HBO’s ‘Staircase’: Who is David Rudolf? What to know about Michael Peterson’s lawyer
The premiere of HBO Max’s “The Staircase” is renewing interest — locally and beyond — in the 2001 death of Kathleen Peterson in Durham and the subsequent trial and conviction of her husband, Michael Peterson.
The series, premiering May 5, is a dramatization of Jean-Xavier de Lestrade’s documentary series of the same name, which is available for streaming on Netflix.
Throughout his original trial, Peterson was represented by David Rudolf, a defense attorney who was then based in Chapel Hill (he’s now based in Charlotte).
Viewers of the “Staircase” documentary got an inside look at Rudolf and the defense team building their case as de Lestrade and the documentary crew were granted full access for filming the entire trial (including the tense moments as Rudolf prepares his opening statement and PowerPoint presentation the night before the trial begins).
In the new HBO Max series, Rudolf is portrayed by Michael Stuhlbarg. The News & Observer has reported that viewers won’t see that PowerPoint scene, but Rudolf nevertheless is heavily featured throughout the scripted series.
Also featured in the new series is local TV reporter Sonya Pfeiffer, portrayed by Teri Wyble. Pfeiffer covered the Peterson case for local station ABC11/WTVD. She and Rudolf, who went through a divorce after the trial, later got married.
Here’s more about Rudolf and Pfeiffer.
Who is David Rudolf? Education, law career, more
Rudolf has been practicing law since the mid-1970s, beginning his career as a public defender in the South Bronx of New York in 1974, according to the biography on his website.
▪ Rudolf had previously received a bachelor’s degree from Rutgers University, and he received his law degree from New York University. He also attended the London School of Economics.
▪ After his time in the Bronx, Rudolf then moved to the Federal Defenders office in Brooklyn, where he “tried a number of federal criminal cases.”
▪ Rudolf then decided he wanted to “encourage new law students to represent poor people.” In 1978, he was hired to start the Criminal Law Clinic at the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Law — bringing him to central North Carolina, where he would later represent Peterson.
▪ Rudolf, missing the courtroom and representing people himself, then started his own law firm in 1982. The firm still exists today as Pfeiffer Rudolf, which is based in Charlotte. According to the firm’s website, it is “consistently ranked as one of the top law firms in North Carolina.”
David Rudolf as Michael Peterson’s attorney
Rudolf writes on his website that he and his defense team were hired to represent Peterson about a week after Kathleen’s death, “when it became clear that the police believed Michael was responsible.”
▪ Rudolf writes that Peterson’s brother Bill, who is an attorney himself, “made a number of calls to other attorneys,” and many of the attorneys recommended Rudolf and his team.
▪ Rudolf and his team, including partner Tom Maher and investigator Ron Guerette, met with Peterson and questioned him about his relationship with Kathleen, about the night of Kathleen’s death and more. Rudolf writes that after getting answers to those questions and conducting their own investigation, “I believed Michael had nothing to do with Kathleen’s death.”
▪ Rudolf would go on to represent Peterson throughout the entire original trial, which ended with the jury rendering a guilty verdict. Rudolf described the verdict to The Charlotte Observer in 2018 as “a really tough time in my life, on a personal level, dealing with that.”
Rudolf represented Peterson again beginning in 2011, when he pushed for a new trial for Peterson after the State Bureau of Investigation and SBI agent Duane Deaver came under fire for withholding evidence and lying under oath in multiple cases, including Peterson’s original trial.
▪ After securing a new trial for Peterson, Rudolf eventually left the defense team in 2014 after he could not reach a plea agreement for Peterson with the Durham District Attorney.
▪ Peterson was then represented by attorney Mike Klinkosum. According to Rudolf’s website, Klinkosum had a stroke before a hearing in which he had filed to have the case dismissed. Peterson was then represented by Mary Jude Darrow for the hearing. The motion to dismiss the case was denied.
▪ After the hearing, Rudolf then stepped in to represent Peterson once again. After negotiations, Rudolf and the state reached an agreement for Peterson to enter an Alford plea, which he did in 2017.
Who is Sonya Pfeiffer?
Sonya Pfeiffer covered the original Michael Peterson trial as a local TV reporter for ABC11/WTVD. Her reports on the case are seen multiple times throughout the “Staircase” documentary and depicted in the HBO scripted series.
▪ Pfeiffer had previously received a bachelor’s degree in journalism from Ohio University in 1995, according to her LinkedIn profile.
▪ Her biography on the Pfeiffer Rudolf website says that, in addition to Raleigh, she also worked in Omaha, Boston and New York during her time as a journalist. She also has experience reporting internationally in Paris and Tel Aviv.
▪ Pfeiffer became a controversial figure during the trial, after sending a letter to each of the jurors’ homes during deliberations requesting a group interview after the trial ended. Pfeiffer and WTVD’s news director said the letters had been sent prematurely, and they were not supposed to have reached jurors until after a verdict had been reached.
Pfeiffer enrolled at the UNC-Chapel Hill School of Law beginning in 2004 — the year after Michael Peterson was found guilty in his original trial. She graduated in 2007.
▪ Pfeiffer is now admitted to practice law in North Carolina, Massachusetts and Washington, D.C., according to her biography.
When did David Rudolf and Sonya Pfeiffer get married?
Rudolf was married during the Peterson trial, but went through a divorce after it ended.
▪ Rudolf’s character, played by Michael Stuhlbarg, says in Episode 3 of the new HBO Max series that his then-wife during the trial is “not so crazy about me right now.”
Rudolf and Pfeiffer met during the trial, getting to know each other in what Rudolf described to The Charlotte Observer in 2018 as “an interesting way.”
▪ Rudolf told The Observer that he “was close with all the reporters” during the case and that he didn’t “think it’s terribly strange for two people, in that circumstance, to form a bond of some sort.”
▪ In the new HBO Max series, Rudolf and Pfeiffer refer to each other as “friends”
Rudolf and Pfeiffer got married in 2007, according to The Observer. They now split their time between Ontario, Canada, and Charlotte, where they are partners in their law firm.
▪ The couple also co-hosts “Abuse of Power,” a podcast that identifies “the ways in which the US justice system has victimized the people it was built to protect: us.”
More on HBO’s ‘The Staircase’
For full coverage of HBO Max’s “The Staircase” and other background on the death of Kathleen Peterson and the murder trial of Michael Peterson, visit: newsobserver.com/topics/staircase
This story was originally published May 5, 2022 at 12:46 PM with the headline "HBO’s ‘Staircase’: Who is David Rudolf? What to know about Michael Peterson’s lawyer."
