Netflix - The Staircase...innocent or guilty?

[CoRhona]

YABU - it was an unfortunate fall

YANBU - guilty as sin

(If you've not watched it but plan to, read up more about it afterwards...I was )

@AryaStarkWolf Yes the podcast is on BBC sounds. Look for Beyond Reasonable Doubt, all episodes. It starts with an episode called ‘At home with the Petersons’.

[quote BobbingPuffins]@AryaStarkWolf Yes the podcast is on BBC sounds. Look for Beyond Reasonable Doubt, all episodes. It starts with an episode called ‘At home with the Petersons’.[/quote]
Brilliant, thanks for that

I don't think I could watch any more, we kept getting to the end of an episode thinking that MUST be it and then there was some twist that meant it carried on

GUILTY as sin 🌺

I think he is guilty. He is creepy and the way he is with the kids is equally so. Apparently the blood was completely dry and yet he tried to say she was still breathing when he called the emergency services. There were money and potentially fidelity issues. You can be badly hurt falling down the stairs but there was so much blood everywhere

I wish I knew...
I've seen this twice ( once with DP and DD18 )
I still can't fathom it - there's a podcast about it too. Can't remember the name of it, look on BBC Sounds. It's great!!

Beyond Reasonable Doubt ( must read all the thread ) :)

@AryaStarkWolf I don’t think the owl theory was around at the time of the trial, and wasn’t argued in court which is why it wasn’t included. David Rudolf (the lawyer) has said it never occurred to them. But he thinks it is plausible!

davidsrudolf.com/thestaircase/the-owl-theory/

There weren’t the forensics to support the kind of injuries she sustained being caused by him though - you can’t bludgeon someone without cast off, the forensic analysis was dodgy as fuck. The blow poke can’t have been the weapon.

And the woman in Germany didn’t die from falling down the stairs or from injuries at all, did it? While being a horrible coincidence it’s not the same situation.

He may well have done it but there was no viable explanation for how he did it.

If you haven’t already seen it, try to get hold of the HBO series The Jinx. By far the best true crime documentary I’ve seen.

[quote ChocBeforeCock]@AryaStarkWolf I don’t think the owl theory was around at the time of the trial, and wasn’t argued in court which is why it wasn’t included. David Rudolf (the lawyer) has said it never occurred to them. But he thinks it is plausible!

davidsrudolf.com/thestaircase/the-owl-theory/[/quote]
Yeah, it just seemed to explain a lot about her injuries i thought .....even if it seems really bizarre but bizarre stuff does happen some times. It's hard not to think it was him watching the Doc because he does come across as sleazy creep and not very likable at all but I just think the Owl theory just fits a lot better

@AryaStarkWolf yeah, I think this one does remain a mystery. I personally do think he is guilty but if I had been on the jury I’m not sure I would have convicted as there are question marks over the prosecution case theory and how she sustained the lacerations with no blunt force injury.

I've not watched this one yet but I'm sure I saw either the same case or a really really similar one on forensic files. gives me something to watch later

@Mommaofferts

I've not watched this one yet but I'm sure I saw either the same case or a really really similar one on forensic files. gives me something to watch later

I was thinking the same! Just looked him up on Wikipedia and yes it was a forensic files episode. I was gutted when they took them all off Netflix

I thought he was guilty all the way through - he was just so shifty and narcissistic. But I do think the owl theory could be plausible, the gashes in her head match an owls talons perfectly - much more than strikes from a blow poke or falling down the stairs in my opinion. However, even if it was an owl, I still think Michael was involved in what happened after. Maybe seeing her dying and not helping her in order to cash in on her house or something to that affect. The way he is with the kids is so cult like!

I don't get the owl theory. She would have gone outside at the front of the house and attacked then? Strange thing to do when you are going back to your house at the time it was but ok, maybe she heard something.

But are we saying she got attacked, she walked back in, and instead of calling and walking towards her husband, she decided to go up a tight stairway? All this without screaming?

Then she fell down at this point? A feather on her but nothing by the door or towards the stair? Massive cuts but only a bit of blood from the front door to the stairs? If she managed to pull her hair to leave strands in her hand, it's hard to believe there wouldn't have been quite a few feathers too.

Don't believe it for a second.

Guilty as sin. And quite sinister.

@LooneyLovefood

I thought he was guilty all the way through - he was just so shifty and narcissistic. But I do think the owl theory could be plausible, the gashes in her head match an owls talons perfectly - much more than strikes from a blow poke or falling down the stairs in my opinion. However, even if it was an owl, I still think Michael was involved in what happened after. Maybe seeing her dying and not helping her in order to cash in on her house or something to that affect. The way he is with the kids is so cult like!

Yeah that's certainly a possibility, he was a very odd man

@NoBloodyHolly

I fully believe it was an owl

Do you mean a raptor

She could have been screaming - remember they tested playing screams in the stairway and seeing if they could hear her outside by the pool. They couldn’t.

Those who believe he did it - how? What weapon? Why were there no cast off patterns from that weapon?

I’m not convinced by the argument that it was just a fall, but not convinced by any theory I’ve seen about how an attack by him could have happened in that space either

I think they had a physical fight. I don't think it was a planned murder - they had a pool. Surely "accidental" drowning is easier to swallow than that weird crime scene?

I can't believe the Owl theory is actually taken seriously. It was a theory put forward after the trial by Peterson's neighbour who couldn't believe he was guilty of Kathleen's murder. I also think they had a physical fight, the lacerations may have been caused by her head being smashed into a stair.

The incriminating emails from Brad the escort had been opened just before her death. Prior to this Peterson had begged his ex-wife, from whom he had been divorced for many years, to remortgage her house in Germany in order to pay their son's debts. Kathleen, the main earner, was facing redundancy. Desperate people do desperate things.

The owl did it..

Am I missing something? I thought the woman in Germany died the same way, blood and all?

There are conflicting accounts. Some say blood, some say none. The original autopsy said cerebral haemorrhage, the second one conveniently carried out by the state pathologist said murder. I genuinely don't think he killed his friend in Germany but I do suspect her death gave him the idea to stage a fall after he killed his wife.

IIRC Elizabeth Ratcliffe was found at the foot of the staircase by the Nanny who said she was in a pool of blood. Peterson was the last person to see her alive when he walked her home.

The Nanny testified as to the amount of blood at the scene, because the death happened on a US military base in Germany, I think there was an aspect of covering up and the death was recorded as a brain haemorrhage. During the trial, Elizabeth's body was exhumed and the cause of death was found to be homicide. This was pretty much disregarded as Peterson's defence team argued - rightly - that the body should have been examined by a neutral pathologist in Texas where the grave had been and not sent to North Carolina where the trial was.