Can't stop thinking about this case/this victim
View: thread | inline
-
Can't stop thinking about this case/this victim Posted on Oct 14 2006 at 12:24am by We Netflicked this documentary last year and I have not stopped thinking about Michael Peterson and his family ever since. For awhile afterwards it was the talk of our social chatter; we must have turned 30 friends/couples onto the doc who would then talk with us extensively about it. I tried to follow Michael Peterson as inmate, thinking there must be a family website, if not blogs about his well-being or any updates about the case, appeals, or where it stands. We were repulsed by the prosecution's case and the ignorance with which the case was tried in court. Never in a million years, in a post-OJ Simpson world did we think this would end in the manner that it did; I was sleepless and morally outraged for days. So does anyone in fact know if there is a way to track the case, or support any actions that the family has taken? Did Mr. Peterson's brother stay well, and proceed to lead the appeals? Does the defense attorney still have the appeals/the case? I have also followed the career of the Durham County DA's that tried the case and though I am a Southern Californian, believe it or not, those two find strange cases to still get their names attached to. This was a fantastic documentary simply on a film-making level sure; but it was really the shock-and-awe of business as usual in the Southern White states (forgive me North Carolina)and their approach to justice. JB in the burbs of Los Angeles 
RE: Can't stop thinking about this case/this victim Posted on Sep 30 2007 at 5:16am by It is very well that you have made up your mind about the people of Durham, NC. It is actually a city with many, many gay people living there. And that is a fact. But that is completely besides the point. The point is that there was physical evidence against Michael Peterson. The blood spatter, the lacerasions (seven of them), and the footprints. His actions during the 911 call will always be up for interpretation, although he sounds very unwilling to comply and aid in a situation where he may able to save his wife's life. Michael was always skeptical of the Durham Police Dept. and he pre-meditated this murder as he was previously successful in Germany. He assumed everyone would buy his story that the Durham Police had it out for him. Durham is not just some po-dunk town with uneducated, biggoted people residing in it. It is actually where Duke University, UNC, NCState, and other schools have their campuses. It is a highly educated area. Regardless, he has apparently done this before. So, get off your high horse and bring facts. Don't just smear the people of Durham, NC while you proudly say you are from Southern California. Southern California is the most superficial place in this country and the people are very quick to judge. Well, I'm sure they cannot all be like you, just a little taste of your own slandering. You have not a clue as to the evisence, do you?
-
RE: Can't stop thinking about this case/this victim Posted on Sep 30 2007 at 5:16am by It is very well that you have made up your mind about the people of Durham, NC. It is actually a city with many, many gay people living there. And that is a fact. But that is completely besides the point. The point is that there was physical evidence against Michael Peterson. The blood spatter, the lacerasions (seven of them), and the footprints. His actions during the 911 call will always be up for interpretation, although he sounds very unwilling to comply and aid in a situation where he may able to save his wife's life. Michael was always skeptical of the Durham Police Dept. and was sure that everyone by this story that Durham is just some po-dunk town with uneducated, biggoted people residing in it. It is actually where Duke University, UNC, NCState, and other schools have their campuses. It is a highly educated area. Regardless, he has apparently done this before. So, get off your high horse and bring facts. Don't just smear the people of Durham, NC while you proudly say you are from Southern California. It is the most superficial place in this country. Apparently people in Southern California are very quick to judge. They must all be like you. You have not a clue as to the evisence, do you? RE: Can't stop thinking about this case/this victim Posted on Nov 10 2007 at 9:03pm by Having seen as much evidence as I can, including the now-famous documentary, my problem from an outsider persepctive is not with the folks of NC or Durham in general, but with the way the trial was conducted. Judge Orlando Hudson could not have been more remiss in his judicial rulings if he had tried...but his whole demenour suggests he really wasn't trying at all.
The key inclusion of the evidence from Germany illustrated how lazy/biased/asleep/whatever he was in approaching this case. The Elizabeth Ratcliff evidence he allowed in was presented in such an absurdly predujicial way that reflects very badly on the Durham LE in general...tainting them all with the blatently biased 'evidence' and arguement presented by the now-discredited Freda Black and the medical hack Deborah Radisch, whose 20 year old attempt at an autopsy simply does not hold water, as anyone competant in the field would advise in the circumstances.
I don't know if Michael Peterson is guilty or not, but the validity of the verdict would have been considerably more concrete had Orlandio Hudson demonstrated the judicial judgement that a man in his position is obligated to, as opposed to casually letting in unfair evidence, with the implied codicil that his errors can be rectified by superior courts on appeal.
Now the boundries of legal juristriction that Orlando Hudson presides over have been changed to facilitate his move to a bigger house, whilst a man like Peterson languashes in a jail cell as a result. I would be quite open to the arguement that Peterson deserves to be there, but because he was denied due process because of a Judge who was either inept or in cahoots with the DA's office during this trial, I cannot accept this verdict.
Living in England now I've had the benefit of the informed opinions of legal professionals who followed the case with both interest and disbelief. The key points raised are always concerned with the admisibility of the evidence the DA presented, and how Hudson allowed it into the trial in such a questionable fashion. What was noticable to me during the trial was how Jim Hardin preferred to let his ADAs make the most disturbing and dubious arguements on the prosecution's behalf, giving him distance from that party's questionable tactics, to further his career when this trial was analyzed in the future.
Peterson's guilt or innocence is thoroughly tainted by a combination of the presentation the prosecution case and the ineptness (or lazyness) of Orlando Hudson. The media coverage, primarily from the blatently biased and headline-grabbing attempts at journalism (and I use that term with reservations) was both unfair and unwarrented. Court TV's coverage make Fox News look like part of the much-maligned and unfairly characterized liberal media in comparison.
I would like to see jutice for Kathleen Peterson as much as any reasonable person, but the combination of over-enthusiasm, incompetence and legal ineptness on the part of Durham's law enforcement folks, has made this nigh on impossible. It's a shameful stain of the good people of NC and Durham that proper justice was denied by a small number of people who made severe judgemental errors in the investigation and subsequant prosecution of the case. Thus Michael Peterson's case remains as questionable now as when he made the 2 fateful 911 calls on the night of Kathleen's death. This would not have been the case had the matter been dealt with by true professionals, and the questionable legacy of the trial outcome would not still be such a high profile issue.
RE: Can't stop thinking about this case/this victim Posted on Mar 13 2008 at 7:24pm by BBCoder::decode ERROR: BBCoder::decode ERROR: missing param 'value'