Fast Facts: Key Figures in Case
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A look at key figures in the Scott Peterson case:
SCOTT PETERSON — The 32-year-old former fertilizer salesman told police he was fishing alone the morning his wife disappeared. He was having an affair when his wife vanished; prosecutors said he wanted to escape married life and fatherhood.
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LACI PETERSON — The 27-year-old substitute schoolteacher was eight months pregnant with her first child, a boy the couple planned to name Conner, when she disappeared. Described by friends and family as the life of the party, displaying an ever-present smile.
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ALFRED A. DELUCCHI — A trial judge for more than three decades, Delucchi, 72, retired in 1998 after serving in Alameda County for 15 years. He was called out of retirement for the Peterson case after the trial was moved from Modesto. Delucchi has presided over 22 death penalty trials.
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JOSEPH "RICK" DISTASO — Quiet, neatly groomed and painstakingly procedural, the 36-year-old lead prosecutor graduated in 1992 from Loyola Law School and worked in the Army's Judge Advocate General Corps before becoming deputy district attorney for Stanislaus County in 1996. He won two prior murder convictions.
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MARK GERAGOS — Suave and smartly dressed, the 47-year-old defense attorney previously represented Whitewater figure Susan McDougal, actress Winona Ryder and former Rep. Gary Condit. Before he was hired for the Peterson case, he described Scott Peterson as "a felony cad" who faced a "damning circumstantial case."
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SHARON ROCHA — Laci Peterson's mother testified early in the trial that Scott Peterson was distant and emotionless as family and friends searched for Laci Peterson the day she vanished. She never told police about her early suspicions until after learning of his affair.
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JACQUELINE PETERSON — Scott Peterson's mother, who suffers from a lung ailment and carries a small oxygen tank, told police her son never intended to flee after Laci Peterson's disappearance. Scott Peterson was arrested carrying nearly $15,000 in cash — money his mother said she gave him for a car.
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AMBER FREY — The 26-year-old massage therapist had an affair with Scott Peterson. Prosecutors used taped conversations between the two to show how Peterson lied in the weeks after his wife vanished and continued to romance Frey, a single mother of two.