Blog #2

There was a recent court case that proved a man guilty in a rather new fashion. Drew Peterson was found guilty of murdering his third wife and sentence to a maximum 60 years in prison. This case was different because it could be a possible precedent setter. The state of Illinois past the law, dubbed as "Drew's Law" in 2008, that allowed prosecutors to built their case off hearsay. Hearsay is any information reported by a witness that is not based on the witness' direct knowledge. This is the first time that Illinois has had a case that involved hearsay, and many experts are worried that this will start a hoard of cases for the admissibility of such evidence in Illinois and other places. The jurors however, used more than just what the witnesses said to base their conviction on. Peterson did not make himself look too good during his arrests or trials. Before his 2009 arrest, Peterson seemed to almost taunt the authorities. He even went as far as to joke on television shows suggesting a " Win a date with Drew Contest." After his arrest he called a radio station and modified his suggestion to "Win a conjugal visit with Drew." These actions inspired the making of a TV movie on the events. Peterson had divorced his third wife before her death, but prosecutors said he had reason to commit the murder. They said he feared the pending settlement for their $300,000 house would wipe him out financially. While all this was happening, there was still curiosity as to what happened to Peterson's fourth wife who vanished in 2007. Peterson sticks to his story that she ran off with another man, but many other people believe this is not the case. There was considerable evidence that Peterson taught his fourth wife how to lie to police, and that she had talked to their pastor and said the Peterson got up out of bed about the time his third wife was being killed. After the case, everyone was happy to see Peterson get his conviction. That is except his attorneys, who criticized the courts use of hearsay and said they might appeal the case all the way up to the Supreme Court on the junction that hearsay is unconstitutional.

http://m.yahoo.com/w/legobpengine/news/jury-convicts-drew-peterson-3rd-wifes-death-194658507.html?orig_host_hdr=news.yahoo.com&.intl=US&.lang=en-US