DEATH BY TALONS-Tiddy Smith

True Murder: The Most Shocking Killers

Dan Zupansky

True Crime, News Commentary, Documentary, News, Society & Culture

4 • 2.7K Ratings

🗓️ 21 March 2023

⏱️ 48 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

On December 9, 2001, Kathleen Peterson was found dead at the bottom of a staircase in her Durham, NC home. Her scalp was laced with deep incisions, and her blood was strewn from outside to inside the house.
The sinister truth of that night turned her murder into North Carolina's most enigmatic criminal case, capturing media attention across the globe.
Police zeroed in on Kathleen’s husband, Michael Peterson, and charged him with murder.
But Was It The Truth?
A neighbor, Larry Pollard, came up with an alternative “killer;” he claimed an owl had attacked Kathleen outside her house. He said it sliced her scalp with its fierce talons and caused her to run inside, collapsing at the stairwell, and bleeding to death.
When the media heard about his theory, Larry was mocked. And Michael was convicted.
Now, twenty years later, author Tiddy Smith explores Pollard’s theory and questions whether law enforcement ignored, or even hid, evidence to convict Michael Peterson. And was an owl, in fact, the real killer? DEATH BY TALONS: Did An Owl 'Murder' Kathleen Peterson?-Tiddy Smith

Transcript

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0:00.0	Jane loved crisps.
0:02.4	She ate them for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
0:05.5	Even at fancy pants restaurants.
0:07.6	Your crisps, madam.
0:09.0	Years went by, but then crisps stopped doing it for her.
0:12.8	They got her thrown out of cinemas.
0:14.8	And were forever in the bedsheets.
0:17.8	Crisps.
0:20.8	They're kind of like your current account.
0:22.8	Just because they were good ones doesn't mean you have to stick with them forever.
0:26.4	Maybe it's time to switch with the current account switch service.
0:30.2	You are now listening to True Murder, the most shocking killers in True Crime history,
0:43.0	and the authors that have written about them.
0:45.5	Gacy, Bundy, Dahmer, The Night Stocker, BTK, every week, another fascinating author,
0:53.4	talking about the most shocking and infamous killers in True Crime history.
0:57.7	True Murder, with your host, journalist and author, Dan Zufantke.
1:11.5	Good evening.
1:12.5	On December 9, 2001, Kathleen Peterson was found dead at the bottom of a staircase in
1:18.7	her Durham, North Carolina home.
1:21.1	Her scalp was laced with deep incisions and her blood was strewn from outside the inside
1:26.2	the house.
1:27.7	The sinister truth of that night turned her murder into North Carolina's most enigmatic
	...

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