REDWOOD CITY, Calif. – Repelled by Scott Peterson’s seeming lack of sorrow and remorse, a jury decided yesterday that he deserves the death penalty for murdering his pregnant wife, Laci, almost two years ago to the date.

A cheer went up outside the courthouse as the jury announced its decision after 11 1/2 hours of deliberations over three days. Inside court, Peterson reacted with the same tight-jawed look that some jurors said turned them off after seeing little emotion out of Peterson since his wife’s disappearance two years ago.

“I still would have liked to see, I don’t know if remorse is the right word,” juror Steve Cardosi said at a news conference following the sentence. “He lost his wife and his child – it didn’t seem to faze him. While that was going on …he is romancing a girlfriend.”

A crowd of several hundred gathered outside the courthouse for the verdict – a scene reminiscent of when about 1,000 people showed up last month to hear the conviction.

Laci Peterson’s mother, Sharon Rocha, cried quietly – her lips quivering after the verdict was read. Scott Peterson’s mother, Jackie, showed no apparent emotion.

Laci Peterson’s stepfather, Ron Grantski, was the only member of her family to speak to the media after the jury’s decision. Ms. Rocha and a dozen other family members and friends sat sobbing nearby.

Mr. Grantski noted that the last time he and Ms. Rocha saw Laci was almost two years ago to the day, on December 15, 2002. “We have a lot of tough holidays and dates coming up that are going to be very hard for us,” Mr. Grantski said.

In a brief news conference after the verdict, defense attorney Mark Geragos said: “Obviously, we plan on pursuing every and all appeals, motions for a new trial and everything else,” he said.

The jury had two options in deciding the 32-year-old former fertilizer salesman’s fate: life in prison without parole or death by injection.

Judge Alfred Delucchi will formally sentence Peterson on February 25. The judge will have the option of reducing the sentence to life, but such a move is highly unlikely.

If the judge upholds the sentence, Peterson will be sent to death row at San Quentin State Prison outside San Francisco, the infamous lockup where prisoners gaze out small cell windows overlooking the same bay where Laci Peterson’s body was discarded.

But Peterson still might not be executed for decades – if ever – and it can take years for even the first phase of the appeals process to begin. Since California brought back capital punishment in 1978, only 10 executions have been carried out; the last execution, in 2002, was for a murder committed in 1980. The state’s clogged death row currently houses about 650 people.

The sentence marked one of the final chapters in a soap opera-like saga that began nearly two years ago with the Christmas Eve disappearance of Laci Peterson, a 27-year-old substitute teacher who married her college sweetheart and was soon to be the proud mother of a baby boy named Conner.

The tale of adultery and murder quickly set off a tabloid frenzy as suspicion began to swirl around Scott Peterson, who claimed to have been fishing by himself on Christmas Eve and was carrying on an affair with a massage therapist at the time.

The remains of Laci and the fetus washed ashore about four months later, just a few miles from where Peterson said he was fishing in the San Francisco Bay.

The case went to trial in June, and the jury of six men and six women convicted Peterson November 12 of two counts of murder before issuing the sentence yesterday.

“There are so many things, so many things,” juror Richelle Nice said in describing how the jury came about its decisions. “Scott Peterson was Laci’s husband, Conner’s daddy – the one person that should have protected them.”

Jurors said they were swayed as much by Peterson’s emotions as by any of the testimony during the trial.

“For me, a big part of it was at the end – the verdict – no emotion. No anything. That spoke a thousand words – loud and clear,” Ms. Nice said, responding to a reporter’s question about whether they wanted to hear a statement from Peterson. “I heard enough from him.”

The jury’s decision followed seven days of tearful testimony in the penalty phase of the trial. In arguing for death last week, prosecutors called Peterson “the worst kind of monster” and said he was undeserving of sympathy. Mr. Geragos begged of jurors: “Just don’t kill him. That’s all I am asking of you. End this cycle.”