3 Testify That Peterson Gave Different Alibi

Three people testified Wednesday that Scott Peterson told them he went golfing the day his wife disappeared, bolstering the prosecution’s case that he had given conflicting statements on his whereabouts.

Peterson told others, including police, he went fishing in San Francisco Bay, about 90 miles from his Modesto home, on Dec. 24, 2002, the day Laci Peterson went missing.

Peterson, 31, a former fertilizer salesman, is accused of killing his wife and their unborn son and dumping her body in the bay. He told police he had gone to the Berkeley Marina to fish on that Christmas Eve morning. Laci’s body and her fetus washed up nearby four months later.

Prosecutors say Peterson’s affair with a massage therapist drove him to kill. If convicted, Peterson could face the death penalty or life in prison without parole. He has pleaded not guilty.

During testimony Wednesday, the sixth day of the trial, Harvey Kemple, the husband of one of Laci Peterson’s relatives, and two neighbors said Peterson told them he had been golfing the day his wife disappeared.

Kemple was among a group of about 80 friends and relatives who gathered at the Peterson home to help search for Laci after Peterson reported her missing when he returned from his fishing trip.

Kemple said Peterson told him Laci would have taken the couple’s golden retriever on a walk to a nearby park.

“I asked Scott where he had been and why was Laci in the park alone?” Kemple testified. “He told me he went to play golf.”

When Stanislaus County Deputy Dist. Atty. Rick Distaso asked whether Peterson had told him any time that night that he had gone fishing that day, Kemple said no.

Amie Kraigbaum and Terra Venable, neighbors who live across the street from the Peterson home, said Peterson knocked on their door about 6 p.m. Dec. 24, 2002, and asked whether they had seen Laci.

“He said he’d been golfing all day and had been trying to get ahold of her,” said Venable.

Kraigbaum said they told Peterson they hadn’t seen Laci all day.

“He was distraught,” she said. “He made me distraught.”

The women said they joined in a search of the nearby park that night looking for Laci.

During testimony Wednesday, Kemple also said Peterson behaved oddly the night his wife vanished, as well as in the following weeks.

“I saw more emotion out of him when he burned the chicken [in his barbecue] than when his wife was missing,” Kemple testified.

He said that one morning after he saw Peterson at the volunteer search center, he became suspicious and followed as Peterson drove in the opposite direction from where he had said he planned to post fliers.

Kemple said Peterson drove into a shopping mall parking lot, and Kemple watched as Peterson remained in his car for about 45 minutes. Another time, Kemple said, he followed Peterson from the search center to a golf course.

He admitted under questioning by defense attorney Pat Harris that it was strange behavior for a grown man such as himself to follow Peterson.

This is the second week of testimony in the murder case. Peterson’s lawyers contend that his wife was abducted while walking in a park, that his seeming indifference was actually shock and that he rarely showed emotion publicly.