Was Laci Online?

August 30, 2004

Detective Lydell Wall testified that at exactly 8:40 a.m. on December 24 someone used the home laptop to look at a five-day weather forecast for San Jose and a Yahoo shopping site featuring a garden weather vane. At 8:44 a.m., a Gap fleece scarf, priced at $6.99, was viewed, as well as a sunflower motif umbrella stand for $29.99. At 8:45 a.m. Peterson's e-mail account was accessed and an e-mail (regarding a Ping Staff golf bag he had auctioned on eBay) was viewed, but no e-mails were sent. Wall said he was never asked to review web-surfing habits for Scott and Laci to try and determine which of them was using the computer. The sunflower motif umbrella is interesting because Laci had a sunflower tattoo on her ankle.

Of course, if this someone was Laci, then that totally rules out a two-trip to the Marina possibility, as some argue that he made a trip to the Marina to dispose of her and the second trip, the fishing trip, was either to create an alibi or to be sure she hadn't floated up. It doesn't rule out the one-trip theory, as he still does have time to murder her and load her into the truck by the 10:08 cell phone call. But, it borders on the ridiculous to think he would have a dead body in his truck and be taking the time to check voice mail, sending his boss email Christmas greetings, and building a mortiser. All of this would be done in broad daylight with umpteen opportunities for eye witnesses to see him doing something suspicious.

But what is telling is not so much the possibility that Laci was alive and on the computer on that morning, but that the Prosecution didn't introduce this information themselves. It appears as if they wanted to hide it. And, the fact that they didn't even ask Wall to try and determine whether it was Laci or Scott that used the computer suggests that they didn't want to know if it was Laci. That's very disturbing.