FROM THE VAULT - The Staircase: Michael Peterson - Parts 1&2
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What is the Staircase case and why revisit Michael & Kathleen Peterson now?
I remember when I was a kid, we used to have a sauna.
My grandma used to put water in the sauna after a cold. She always had that very nice Finnish shampoo. That blue bottle. Sillä hiukset tuntui kuin sadevedellä pestyviltä. Ja se tuoksu. Kuin lämmin halaus noilta vuosilta. Mä käytän erittäin hienoa suomalaista shampoota edelleen.
Hello. Hello there. If you're listening to this, then it's because you understand that for the month of July, dear listeners, we are taking you on a virtual road trip through the whole of North America. We haven't been for a few years now and it's just quite hard. Visas are hard, guys. So we're going to do it with the power of the back catalogue and your imagination. What are we doing this week, Hannah?
Well, apparently the staircase, but In a meeting the other week, I had to ask if we had covered it. And apparently we did.
How dare you?
I just had forgotten about it, which is quite rare for me. So I don't know if I'm actually qualified to be doing this topper right now. I can't remember. Fuck.
Oh, my God. Well, I wrote our staircase script, two-parter script. So I do remember it. And I fell down a big fucking staircase. Staircase. while researching this it is a fucking bonkers story I mean obviously you guys are going to listen to it now hopefully you've already heard the episode if you haven't don't worry it's about to be played for you it took place in North Carolina let's say that firstly while we're here on our big North American road trip we're stopping off in North Carolina and honestly people like what comes to mind when you think of North Carolina it's the fucking staircase case for me it is mad it's basically the story Of this woman who falls down or is pushed down a flight of stairs and dies at the bottom.
Was she pushed? Did she fall? Was it an owl? Was it her husband? Are owls the new husbands?
Oh, it's the owl one.
It's the owl case. It's the fucking owl case. I obviously started off thinking, well, obviously the fucking husband did it. But by the end...
I don't fucking know. And I think it could have been an owl.
As you will understand when you listen to this episode again. I feel like it is creeping back to me. I think I am also team owl. So do you know what? I'll listen to it. Thank you. And you can do it too. You can listen to it right now because here it is.
Enjoy.
I'm Saruti. I'm Hannah. And welcome to your end of year red-handed class. Welcome, everybody. This is it, guys. This is the final two-parter of our red-handed journey here for 2023. Yeah.
And I just remembered this as I heard you say your own name, which I've obviously heard you do many, many times.
I am always saying my name. Do you know or have you seen what YouTube has autocorrected your name to in the subtitles of our videos?
Is it Soranti?
What was the timeline on the night Kathleen Peterson died and the initial 911 calls?
No. What is it? S-T-I. S-T-I? What? YouTube. Someone tweeted us this morning. Brilliant. To not a specific S-T-I. No, it's just I'm S-T-I and I'm S-T-I. Well, Merry fucking Christmas from STI. Let's start again. Hello, I'm STI. Fuck off. That is outrageous.
Anyway, we'll deal with that later. For now, we've got too much to deal with. We've got quite a lot to deal with. Too many things.
Almost like having a very vigorous STI is how it has been to research this case. Because I could not stop. It was relentless. I said on Under the Duvet a few weeks ago that this was by far the hardest case I've ever had to research because it never ends. Every time you go onto Google and search the name Peterson in some combination of question, it is filled with articles that I've never seen before. And I'm like, how is this happening? Every other case you do, you hit a point where you've read everything there is to research.
Or you're coming across what you think are new articles, but they're actually just repeating stuff you already have.
And I've also never seen a case where there are so many articles by reputable places that I feel like that must be worth reading. Right, right, right, right. So here we are. After many a week researching this case, we're ready to finally talk about it.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What is the Staircase case and why revisit Michael & Kathleen Peterson now?
0:00–3:37
2
What was the timeline on the night Kathleen Peterson died and the initial 911 calls?
3:37–1:15:28
3
How did experts debate whether Kathleen's head wounds came from a fall or an assault?
1:15:28–1:16:53
4
What forensic controversies (blood, blowpoke, footprints) undermined the prosecution's case?
1:16:53–1:25:10
5
Why was Duane Deaver's conduct and the SBI audit pivotal to Michael Peterson's appeal?
1:25:10–1:32:42
6
Could an owl attack explain Kathleen Peterson’s injuries and the odd evidence trail?
1:32:42–2:34:33