Prosecution: TV Interview Reveals Peterson's Lies

R E D W O O D C I T Y, Calif., Feb. 24 -- Prosecutors in the Scott Peterson case say they can prove the man accused of killing his young pregnant wife and his unborn son is a liar. But first they've got to convince the judge to admit their evidence.

Peterson wanted to tell the world he was innocent in his 2003 interview with ABCNEWS' Diane Sawyer.

Months before police found Laci's body washed up on a San Francisco Bay beach, Peterson, in the televised interview, said he had nothing to do with Laci's Christmas Eve disappearance.

Now prosecutors want to present Peterson as a liar, by using his own recorded words against him. They have filed a motion asking to admit his televised statements as evidence that he lied repeatedly.

They allege Peterson clearly broke his televised promise to preserve his unborn son's nursery.

"Can't go in there," Peterson said during the Jan. 2003 interview. "That door is closed until there is someone to put in there."

Prosecutors say Peterson not only went in the room less than a month after the interview, they said police revealed he was using it as a storage room after their search of the home in mid-February.

The prosecutors also say Peterson wasn't telling the whole truth when he admitted to his affair with Amber Frey. They said he lied when he said there had just been one mistress during his five-year marriage. A prosecutor said, in court papers filed Monday, that Peterson had another affair before Frey came along.

Richard Gabriel, President of the American Society of Trial Consultants, says Peterson's televised interview gives prosecutors an opportunity to really show the defendant to the jury if he doesn't end up taking the stand himself.

"If Scott Peterson chooses not to take the stand, this is one of the ways they can essentially show him in front of the jury — show inconsistencies or show he has not been entirely truthful in his testimony," Gabriel said.

Prosecutors in the double-murder trial won't be breaking new legal ground if they are successful in their attempt to introduce Peterson's televised interview as evidence.