiments

to shore up a prosecutor's case.

I interviewed Tonya Rogers,

who was one of jurors in the Michael Peterson trial.

She said that Deaver's testimony was the most important evidence

presented at the trial.

Ms Rogers said that, during the jury's deliberations,

they started off split, 6-6 or 8-4, but as they talked the most

powerful evidence that moved the jury to come 12-0 for a conviction

was that bloodstain on the inside of Michael Peterson's shorts.

The jury was convinced by Deaver's testimony that the only way

the bloodstain could have arrived there was through an assault.

When I heard what Deaver had done in the Greg Taylor case,

it became clear to me that I might be able to finally prove that

what he had done in Michael's case was the same sort of thing.

In other words, ignore the facts, ignore the science,

and do what you need to do to get a conviction.

Ten years ago next Friday, Kathleen Peterson was found

dead at the bottom of a staircase in their home.

Almost two years after that, her husband Mike Peterson was

found guilty of murder and sentenced to life in prison.

Now Mike Peterson hopes a hearing that could begin next week

will give him a new chance at freedom.

The district attorney's office has seen some turnover

since Peterson's murder trial in 2003.

The original DA, Jim Hardin, is now a superior court judge.

Freda Black, the assistant DA at the time,

is no longer with the district attorney's office.

Tracey Cline, who is Durham's current DA, will represent the State.

Some of the key players have remained the same -

Orlando Hudson, Durham County's Superior Court Judge, and

David Rudolf, who is taking on the case pro bono, are back on the case.

Oh, wow, it's Ron Guerette!

Martha, Ron Guerette just walked in.

-Oh my God. Hi!

-Hey, girl.

I'm going to get up and hug you.

I'm on the phone with Martha, with my sister.

-You're not a kid any more.

-Good to see you. I know!

-What have you been up to?

-Just working in this crazy world.

Yeah, I know what you mean.

He's trying to come back from his near-bankruptcy

in 2003 as a result of working on your father's case.

-Still working on it.

-Wow, it's been eight years.

I can't believe it.

-You've gone from a little kid to a young lady.

-Little kid?

-I was, like, 20!

-You were still a little kid.

-Yeah, I'm turning 30 on Saturday.

-Is that right?

-Yeah, it's been ten years.

-Wow!

-Yeah.

Yeah, because Mom died on the 9th and I turned 20 on the 10th

-and...

-Oh, that's right!

-Crazy.

-That is crazy.

-Yeah, I'm married now.

-Are you?

Well, congratulations.

'Well, one thing about Radisch, Deaver

'and Butts is they have been in this very courtroom before.

'They have. They've testified in front of people just like you.

'Agent Deaver, Doctor Radisch, they are tried and true. Tried and true.

'Because they work for us.

'Now to hear them tell it, that scene was altered.

'if you believe that, you're just going to have to believe

-'that Duane Deaver is just a liar.'

-Pleasant memories?

'He has no reason in the world to come up here and lie to you.'

-Wow, that one...

-Where she says you have...

-Where she says they'll

be back in the courtroom again - it just gave me chills.

And you have to believe that Deaver's a liar. Guess what?

And he tried to get himself vindicated by blaming it

on the SBI in general and that got him fired.

Well, after editing that stuff for you for the Deaver clips,

my husband watched it too and he goes, "This guy's an idiot."

-Yeah. I know.

-Greg Taylor was let out.

-How long was he in prison?

-17 years.

-Yeah, he was in there for quite a while.

-Oh, my God.

That's terrible.

Like, it's just a little lie that

put someone away for 17 years.

That's devastating. God.

Greg Taylor. I live in Durham, North Carolina.

49 years old.

When I was 29 years old, I was arrested for first-degree

murder and tried and convicted April 1993.

I was 31 years old at the time and I was married, had

a nine-year-old daughter and after that things just kind of fell apart.

In the beginning you think that the next appeal you'll be free or

the next motion filed in court and then when those things let you

down, you come to realise that if you've been let down so many times

so far, there's nothing to stop you from being let down in the future.

And it just went on interminably until finally when I had exhausted

all my appeals and I realised that the chances were very good that

I was going to die in prison and I had to learn how to deal with that.

I don't have faith in the system like

I used to have, but I still believe - I hope -

that justice will finally prevail after eight years.

And I'll get out of here.

I want people to see what Duane Deaver did.

I want all of it to come out.

I want people to see what that man did not just to me,

but to other people.

He'd say these ridiculous things and I just would not pay any attention.

I wouldn't even listen anymore, thinking that nobody could believe

this nonsense of hitting Kathleen 42 times or whatever it was.

This re-enactment that he did. It was just all a lie.

So, at the time, I just thought, well, this is just stupid,

nobody's going to believe this. But they did.

I do think that it's Michael's last chance.

It's been eight years.

He is now 68 years old and all of his appeals have been denied

and this is really the best opportunity that we're going

to have to prove that he should never have been convicted.

19, please.

All right, Mike. They're saying that they took your clothes

over yesterday to have them prepared.

Come on with me, please.

I remember just a couple of nights ago, I dreamed I was there,

old man, lying on a gurney at the end of a corridor.

You go to central prison and you die.

And you die alone, no family, no-one.

And you die on a gurney.

And I remember having that dream and waking up

thinking, "No!" But it was a pretty scary dream.

Mike, is this going to be good enough for you today?

Is it what you want to wear?

OK. That sports coat? That shirt? Belt? OK.

INAUDIBLE EXCHANGE

-Sorry.

-MICHAEL LAUGHS

Judge, Mrs Zamperini wants to be heard. And she is a victim, Judge,

because I believe that Mr Peterson was convicted of first degree murder.

Her sister was murdered, according to a jury.

So Mrs Zamperini would like to be heard

if the court is inclined just to give her a few minutes.

-All right.

-Thank you, Your Honour.

Yes, sir.

Good morning, um, Judge Orlando.

I think you're aware that I am Kathleen's sister.

In this court, that is very rarely heard.

KATHLEEN is a victim of murder. We have rights in this state.

That is why there's a judge in this courtroom

to make sure victims' rights are heard.

That is, in my opinion, the judge's sole responsibility,

to make sure that there is clear, fair, quality representation

for the victim, dead or alive.

My sister has lied in her grave for ten years.

This Friday, ten years, she was murdered.

SHE BANGS THE TABLE Ten years, I've been without my sister.

Ten years, her daughter hasn't had her.

And, ten years, the rest of us have been alive and had our freedom.

But not Kathleen. Not Kathleen.

She wanted to live and she deserves

and should get the best, best legal representation.

And there is no way I feel, sir,

that you can have this district attorney represent my sister's rights

and feel you are doing the best job by the citizens of this state

in having her represent and not the Attorney General's office step in.

She is not prepared. It is clear she is not prepared.

The office is not prepared.

Thank you very much, sir.

All right. The court, in its discretion,

will deny the motion to continue.

The court is ready to proceed.

Your Honour, the key issue during Mr Peterson's trial

was what happened in the stairway.

There was only one witness called by the state

who claimed to be able to say what happened in the stairway.

And that was SBI agent Duane Deaver.

He testified that the bloodstain patterns in the stairway

proved that there had been a beating.

He testified that the bloodstains on Michael Peterson's shorts -

and, in particular, there was a stain inside the shorts -

and on his shoes proved that he inflicted this alleged beating,

because he claimed he could tell that the wearer of those items

was in close proximity to Kathleen Peterson when her head was impacted.

But we don't have to take my word

for whether Mr Deaver was a critical witness.

We can listen to district attorney Jim Hardin.

'Now what does Duane Deaver find?'

This is the first area that he contends

is the first point of impact.

This is above the 15th step.

It's off the wall. It's off the riser and it's out in space.

Impact spatter in the crotch area of these pants,

in the back side of this right leg.

Duane Deaver said the only way that can happen is if he's standing

over her with his leg above her striking her.

'Now why do we know there was a second assault?'

Because Duane Deaver says, and this is absolutely critical,

Duane Deaver sees blood spatter on top of the clean-up.

There's only one way that can happen.

If there's a second assault.

'He assaulted her,

'she went down,

'he continued to assault her,'

and that's when the premeditation formulated.

And, of course, the only thing Mr Peterson was charged with was first degree,

so, without premeditation, the state's case failed.

And the state relied upon Duane Deaver during the trial.

'There's been no evidence in this case'

that anything that was done to that scene altered the walls.

Nobody was walking on the walls.

'There's been no evidence, no credible evidence,

'that anybody did anything to the stairwell.'

Well, if you believe that,

you're just going to have to believe that Duane Deaver is just a liar...

and he has no reason in the world to come here and lie to you.

'Agent Deaver, Dr Radisch,'

they are tried and true,

tried and true, cos they work for us.

What we didn't know then about Duane Deaver,

but we do know now, is that Duane Deaver had

a pattern and practice of preparing misleading expert reports,

of doing shoddy and scientifically invalid work,

of presenting misleading testimony under oath.

He did it in 2010

at the Innocence Commission Hearing, State vs Greg Taylor.

We never asked for a perfect trial. We hoped to get a fair trial

and I know that this court did its best...

-ALARM WAILS

-..to give us a fair trial.

ALARM CONTINUES

Thank you very much. I think that's my cue.

-It's Candace.

-Yeah, I'm sure that's right.

ALARM CONTINUES

WOMAN: Yeah, leave the building.

VOICES ON RADIOS

PEOPLE CHATTER MAN: Everybody, move back.

-Back of the lot!

-Move back, move back!

-Man, let's move.

Let's go, man.

-It's a bomb threat.

-Are you serious?

-It's a bomb threat.

-It's a bomb threat?

-Yeah.

-Oh... Oh, my God.

It was surprising to see that >

40% of Hardin's closing statement was about Duane Deaver.

It was about his research,

-his testimony, and...

-That was pretty shocking.

I don't think they had anything else that made it first degree

-and that was all Deaver.

-That was it. Exactly.

-Made me feel sick to my stomach.

-I know.

-Ten years a-wasted.

-Yeah.

-Nine years a-wasted.

-Mike, there you go.

-OK, thank you.

-Don't drop the plate.

-No, I got it, I got it.

My God, I'm wearing this ten-pound boot on my foot!

-HE LAUGHS

-I can barely move!

What was so nice was to see everybody and my children there.

I can't really talk to them. That's not allowed.

I certainly can't touch them or interact with them,

so that's very hard,

but it's wonderful to know that they're there.

Should be in one of these here.

-Dad, we're here! We're here! Oh, my God!

-I know!

-Dad, we love you!

-Oh, my God!

-Oh, my God!

-I have never been so tired in my life.

-BILL:

-I can relate!

-Oh, God!

-But everything's OK?

-Yeah.

-You like LA?

-Yeah, I love LA.

-And you love Boulder?

-I don't love it, but it's good.

-You look great.

-Thank you.

-You look...

-Margaret's helping me with fashion tips.

LAUGHTER

-Well, what did you think of Candace?

-HE LAUGHS

-Wow, how was that?

-Dad, are you safe?

I'm afraid she's going to hunt you down!

And I told you that from the beginning - don't hate.

-Don't get caught up in it. And you could see that in her face...

-Yeah.

-..and her eyes...

-And her hands.

-Just CONSUMED by hatred.

-Yeah.

And yes, you know, I understand it.

But she can't be the only victim, you see.

You guys are victims. I'm a victim.

Um... You don't have to be there all day, every day.

I want to, it's fascinating! I'm so angry at Deaver!

I just want to see all the crap that's talked about him.

-SHE LAUGHS

-You know, sometimes I wonder,

-"Where was I during some of that trial?"

-I know!

-Yeah!

-I don't remember some of that stuff.

-Yeah.

-He was so...

-He was so boring!

-Yeah, he was gross.

-He was just boring and gross.

-Supercilious, a know-it-all...

-Yeah!

-He was really terrible.

Oh, I... Yeah, I hated him so much.

Oh, God, lord!

-OK. No more crying.

-Whatever! That's going to make us cry more.

THEY LAUGH

We'll see you tomorrow!

-I love you, Dad!

-Bye-bye.

-Bye!

-He does look very tired.

-Yeah, I know.

-I don't remember how we got in.

-What's the...?

You know, we don't know really what happened,

and so we have to live with the mystery of her death

and trust that our dad didn't kill her at the same time.

So it's kind of a hard position to be in...I think...or it's a position

that would, you know, bring up a lot of stuff, so, um...

So I've never doubted my dad's innocence, but...

it's just, it's...just kind of... I don't know, a hard place to be.

Um...

I was looking at here - photographs that were taken from his computer

and most of them are of homosexual military men

and they're all different types of things that they're doing,

you know, multiple partners, but they're all portrayed as being

gay military men, um, performing sexual acts on each other.

It's not the type of thing your typical, average citizen would want to access.

Not if they want to portray themselves

as someone that has this perfect marriage

or however he wants to make his life seem so perfect, um, with his wife.

I loved Kathleen. Kathleen loved me.

I could not love anybody else.

She could not love anybody else.

That's the faithfulness that we...meant to one another.

It transcended body.

It was much deeper than that.

-I loved her spiritually...

-HE TAPS HIS CHEST

..as well as physically, so I saw no, nor did she see, any problem.

She would've been infuriated by learning that her husband,

who she truly loved, was bisexual.

We believe that, once she learned this information,

that an argument ensued and a homicide occurred.

-State your name, please.

-Brent Wolgamott.

-How old are you, sir?

-I'm 28 years old, ma'am.

Do you remember when you were contacted by a person

-with the name "mpwriter"?

-Yes, ma'am.

Did you all actually discuss what you were going to do

when you were to get together on September 5, 2001?

-Yes, ma'am.

-And what we're y'all planning on doing?

-Er, having sex.

-What type of sex, sir?

-Um...

-Do you know?

-Can I say it? I guess, anal sex.

-OK.

-Did you get together with him on September 5, 2001?

-No, ma'am.

-Well, what happened?

-I 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.

We found out he's bisexual. We found out that he'd had correspondence

with a male, military prostitute kind of guy.

We found out crazy stuff. I mean, lots of crazy, crazy stuff,

but none of it really shocked me at all. I mean, it was more like,

"Oh, great, this is going to be terrible for the case,"

you know, "jurors hate this stuff, especially in Durham," um, but...

Yeah, it wasn't like, um...

I was never presented with anything that made me

think twice about my dad.

Did Michael Peterson ever do or say anything,

either on the phone or in an e-mail,

that indicated that he was not in love with Kathleen Peterson?

To the contrary, 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.

To think that he had this secret life going on is baffling

and it makes me think there are so many things I didn't know about him

and it cancels out all trust I have in him.

Parent figures have always been difficult for us.

Just having such a tumultuous experience of...

losing our birth parents.

Living with Patty and our dad was really tumultuous.

We were kind of tossed around a lot

and then we moved in with Kathleen and Dad

and Kathleen had a daughter, Caitlin.

And, you know, we weren't anybody's natural children,

so we kind of...

had...parent issues most of our lives, I guess.

THEY LAUGH

-Um...

-I think, yeah,

the thing that makes me so sad is that our two constants, really...

I mean, Dad was the only continuity we've had in our lives for parents.

Um...

And so I feel like that's why we have such a strong bond with him,

um, and with each other, but also Mom, Kathleen, it's..

She really was the first person who took us in and combed our hair.

I just know that, um, my mom died in '85 from a brain haemorrhage.

She had been having many headaches before.

I mean, there's... Many people have said this.

That, um, she called her mother complaining of headaches.

She hated doctors, like I don't like doctors either!

Neither does Martha, um...

So she didn't want to go see one no matter how much, you know, Dad...

Um, Mike and Patty, I guess, um, told her to go

and she basically died before she even hit the bottom of the stairs.

NEWS ON TV

'The murder case against Michael Peterson doesn't just involve

'his wife any more - it involves a friend who died 18 years ago.'

'Elizabeth Ratliff was a friend of Michael Peterson.

'In fact, Peterson was with Ratliff

'the night before she was found dead in Germany.

'Ratliff's body was discovered at the bottom of the staircase in 1985

'and prosecutors have implied that the circumstances of her death

'mirror those of Michael Peterson's wife Kathleen.'

The two daughters that were adopted by Michael Peterson

were the daughters of Elizabeth Ratliff,

that woman that died 18 years ago in Germany.

They were raised by Michael Person, 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 twenties,

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 step-mother who was helping to raise them,

they are saying no.

There's an autopsy report that says, "Cause of death - natural causes."

-"The stairway killer." Is that the idea?

-That's what they'll try...

-He found a way to kill women 17 years apart.

-Right.

Once it became clear to us that the prosecution was going

to try and use this evidence in Germany,

we went to Germany ourselves.

'We spoke with Patty Peterson,

'who had been there with Liz the night before she died and who was

'at her house with Michael that morning that her body was found.'

There was nothing out of place, except she was no longer living.

Everything was as if one would've walked into a normal home.

-You know, there was no pool of blood, there were no...

-Spatters?

I mean, there could have been a few spatters here,

but so small that they did not register with me.

She was turned sideways.

-She was turned on her side facing upwards.

-Facing that way?

Yes, like that.

In the very beginning, I was surprised

when people made a connection between Liz and Kathleen,

because there was no connection.

Liz had had a stroke. She was found at the bottom of the stairs.

Kathleen fell down the stairs, I firmly believe.

I saw no connection between those,

but now, of course, knowing how it was presented.

"This person murdered, found at the bottom of the steps.

"This person murdered, found at the bottom of the steps."

Anybody would understandably come to that conclusion.

Three, two, one.

The DA thinks that there's enough similarity between the two deaths

that they've had Ratliff's body exhumed from a cemetery here in Texas

and brought to the medical examiner's office in Chapel Hill.

It was, like, my worst nightmare when I was little.

You know, you'd have nightmares of, like...

your mother, your parents coming back alive

and, like, what they would look like, you know,

just typical childhood nightmares and it was like it was coming true.

They spent thousands of dollars

transporting her body 1,200 miles from Bay City, Texas, to Chapel Hill

in order to allow the very same medical examiner, who had already

concluded that Kathleen Peterson's death was not accidental,

to perform that autopsy in the hopes of coming to the same conclusion.

I expect him to be found guilty

of killing his wife and I think, after the autopsy tomorrow,

people will have...issues, I think, with the result of that,

as far as his involvement with the death of Elizabeth Ratliff.

'They didn't prove that Elizabeth Ratliff had been murdered,

'but just the jury hearing about all this created this impression'

that Michael Peterson must've been responsible in some way.

'This is just too big a coincidence.'

In my opinion, the cause of death of Mrs Ratliff

was blunt trauma of the head.

-JIM HARDIN:

-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.

Court is now in recess for ten minutes.

'When I found out the evidence of Liz Ratliff's death'

'and that it was very similar to my mother's death,'

there was a possibility that I had been living with a man for 13 years

who had possibly committed murder 18 years ago and, all this time,

there was this big secret, something I didn't know about him,

and that's very scary.

DOOR RATTLES LOUDLY

Step right over here.

DOOR BANGS AND SQUEAKS

So what do you have?

You have two women murdered on or pushed down, whatever...

-Oh!

-..two staircases, two different countries...

-Take it easy.

..and one man present with them each time. Both ruled a homicide.

The second thing is the blood wiping on the walls.

The medical examiner testified, and I read last night,

that Kathleen Peterson laid there and was bleeding for a time -

she couldn't say how long - for a period of time before she died.

But it's clear evidence that somebody was wiping the blood off the walls.

And then, how do you get past the blood spatter on his shoes?

And then, the bloody footprint on the back of her leg.

And judge, I went back and I looked at the photographs in this case.

I don't know how high that ceiling is in that home,

but anybody with common sense would know that the blood on that ceiling

and on the wall did not come from falling down the steps.

I grew up in a house that had steps. I've fallen down the steps.

My mother's fallen down the steps.

Separate and apart from anything Mr Deaver did,

Mr Labor and Mr Epstein indicate in their report

that this was clearly not a fall down the steps

and furthermore, Judge Hudson,

they indicated from wearing the pants of Michael Peterson

that the spatter inside of those pants came in an upward direction,

and found that, in their opinion,

-Mr Peterson was standing over the body of this young lady...

-Not true.

-That's just not true.

-..when that spatter went inside of his pants.

Your Honour, at this time,

the defendant would call Mike Klinkosum to the stand.

In 1991, Greg, um, and his acquaintance Johnny Beck

had been out in Raleigh that evening

and had been seeking drugs and drinking.

They had been together, because Johnny knew where to get drugs

and Greg had the money and so they were doing drugs together

and they ended up driving down

into a cul-de-sac on Blunt Street, here in Raleigh,

and they sat there for a while and smoked some more crack

and, then, at one point, when they were getting ready to leave,

Greg decided, because he had a four-wheel drive vehicle,

that he would go down this dirt path out into this field.

And when he did, he got his car stuck in a ravine out in the field.

As so, as they walked back into the cul-de-sac on Blunt Street,

they noticed... And this was in the early hours.

They noticed, um, what Greg at first thought was a roll of carpet

lying in the road in the cul-de-sac

and it was really Johnny who determined that it was a body.

And because they had been out using drugs

and Greg still had some marijuana on him

and didn't have a driver's licence, they just decided to leave it be.

And later that morning, he went back to the cul-de-sac

and he walked up to the police

and told them that that was his truck in the field.

And they asked him to come down to be questioned and he agreed to do that

and, at that point, um, things started rolling against him.

They had found stains on the fender and the fender liner

that law enforcement thought might be blood.

So they sent these stains

to the SBI lab for testing in the serology section.

The report that was generated

and signed by Agent Deaver from the SBI lab said that

there were chemical indications for the presence of blood.

That's what was written in the lab report.

What was not turned over or disclosed was the fact that Agent Deaver

had gotten a negative result on the Takayama test, which indicated

that he could not confirm that those two stains were in fact blood.

And the lab report that was given to defence counsel,

given to the prosecutor and introduced into evidence,

Duane Deaver's lab report, did it say anything about the fact

-that an additional test had been done?

-No.

What was the result of that trial?

Um, Mr Taylor was convicted of first degree murder.

-And what was his sentence?

-Er, he was... Life in prison.

Did you see in the report where Agent Deaver stated,

in his opinion, there is nothing scientifically wrong

with what they reported and they did not hurt anybody

by not reporting negative results. Do you see that?

Greg Taylor is the prime example.

He spent 17 years in prison for a murder he didn't commit

and if the results of the confirmatory test,

the Takayama test, had been turned over,

I think that would have made a large impact on the jury,

because, at his trial, the prosecutor,

um, in his closing argument,

several times referred to the blood on the truck.

I think, even later, some jurors gave their opinion

that the blood on the truck was a major factor, um, in their decision.

It never occurred to anybody.

We thought they hadn't done all the testing they should've done.

Er, we thought the testing was probably not accurate,

but it never occurred to anybody that they had done the testing

and just hidden the results. Um...they're scientists

and scientists are supposed to be about the facts.

They're not supposed to take sides. They're supposed to

reveal everything they find and not have bias,

but the fact that they held back these confirmatory tests was...

was absolutely biased in favour of the prosecution

in the way they conducted, er, they prepared that final report.

So I was shocked, really.

We were all shocked.

You know, how could a lab do that? You'd expect...

I'd expect it from a prosecutor or a policeman or an attorney,

maybe a judge or whatever, but from a lab, you know?

You know, where's the... the sense of fairness?

Why do they feel like they have to do something like that?

Um, you know, when I think about, you know, all the years that I lost,

because of this, what I missed of my daughter growing up, you know.

I missed her tenth birthday. I missed her high school graduation.

I missed her college graduation.

I missed her getting married.

I missed the birth of my grandson.

You know, she was 26 years old when I was released

and I missed all that. I look at her today like she's a stranger,

cos I don't know how she came to be about herself.

-Do you know which direction to go?

-Um...

HE GASPS

-Say hi?

-How are you doing?

-Say hi? Hi, Grandpa!

How you doing?

HE CHATTERS TO THE BABY, BECKY LAUGHS

-His first visit to jail.

-But he's been to prison twice already!

-Dada!

-He's seen you twice at Nash.

-In prison! That's right. Right!

His first time to jail, though.

The first through-the-glass conversation! All those

little memories that you write down in the baby scrapbook, you know!

-In his baby book!

-SHE LAUGHS

Oh, for God's sake!

-Oh, it's good to see you! God!

-You too, Dad.

THEY LAUGH

Oh, Christ! Now your ears go back beautifully!

Yeah, everything's great.

-Work's going well, all this is good.

-He's a darling.

You know, down here with family, it's stressful but, you know,

-it's nice to see everybody.

-Oh, yeah!

So do you think he looks like anyone yet?

-I think his ears are a little like mine.

-They are!

I said that to Margaret the other day,

because we were looking at you in court from the back and I look at him

from the back and your ears look the same from the back.

I had gorgeous small ears when I was young.

-Is he going to have hair or not?

-I don't know.

-One of these days.

-Some day! Some day!

When you see Margaret, would you please wish her a happy birthday?

-That poor child.

-I know.

You know, I wrote about this day with her.

I was there when she was born.

Well, I wasn't in the room, but I took her to the hospital

in 1981, drove her in a snowstorm to go to,

you know, Wiesbaden hospital.

And then, I was there every birthday after that.

Every single birthday she ever had,

I was there until, I guess it was about the 18th birthday.

Then she went to college. And then there was the 20th birthday.

-Yeah, that one kind of sucked.

-Kind of sucked?(!)

Yeah, you remember that? Watching the grid search of the house.

And then here it is, her 30th birthday. Oh my god.

So maybe this is the last I'm going to see of Dorian

until you bring him down for our ice cream and tattoo outing.

Well, we'll see.

-So I'll see you Tuesday morning.

-Yup.

You're going to watch me hobble down the stairs, OK?

God almighty! Christ. Don't let them film me going down the stairs!

THEY CHUCKLE

Jesus. No filming going down the stairs!

I love you.

-Love you, Dad.

-Bye bye.

Come on, wave.

Bye bye!

-Bye, Dad. Love you.

-Oh, shit.

# Happy birthday to you

# Happy birthday to you

# Happy birthday dear Margaret

# Happy birthday to you. #

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

APPLAUSE AND CHEERING

It was snowing, gently falling everywhere and after many,

many hours of intensive labour, I was at your birth mother's side.

Margaret at long last emerged.

She was exquisitely beautiful and she looked exactly the same.

Lovely red strawberry blonde hair. To Margaret, much love.

May the future bring you much happiness and continued fulfilment.

We love you, dearest Margaret.

APPLAUSE

Thanks for coming, guys.

I hope your thirties are freaking awesome! >

APPLAUSE

My 20th birthday sucked so hardcore and my 30th birthday

is so much better, so thank you guys for coming.

It's gonna just be a lot better from now on. I hope.

So to all of you guys and to Dad, too.

Place your left arm on the Bible, raise your right arm and swear

the testimony you're about to give the court and the jury

in the case now being heard to be the truth and nothing but the truth,

-so help you God.

-I do.

-Please be seated.

Did there come a time

when you were asked to conduct a review

of the SBI laboratory?

Yes,

in early March of 2010 we agreed to conduct a review

of all serology files with similar reporting sequences

as had appeared in the Taylor case.

The purpose of the report was to see

if there had been any cases of injustice.

Did you find that there were at least a number of agents,

not just agent Deaver, who were producing lab reports

that didn't have all of the tests that they had actually run?

We identified 230 cases where not all the tests were reported

in the final report that was issued by the lab.

You would see a presumptive positive and a negative Takayama

shown in the notes and then you would see a final report

that simply reported the presumptive positive.

And of the five cases that were categorised by you all

as the most serious of all the cases you looked at,

who was the agent on each of those cases?

Special Agent Deaver.

Were those the only instances where you found that agent Deaver

had failed to put down what his lab notes reflected?

-No, I believe the final total was 34.

-34 cases?

-That's correct.

Thank you very much. Please answer whatever questions the DA may have.

I appreciate it.

I got this group of French people who are following me

around with a camera.

I think they want to film inside there.

-I don't know if you're...

-If it's OK with you it's OK with me.

-It's OK with me.

-Oh, you've come to share lunch with me!

-No!

-You were going to bring your own.

No, no, I'm not sharing anything with you.

Why are you hobbling around like you're 80 years old?

-Jeez, 80?!

-90.

-How about 200?

-Ask them what I looked like yesterday.

-Why, what's going on?

Well, I'm hardly the Princess and the Pea here.

-You know, the story of the Princess and the Pea?

-Yes.

I've been in prison for eight years.

We don't have orthopaedic mattresses or anything.

-They don't have the foam?

-No, it's pretty terrible.

I'm so used to prison luxury conditions, you see,

that coming to the jail, sleeping on cold concrete - maybe that's it.

Maybe that's it.

It's sort of like going from the Westin with their Heavenly beds

to Motel 6.

So, she is not calling Deaver. She is not calling any experts.

Uh, she's going to call a couple of witnesses.

I think she's going to try to get into evidence that Deborah Radisch

thought it was a homicide, but neither of those things

has any bearing on it.

-As you say, that's for a retrial.

-Right, right.

I don't want to get too far out ahead of ourselves here,

but if we get a new trial, then the question becomes,

can they even retry you,

given the fact that Deaver was all over that scene?

I mean, ALL over the scene, and remember the photo glitches

and him smelling the wine and...

Yes, he's the one that did that!

-All of it. He did all of it!

-Such bullshit.

He did all of it. Get a good close-up of him.

THEY CHUCKLE

Oh, another close-up right there.

How the man got away with it, for as long as he did,

that's really a crime, because you wonder how many other cases

there are - not high-profile cases -

but other cases in which the man probably testified.

He made the difference of sending them either to prison

or getting them much more time.

And I just cannot even imagine that anybody would do that,

but he's done it for, gosh, over 20 years.

In September 2007, Dr Turner killed his wife Jennifer Turner

and several months after the killing,

Dr Turner was indicted by the Davie County Grand Jury

for first-degree murder.

What does Dr Turner say had happened between him and his wife?

Well, the killing occurred in an outbuilding of the property

that Dr Turner and his wife had shared until they became separated

about 18 months before the killing.

Inside the building, there were tons of stuff just lying all around.

One of the things that was lying around was a large seven-foot -

I mean, for lack of a better term - Viking spear

that had about a 16-inch blade on the end of it

and Mrs Turner picked up the spear

and attacked him with it, driving it through his leg near his groin,

through and through twice and stabbing it on his arm.

At that point in time, he went into his pocket.

He had a pocket knife with him and he used the pocket knife

to defend himself and in doing so,

inflicted the wounds that killed her.

Did he in fact have wounds on his leg that were consistent

with what he had said happened?

Yes, he lost about a quarter of his blood volume

and one of those wounds was about 1.5 centimetres

from his femoral artery, which they also concluded would have killed him

if it had hit him.

I'm going to show you what has been marked as exhibit 27.

What was the initial opinion that Agent Thomas had

with regard to the shirt that Dr Turner had been wearing?

Uh, this transfer bloodstain pattern was consistent with a bloody hand

being wiped on the surface of the shirt.

What does the second report say?

It says, "it is consistent with a pointed object,

"consistent with a knife being wiped on the surface of the shirt."

Was there any indication in that second report

that there had been a significant change?

No, there wasn't.

What special agent Thomas testified about is that the SBI

and Special Agent Deaver, who was working with him,

had been presented with a new scenario.

That, in essence, he had inflicted those wounds on himself

and entirely staged the scene.

Following that, they, when looking at the shirt, could it possibly

have been because someone was wiping a knife off on the shirt?

Was that what he got out of that meeting that Agent Deaver attended?

Yes.

Then it says, "I'm going to meet with Duane

-"to do the actual reconstruction."

-Yes.

-Who's filming this?

-Special Agent Deaver.

-He's present there?

He's filming it, yes.

I think what they were trying to do is put blood

on just the outside layers of the knife in the hopes

that it would somehow duplicate the initial stain, even though

he didn't know a scenario where that would occur in actual real life,

where you only have blood on the absolute edges of a knife.

Nice good curve. Turn your wrist in. Even better, yeah.

'All right then, you might get some just lightly on the fingers'

and just kinda...up, up.

'Beautiful. That's a wrap, baby.'

Not in any effort to recreate any scenario

of what actually happened that night, but just to create a stain

that might look like another stain, that might refute

what our experts said about what that stain was.

'There's a bloodstain expert, Stewart James.'

He's universally regarded as one of the handful of top two or three

experts in this field.

He takes the video of the Kirk Turner blood experiments

where Gerald Thomas wipes the shirt and Duane Deaver is filming it

and he shows this video at professional conferences,

both in the United States and abroad.

The reaction in the community of bloodstain pattern analysis,

he says, is shock, that everyone just looks at these experiments

and says, "That is a bunch of malarkey."

It's sort of what's happening in Mike Peterson's motion

for appropriate relief right now. You can sort of know

all of these anecdotal things and you can experience individual cases

like we did with Dr Turner and other cases, but once you see

all of those things synthesised and brought together

and woven into the same tapestry, it's pretty devastating

to see what can pass for science and justice in a courtroom.

Thanks, I appreciate it.

Am I going to get a lunch today, deputy?

We're working on it.

This woman stabbed him with a spear and then he cut her throat.

You know, this is not a good marriage here, but anyway...

But then when I read that Duane Deaver believed that the man

had taken a spear and put it through his leg,

I mean, it just boggles the mind,

that anybody would come up with that.

I got an orange. Oh!

You ought to feel how cool this sandwich is.

Just feel how cold that is.

Mrs Sutton, have you been qualified as an expert witness

in the field of bloodstain pattern analysis?

Yes sir, I have.

I want to show you what Mr Deaver testified to

at Mr Peterson's trial.

I'm gonna ask of you to describe the types of experiments that you used

and what the results were, generally.

Test 1 was to place a source of blood a certain distance above

a horizontal or above the ground and impact it with test shoes on

and to take a look at those spatters

to determine if they were comparable to what I found on the real shoes.

The wearer of these shoes -

these shoes were actually directly below the source of blood,

which in my opinion is the back of the head of the victim

when it was impacted.

Is there anything about these experiments that you saw

that in any way supports Mr Deaver's opinion?

No. The experiment won't show that at all.

What the experiment shows is that if you impact a sponge,

it'll create spatter.

That's a given in my field. That's a recreation.

That's trying to make a set of circumstances

and get a desired outcome.

It's not what I would classify as an experiment.

'The opinion is that these pants are consistent with impact spatters

'that result from a forceful impact'

and that the individual

wearing these pants at the time of that impact

was in close proximity to the source of blood when it was impacted.

Was that experiment that you just saw acceptable within

the bounds of bloodstain pattern analysis?

No. The first thing that really struck me was

as soon as he stepped into the stairway

he pulled the short leg open. That's not fair.

If the question is, can I take a step into the stairwell,

hit somebody, and get spatter back into my shorts,

then I have to do it with as natural a motion as possible.

One thing I did notice,

the target was placed more towards the centre of the landing

as opposed to back where the area of origin was actually calculated.

And of course, that's so that you can have one leg up.

That certainly could be one explanation, sure.

If it was back further, somebody would be standing on the landing.

They wouldn't have their leg up, would they?

I agree with that and it would also be difficult to hit that sponge.

Are the experiments that you used consistent with what others

in the field use to conduct analysis of bloodstain patterns?

Yes, they are.

Is it consistent with the methodology that you learned

-15, 16 years ago?

-Yes, it is.

-Is that true?

-No, sir.

Is his methodology, as you saw in these experiments,

what others who are competent in the field of bloodstain analysis

use to analyse crime scenes?

No, sir.

Happy birthday.

I'm glad you were able to finally get here.

Can't shake hands.

Remain seated, come to order, court is back in session.

Could you please state your name

and spell your last name for the court reporter, please?

Ronald Thomas Guerette. G-U-E-R-E-T-T-E.

Before becoming a private investigator,

what was your profession?

I was a police officer in Colorado for a couple years.

Then I was a police officer in Charlotte for about ten years.

When did you first get involved in the case

State vs Michael Peterson?

About a week after December the 9th.

Of what year?

-Umm, ten years ago.

-2001?

-2001.

In connection with this hearing, did you review

all of the discovery that was provided

by the state of North Carolina in response to the orders

-that were issued by Judge Hudson?

-I did.

Well over 100,000 pages, many, many CDs, and disks, and...

-And you reviewed all of that?

-Unfortunately.

All right. Did you review some reports that Duane Deaver

-either authored or was mentioned in?

-Yes, sir.

On how many cases of bloodstain pattern analysis or evaluations

have you actually worked?

I don't know for sure, but it would be somewhere around 200

that I have written reports on myself. Now, that doesn't include

the number of cases that I have looked at as part of my training.

And I continue to provide help to others who are in training.

I help them with their cases

and I wouldn't necessarily write a report on that.

Were you able to compare the results of your analysis

of the reports that he wrote with his testimony?

Yes, I was.

How many cases were there in total in which Agent Deaver just

observed bloodstains, either at the scene, at the SBI laboratory,

-or by looking at photos?

-Only 54.

In how many of those cases did Agent Deaver provide

-a bloodstain pattern analysis opinion?

-36.

In how many of those cases did Agent Deaver actually go to the scene

-of an event?

-Well, he went to 17 different scenes

between 1987 and 2003.

How many cases were there in which Agent Deaver performed tests

or experiments before the Peterson case?

Three. Only three.

What was the date of the last experiment

that Agent Deaver conducted on his own before the Peterson case?

Back in 1991. 11 years before.

How many cases were there in which Agent Deaver,

before the Peterson case, found a precise point of impact?

Zero.

I think Agent Deaver also gave some testimony about falls

and investigating falls, correct?

That is correct...and stairs.

Have you ever analysed bloodstain evidence from a situation

that was known to be a fall?

Well...yes, I have been to, probably, about 15 times

where it was reported that a fall had occurred.

Probably five or six of those times I was in agreement

that a fall was involved. The rest of the those, I was not in agreement

that a fall was involved or created the spatters,

the patterns, that were seen there.

Mr Guerette, how many of Agent Deaver's cases did you find

in which he had gone to the scene of a fall to analyse it in some way?

Well, I checked every word on every page in these documents

and the word "falls" never occurred.

-That's all I have, your honour. Thank you.

-You can come down.

Hey! Good to see - oh! Look at those teeth!

So are you alive, or what? Are you alive?

You've been hobbling around all day. Let's see you move!

-It looks like it's going well, really well.

-It really is.

Yeah, it really is. I mean, you never know, of course,

but I would think he'll rule in my favour.

Freaking...that would be amazing, right?

No! it's supposed to be the way it's supposed to be.

-Either way, it's amazing.

-Well, here it is!

So with any kind of luck I'll be out of here, you know... soon.

Obviously that's what we're all hoping for,

-but it would be so amazing for that to happen.

-I know. I know.

Yesterday, there were around 217 articles

-from local papers to the Washington Post.

-On what?

And they're just basically talking about how all the experts

are discrediting Deaver.

But he really did convict me with his points of origin

and "the head had to be right here, and so therefore,

"if the head's right here, all the blood must have hit out there."

-And that's just bullshit.

-Well, it's so convincing, right?

For him to get so specific and say that it happened here, there,

-and there.

-Oh yeah, there's no question.

And the thing with the shorts and the tennis shoes and

what David picked up and I had missed also the second time

was the first-degree murder charge premeditation only came

because of Deaver.

Enough about me. We've all seen me. I'm sick of me.

Tell me about you, kid.

Man, my life has changed night and day.

I've got this best friend, this girl named Jasmine,

-and she's lived there for...

-I'm going to have to come closer.

-I can't hear.

-Yeah so, you want to stand up?

-You can stand up.

-Sit down.

-They're making too much damn noise.

Can't you hear that shit down there?

It's buffered, it's buffered.

It's coming in my ear. What the fuck are they doing?

Well, when am I going to become a grandfather again?

I'm working on it - very hard, I'll have you know.

-I'm working on it, hard.

-Good!

-Yessir.

-Time's up, sir.

OK. I got to go.

OK. I love you very much, Dad, and put 'er there.

I love you and I'm so glad to see you again.

I'll see you, I'll see you, all right.

Not to jump the gun in any way, but we wanna try to be prepared,

just in case this goes our way.

-Which I don't know is going to happen.

-I understand. I understand.

But anyway, so, we've put together about 300,000 worth

of property - actually a little bit more than that,

but enough property that will secure a 300,000 bond.

Kerry has checked into electronic monitoring,

Joan Miner has agreed to allow you to stay there

-for as long as you need to.

-All right.

And I need to talk with her to ask her if she's also willing

to be a third party custodian, which simply means,

if you don't come home one night, not only would the monitor go off,

but she would call the sheriff and say, "Hey, he's not here."

-All right?

-What do you think? Seriously?

I think the same thing I thought before the verdict came in back then.

-OK. All right.