Don’t you think the “Innocence Project” has to have some pretty convincing reasons and evidence to think that Scott is innocent? They are not likely to take a case of someone who is guilty.
The Innocence Project put out a statement specifically addressing this, it is on their website . They are crystal clear that they have nothing to do with the Scott Peterson case and they have nothing to do with The LA Innocence Project.
If it only takes inserting Innocence Project into a law office’s name to make them a supposed subsidiary of THE Innocence Project then it would be extremely easy for anyone to deceptively employ such a title in order to boost their credibility by piggybacking off of the work done by the famous, national Innocence Project without them having to demonstrate that their own offices are credible or competent.
Additionally, if the Innocence Project is so trustworthy that even taking on a case is in itself evidence of innocence what does it mean when they feel compelled to release a statement making it clear they have absolutely nothing to do with a case? That’s the folly of trying to argue this particular point as a piece of evidence in Scott’s favor, it cuts both ways.
Even if the Innocence Project had been involved and worked with LA Innocence Project that still doesn’t automatically mean that Peterson must be innocent or that there must be credible evidence that this new appellate team has that will raise doubts about his guilt and perhaps lead to his exoneration. The Innocence Project is not infallible and it is as capable of making mistakes as any other organization is.
A particularly notorious example: Northwestern University’s Innocence Project managed to free death row inmate Anthony Porter in large part by framing another man named Alstory Simon for the double homicide Porter had been convicted of and sentenced to death for. Simon was sentenced to 37 years in prison. He served 15 years of that sentence before he was exonerated. It was also falsely alleged that Porter had been tortured by police when he had not. The overreaching of the team that exonerated him ultimately hurt his civil suit against the state for his conviction and wrongful imprisonment. A jury refused to award him anything. By contrast, Alstory Simon was able to receive compensation for what was done to him when his case settled before ever making it to trial. The evidence that Simon was innocent and had been completely railroaded was way stronger than it ever was for Porter. Things might have gone differently had Porter’s defense not been so blatantly dishonest in their efforts to free him.
Once again though, even if we set aside the most egregious errors made by Innocence Project (and it’s actual affiliates) the fact remains that nearly half of the cases that the Innocence Project takes on end with confirmation of guilt/proves the prosecutions theory of the case. This is information that the Innocence Project itself has previously volunteered.
I really cannot stress enough just how misleading the Scott Peterson specials defending him are. They make blatant misrepresentations and are shielded from sufficient degrees of scrutiny because they are produced and aired on networks that people trust to some extent to fact check what they’re putting out. One of my fears with respect to this case specifically is that people on both sides get their own entertainment confused with reality. A brutal irony in all of this is that the media that Scott Peterson and his supporters and skeptics invoke to discredit his conviction is arguably being used by them to work in favor of his defense now.
It is especially disturbing to me to see LAIP being given a tremendous benefit of the doubt that they have not earned yet (and in fact they have done several things in their very short lifetime that diminishes their credibility rather than enhances it but for the sake of not writing a whole novel here in the comments I will refrain from saying more about that right now unless otherwise asked to elaborate on this). They make sensationalist claims that mirror exactly what Scott Peterson and his supporters have said from the very beginning even though they still have nothing to back up what they’re alleging and the cases appellate failures have done a thorough and excellent job of countering Scott Peterson’s narrative over and over again. Their evidence is not new. If people took the time to really read the writs, the motions, the oppositions, and the court decisions in full with an open mind they would know better but they don’t do that and so here we all are arguing the same points 20 years after the case was tried and Peterson was found guilty.
innocenceproject.org
