Peyer’s Lawyers Want New Trial, Say Rulings by Huffman Slanted

Attorneys for Craig Peyer, the former California Highway Patrol officer convicted of first-degree murder, have asked the trial judge to grant Peyer a new trial or reduce his conviction to second-degree murder.

The requests were submitted in an 18-page motion filed with Superior Court Judge Richard Huffman by the defense attorneys on Thursday. In the petition, the attorneys argued that Huffman erred during the trial by rejecting several defense motions dealing with evidence and testimony of witnesses favorable to Peyer.

Also, Peyer’s attorneys said, there was insufficient evidence to convict Peyer of first-degree murder, and the prosecutor acted “improperly” while delivering the prosecution’s closing statement. The attorneys also said that the results of a polygraph examination given to Peyer before his arrest were deliberately leaked to the San Diego Union by the “prosecution team” during jury selection for Peyer’s second trial.

Peyer, 38, and a 13-year CHP veteran, was convicted last month of the strangulation murder of Cara Knott, 20. The young woman was killed Dec. 27, 1986, near the Mercy Road off-ramp and Interstate 15 and her body thrown 65 feet into a dry creek bed. Peyer’s first trial ended with the jury deadlocked 7 to 5 in favor of conviction.

He will be sentenced on Wednesday and faces a state prison term of 25 years to life. Huffman is also expected to rule on the latest defense motions before imposing sentence.

In making their request for a new trial, attorneys Robert Grimes and Diane Campbell criticized these trial rulings by Huffman:

- A refusal by Huffman to allow Grimes to question prosecution witnesses Tracy and Scott Koenig about Mrs. Koenig’s misdemeanor fraud conviction resulting from her embezzlement of more than $3,000 from a Mervyn’s store.

- Huffman’s granting a prosecution motion barring the testimony of four defense witnesses who said that they saw a hitchhiker lunging at cars on the freeway on-ramp that Knott took on the night she was killed.

- Huffman’s denial of a defense motion to exclude or limit the testimony of about two dozen women who testified for the prosecution that they were stopped by Peyer at night on the same off-ramp near where Knott was killed.

These rulings were unfair to Peyer and denied him a fair trial, the attorneys argued. Grimes was especially troubled by his inability to impeach Koenig by questioning her about her felony conviction. On the other hand, Deputy Dist. Atty. Paul Pfingst was allowed to “vouch” for the Koenigs’ character in his closing statement, Grimes said.

“In essence, the prosecutor was vouching for and arguing the character of the Koenigs, knowing that the defense had been prevented from producing evidence relevant to that credibility,” said the defense motion. Pfingst’s closing statement “was designed to bolster the character of the Koenigs by assuring the jury that they were of good moral character,” the defense attorneys argued.

Tracy Koenig testified that she saw a CHP car pull over a white Volkswagen similar to Knott’s on Interstate 15 on the night of the murder.

By not allowing the defense witnesses to testify about the hitchhiker, Huffman denied Peyer a “fundamental fairness” that would permit him “to respond to evidence and arguments advanced against him,” the attorneys argued. The same witnesses were allowed to testify at the first trial, when their testimony was not challenged by the prosecution.

The defense attorneys also alleged that Pfingst engaged in misconduct while delivering his closing statement. During the trial, Huffman had instructed the jury that the testimony of the 24 women did not suggest that Peyer had a character trait that led him to stop young women at night on the isolated Mercy Road off-ramp.

But, in his closing statement, Pfingst repeatedly referred to the stops, which he suggested stemmed from Peyer’s “appetite” for young women, “growing appetite,” “pattern of behavior” and “part of an appetite.”

“The prosecutor’s line of argument was a direct appeal to the jury to disregard the court’s limiting instruction, which forbade them from considering such evidence to establish character or disposition,” the appeal said.

Pfingst also acted improperly in delivering his closing statement, said the defense attorneys, by drawing the jury’s attention to Peyer’s failure to testify on his behalf. Under the U.S. Constitution, the accused is not required to testify.

Several witnesses testified during the trial that they noticed scratches on Peyer’s face shortly after police said Knott was killed. At Peyer’s first trial, a number of defense witnesses testified that Peyer told them that he got the scratches when he slipped and fell against a chain-link fence while filling up his police cruiser’s gasoline tank.

During the second trial, Huffman granted a prosecution motion that excluded this testimony. Nevertheless, in his closing statement to the jury, Pfingst mentioned the absence of an explanation by Peyer for the scratches.

“Weren’t you waiting for some type of explanation on the basis of the evidence contained in this case about those scratches?” Pfingst said.

The defense attorneys alleged that Pfingst’s remarks could have been interpreted by a jury “as commenting upon defendant’s failure to take the stand and explain certain facts.” They added that “the prosecutor’s style of argument was designed in a question format, as if waiting for the defendant to answer the questions.”

Prosecutors built their case around Peyer entirely on circumstantial evidence. Even if Peyer did kill Knott, the defense attorneys argued, he should be convicted of second-degree and not first-degree murder, because the killing was not deliberate or premeditated.

“A reasonable view of this evidence indicates that what happened here was a mere unconsidered and rash impulse, even though it included an intent to kill,” said the defense motion. “. . . There is utterly no evidence, aside from the fact of the existence of a rope, from which a reasonable inference may be drawn that a truly deliberate and premeditated intent to kill was pondered in this instance.”

Prosecutors argued that a four-foot rope recovered from the trunk of Peyer’s CHP car was used to strangle Knott. Peyer has never admitted killing Knott, and Friday Grimes said that asking Huffman to reduce the conviction to second degree was not an admission of guilt but rather a technical legal maneuver.

Finally, the defense attorneys argued that the anonymous release to a newspaper of the polygraph results prevented Peyer from getting a fair trial and is grounds for a new trial. They charged that the “prosecution team” intended to influence Huffman to grant them a change of venue by leaking the polygraph results.

“The effect of the illegal act of releasing this information was to narrow the jury pool to a sadly small percentage of persons who had not heard or read about the polygraph results,” the motion said.

In a related matter Friday, a San Diego Union reporter who wrote a controversial story about Peyer failing the polygraph test was ordered by Huffman to appear Monday for a hearing, in which Peyer’s attorneys are seeking information about his sources.

Reporter Jim Okerblom wrote the April 27 story, which was published just as jury selection in Peyer’s second trial had begun.

Peyer’s attorneys want to know details about the report to the newspaper. Okerblom wrote that the newspaper received the report anonymously.

The newspaper’s attorney, John Allcock, said that, if the reporter is forced to testify, he will invoke the California shield law and refuse to answer some of the questions.

Judge Huffman, who was visibly upset by the story at the time, could find Okerblom in contempt of court and sentence him to jail if he refuses to answer questions from Peyer’s attorneys.

On Friday, Huffman again said that 20 potential jurors who survived the screening about publicity were dismissed from the pool after they said they heard that Peyer had practiced deception when questioned about Knott’s murder.

“The defense has sought this information for a legitimate purpose,” argued one of Peyer’s attorneys.

“We know it (the report) came from somewhere in the prosecution camp. We think the leak of the polygraph has affected Mr. Peyer’s trial,” said defense attorney Campbell.

Huffman indicated he would permit Okerblom to be questioned by the defense, but deferred saying what he will do if the reporter refuses to answer the questions.

Campbell said she wants information about the type of report Okerblom wrote about because it would provide a clue as to what law-enforcement agency it came from.

However, Okerblom said, the report no longer exists.