Flee3

Featured Fact: Scott did not Flee, page 3

Scott's appearance...

Scott's appearance changed between December 24, 2002 and April 18, 2003. He'd lost over 20 pounds, grown a goatee and his hair was lighter. None of these changes took place overnight, or made him unrecognizable. Scott's picture had been plastered all over the media, and slow motion video of him was being shown on TV with creepy music in the back ground. Scott had become a recognizable figure. The goatee and hair color may have helped Scott avoid being recognized by media or someone on the street, but he was not trying to use these changes to hide from the police. You can see by the photos below that Detective Grogan had seen Scott outside his home on February 18th looking almost exactly how he did on the day of his arrest.

(photo on the left is exhibit 282, taken Feb 18th, photo on the right is exhibit 276C, DOJ photo taken April 18th, the day of Scott's arrest)

Scott never tried to hide from or evade the police. Once arrested, Scott was taken to the Department of Justice offices in San Diego. While there, he recognized Agent Sonia Ramos as one of the people who had been following him that morning. She had fishtailed and had almost gotten into an accident. Scott apologized to her and said he didn't mean to cause any harm, he thought she was media. (see Sonia Ramos testimony)

The camping gear and knife in the driver's door...

The camping gear in Scott's car was purchased March 16th at REI, one month and two days before his arrest. The store was adjacent to the soccer field where he had attended his nephew's soccer game. Scott's friend, Mike Richardson, testified that he knew Scott enjoyed camping. Video was shown in court from a trip where Scott had gone hiking and fishing with his dad, brother and nephews in the fall of 2002. Modesto Police Officers Hendee, Eichbaum, and Grogan all testified to finding camping gear or rugged camping gear when they had executed search warrants in December and February. Scott was an outdoorsman and he had bought some new gear. He just didn't have a place to take it home to.

The knife in the driver's side door belonged to Michael Griffin, former owner of the Mercedes. He testified in court that when he cleaned out the car, he had forgotten it in the pocket of the driver's side door. The photo below shows the police found the knife in the exact place that Michael had left it.

The cash...

When Scott was arrested he had over $14,000 cash with him. Following is the series of events that lead to Scott having so much cash with him. This was testified to in court and bank records confirm it to be true. Most of these exhibits were not made public because they contain personal banking information.

Scott's mom, Jackie, was going to loan John the money to buy out Scott. John was then going to take over the payments.
On April 8, 2003, Jackie went to Bank of America to withdraw $10,000 from an old account she rarely used. She did not know her account number, so she gave them her social security number to look it up. Unbeknownst to Jackie, she was listed on Scott and Laci's checking account as well. (Jackie had opened that account with Scott in 1991. Scott added Laci when they were married and never removed his mother.) The bank gave Jackie $10,000 from Scott's checking account. The withdrawal receipt was entered as Exhibit D8Y1.
Jackie paid Scott $8000 cash for his equity in the Dodge pick up. She paid him cash so he could better negotiate while shopping for a car.
On April 12, 2003, Scott purchased a Mercedes from Michael Griffin. He paid him with 36 $100 bills. Scott had $4400 left of the $8000 his mother had given him.
Scott discovers the $10,000 withdrawal from his bank account. He sees the withdrawal ticket signed by his mom and calls her.
Jackie then goes to Washington Mutual on April 17th and withdraws $10,000 cash out of her account. She gives the money to Scott that day to replace the money she took out of his account. She paid him in cash so that the bank would not put a hold on the funds. Scott now has roughly $14,400 in cash.
Scott is arrested the morning of April 18th . He had yet to deposit the money his mother had given him the day before.
Scott also had some "foreign currency" with him when he was arrested. The 2 bills were photographed with other items and entered as People's Exhibit 293-29. One bill is worth 50 pesos and the other is worth 20 pesos. This is roughly worth $6.40 US. This is not an unreasonable amount of pocket change for someone who had recently returned from Mexico. This exhibit is sealed due to a personal check shown in the photo.

Scott did not flee...

Scott knew very early on that the police were suspicious of him. His good friend, Greg Reed, heard a comment from an officer the night Laci went missing that they (the police) felt they already knew what had happened. The police had searched his house three times, his warehouse, and his vehicles. They also held a press conference asking the public to help confirm whether or not Scott went to the Berkeley Marina on Christmas Eve (they didn't believe him). (see Greg Reed testimony)

If Scott had any intent to flee, why hadn't he done it yet? If Scott were guilty, wouldn't he have fled when two bodies were found? He wouldn't need to wait until they were identified, he would have known who they were.
In early January, the police announced they had found an object in the bay that appeared to be a body. They announced it would be three more days until they could go back and retrieve it. If Scott was guilty and had intentions of fleeing, wouldn't that have been a good time as well? (The item ended up being an anchor)

Additionally, from Mark Geragos' opening arguments, "He had also just paid his car insurance, paid his income taxes, filed his 1040s, his income tax returns, and had not cashed his paycheck. And as you saw yesterday, he had some children's books in his car when he was arrested. These were children's books for his nieces and nephews to give to them on the following Sunday, which was Easter. And this is hardly the idea of a man who is preparing to flee."

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