Peyer Testifies in Knott Family Case Against CHP : Courts: In a videotaped interview from prison, the former CHP officer says a supervisor once praised him for a nighttime stop of a female motorist.

Testifying publicly for the first time since his arrest for murder in 1987, former CHP officer Craig Peyer said Thursday that a supervisor commended him once for stopping a woman motorist at night at the Mercy Road off-ramp, the same place where he killed a college student.

Peyer’s testimony was videotaped in state prison, where he is serving 25 years to life for the strangulation murder of Cara Knott, 20. The interview was presented as evidence at a civil trial in which Peyer and the California Highway Patrol are being sued by Knott’s family.

On the tape, Peyer testified that, late in 1986 a CHP sergeant told him that the office had received “an inquiry” from a woman who expressed concern for her daughter, who had been stopped by Peyer at night on the dark Mercy Road off-ramp from Interstate 15.

Peyer, 40, said he did not believe that CHP officials regarded the woman’s call as a complaint against him. The sergeant also approved of his decision to stop the young woman at the off-ramp, he added.

“The gist was that there was no problem. It was a good enforcement tactic,” Peyer testified.

The testimony appeared to support arguments by attorney Brian D. Monaghan that CHP officials were aware that Peyer frequently stopped attractive young women at the isolated off-ramp but failed to do anything about it. Monaghan is representing Knott’s family.

During the videotaped interview, which was edited, Peyer was never asked about Knott’s murder, and her name was never mentioned. However, Monaghan said that, in the unedited version not shown to the jury, Peyer denied killing the woman.

“He was very matter-of-fact (in his denial). It was almost as if it (murder) didn’t happen,” Monaghan told reporters outside the courtroom.

The Knott family was not present in the courtroom when the interview was shown and has decided not to view it at all, Monaghan added. They are asking for unspecified damages from Peyer and the CHP. The lawsuit alleges negligence by the CHP for hiring Peyer and failing to adequately supervise him. Peyer is being sued for wrongful death.

In his opening statement two weeks ago, Monaghan told the jury that--before and after Peyer’s arrest--CHP officials received numerous complaints from women and parents of women who were stopped by Peyer. At Peyer’s criminal trial, about 31 young women testified that Peyer stopped them at night at the off-ramp.

Some stops lasted up to 90 minutes. The women testified that Peyer never touched them or asked them for a date, but rather engaged them in long, personal conversations.

Peyer, the first CHP officer found guilty of committing murder while on duty, was convicted of first-degree murder June 22, 1988, after his first trial ended in a deadlocked jury. Prosecutors said that Peyer stopped Knott on the night of Dec. 27, 1986, and forced her to park at the Mercy Road off-ramp, under I-15.

Using circumstantial evidence, prosecutors proved that Peyer strangled Knott, who was a San Diego State University student, with a rope and then threw her body off a 60-foot-high bridge, into a dry creek bed. The body was discovered the next morning.

In the videotaped interview, Peyer had a beard and a bushy mustache. Wearing a blue prison shirt, he appeared confident and displayed no emotion during the 1-hour, 40-minute interview.

At times, Peyer appeared pensive as he answered questions posed to him by a Knott family lawyer. On other occasions, Peyer leaned back in a chair, eyes turned upward, as he thought of a response to a question. His frequent hand gestures revealed that he still wears a wedding band.

He said that he preferred to stop motorists on off-ramps because it was safer than stopping them on a freeway shoulder.

As for the Mercy Road off-ramp, Peyer conceded that the lighting was poor at night. He said there was “some illumination” from overhead freeway signs, “but other than that, it was just the vehicles on the freeway.”

Monaghan said that Peyer’s own daily activity logs showed that he used to stop more women then men at night. When asked on the videotape if he stopped more women then men, Peyer said: “I have no idea.

“When I was making traffic stops, I didn’t know who was driving the vehicle . . . unless I was alongside of them,” he said.

Despite testimony by young women at his criminal trial that their stops were unusually long, Peyer testified that the average stop of a cooperative driver took 10 to 15 minutes.

Circumstances sometimes required some traffic stops to last a little longer, because some motorists were upset after being stopped by an officer, Peyer said. In some cases, he would detain a driver a little longer to give him time to regain his composure before pulling back on the freeway, he added.

“Most people, when you stop them, they’re scared. They’re apprehensive,” Peyer testified.

However, he also remembered stopping a woman motorist at the Mercy Road off-ramp and detaining her for about 30 minutes.

“The lady had moved to California from back East. She was looking for a house,” Peyer said.

During the stop, the woman expressed an interest in living in the same Poway community where Peyer and his family lived, he said.

“I also advised her who she could contact if she was interested in those homes,” Peyer said.

Peyer also confirmed reports from other CHP officers that he was a prolific ticket writer. “I was considered what was known as a hot pencil. I issued a lot of citations,” Peyer said. Whenever he got a new supervisor, Peyer would tell him “that’s how I like to operate. I like to write a lot of citations.”

Peyer said he advised new supervisors of the large number of tickets he gave because he thought it was unfair for other officers who did not issue many tickets to be compared to him.

Several witnesses, including some CHP officers, testified at Peyer’s criminal trial that he had scratches on his face when he got off duty on the night that Knott was killed. Peyer told homicide investigators that he received the scratches when he fell against a chain-link fence while putting gasoline in his patrol car at the CHP office.

On Thursday, Peyer told the story for the first time. He said that gasoline spilled while he was filling up the vehicle’s tank, splashing on his right boot and the concrete. As he walked around the car to check the engine’s oil level, the gasoline-soaked boot caused him to slip and fall against the fence, he said.

At the beginning of the interview, Peyer was asked why he never tried for a supervisory position during his 13 years as a CHP officer.

A supervisory position would restrict him to a desk and office, and he preferred to remain a patrol officer on the freeways, Peyer said. “I wanted to help the public,” he added.