the back stairs, the prosecution called the state s blood pattern expert, duane deaver. he told the jury with certainty that kathleen peterson had been beaten to death. he testified the droplet pattern high up the walls was just what you d expect to see with a weapon rising, striking, and casting off blood with each new blow. and i believe there is a minimum of four blows that have occurred in this, uh in this scene. what s more, deaver testified, this blood stain was found on the inside of peterson s shorts. he d done tests that he says proved that the only way it could have gotten there was if peterson had been standing over his wife, beating her. and the individual wearing these pants at time of that impact was in close proximity to the source of blood when it was impacted. i remember the jurors were captivated by his testimony. um, and it all seemed to make perfect sense. then there was all that dried blood the emts noticed around
for them, the dark cloud that lay over the family name for nearly a decade had lifted. we re part of the peterson family. and we are not afraid to say it. we so were stigmatized before, you know, and, like, hiding it. still, the second trial loomed. but working in michael s favor was the fact that the prosecutor would have to try a very different much weaker case. duane deaver had been fired from his job and some of the state s critical blood evidence would be inadmissible. i think their case is very, very badly compromised because of deaver. he was all over the crime scene. and there was another important victory for peterson s side. what types of services did you perform? oh wow, that s that s pretty broad. brad, the male escort, a sensational centerpiece of the prosecution s case, wouldn t be part of a second trial either, a judge said. the escort had been revealed in a search that was deemed illegal. the search warrant that resulted in the seizure of the compute
did an expert witness who analyzed the blood spatter provide tainted testimony? once again, dennis murphy. by 2010, seven years after michael peterson s conviction, his daughter martha had given up hope that her father would ever be released from nash correctional institution. dad was probably going to be in prison until he died. this was a reality that was never gonna to change. but in michael s cell block, an interesting story was circulating. a series of articles had been published in raleigh s the news & observer alleging misconduct at the state bureau of investigation s crime lab, the sbi. in prison, you don t really care much about international affairs or political, they don t have any effect. that the sbi who who were behind many guys being in there. oh, they re under investigation. oh, we cared about that. it turns out one of the experts at the center of the storm is a name you ve heard before, special agent duane deaver. remember him?
exactly. exactly. we got him. got you gotcha moment. when peterson s brother bill saw the experiment videos, he couldn t believe it. it s all reverse-engineered stuff. it s all designed to get a result. to me, it s not scientific at all. for michael s defense, the implication was clear. the jury had been duped. after all, in its closing argument, the state had even played on deaver s credibility to try to secure a conviction. then 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 up here and lie to you. who are you gonna trust? duane deaver? of course, he would never lie. well, it turns he had he did lie. defense attorney rudolf filed a motion asking for a new trial. and the judge, this time, was ready to listen. coming up, yet another jolt for michael s children. i was weeping with shock. and a critical decision that could change everything. well, that s just not going
my opinion is that this is scene of a beating. he was a star witness for the prosecution in the peterson trial, the blood pattern expert who put michael peterson in the staircase bludgeoning his wife, reporter julia sims. you talked to the jurors here in this case, julia. how important was the blood expert, deaver s testimony? that blood evidence was critical. here s a guy who has been doing this for years for the state. look at what his experiment showed. it s got to be the truth. he d been key in other cases, too. the newspaper recounted the story of a man who was sent to prison for murder after deaver s lab report suggested a stain on the man s car was the victim s blood. and it turned out not to be blood. wasn t blood at all. huh-uh, no. and deaver knew, and didn t disclose it? deaver knew that that was not blood and didn t disclose it. that man s conviction was overturned. gregory f. taylor is innocent of the charge of first-degree murder.