Drew Peterson

Looking at his life from the outside, it would appear that Drew Peterson was a real lady’s man.  But looks can be deceiving and Drew Peterson was no lady’s man, he was a cold-blooded killer.  I’m John Dodson, welcome to The Secret Sits.

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Transcript

Looking at his life from the outside, it would appear that Drew Peterson was a real lady’s man.  But looks can be deceiving and Drew Peterson was no lady’s man, he was a cold-blooded killer.  I’m John Dodson, welcome to The Secret Sits.

Drew Peterson was born on January 5th 1954, to Donald and Betty Peterson.  He had 3 siblings and his parents were married for 48 years until his father passed away.  After Donald Peterson passed away, Betty Peterson ended up remarrying and she married her deceased husband’s former boss.   Drew graduated in 1972 from Willowbrook High School in Villa Park, Illinois, where he ran cross country. Drew joined the United States Army after high school graduation and he briefly attended the College of DuPage in 1974 before moving to Falls Church, Virginia, to train as a military police officer. Drew Peterson would end up serving just four years in the Army, but during his military service, Peterson married his high school sweetheart Carol. After being discharged from the military, Drew Peterson became a police officer for the Bolingbrook, Illinois police department.  The year, was 1977. In 1978, he was assigned to the Metropolitan Area Narcotics Squad, and in 1979, he received a "Police Officer of the Year" award from the department. Drew and Carol produced two sons, Stephen Paul Peterson and Eric Drew Peterson.

After three years together, Carol and Drew divorced, this separation was considered amicable by all accounts.  After this marriage ended Drew began dating Kyle Piry, but after just four months, Piry stopped dating Drew and she made claims that he had abused his position as a police officer and used police resources to harass her.

Peterson married his second wife, Victoria Connolly, who went by Vicki, in 1982. In the beginning the couple were content. Vicki brought a daughter to the marriage and Drew had his two boys from his previous marriage.  The couple owned and operated a bar together in Romeoville. Vicki would remain married to Drew Peterson for 10 years, she told the Chicago Tribune, “When it was good, it was wonderful, it was great.  But when it was bad, it was really bad.”  Vicki told of a history of domestic violence which existed throughout their entire 10-year marriage.  Her daughter lived in the house until she turned 17 and also confirms the abuse suffered at the hands of Drew Peterson.  Vicki would later revel that Peterson had threatened to kill her and also told her that he could make it look like an accident.  

During their marriage, Peterson became controlling and was also unfaithful.  Vicki has also stated that Peterson bugged their home so he could keep track of her and everything happening at the house.  

By this time Peterson had been serving as an undercover narcotics officer for several years and the department began investigating him for misconduct, this was in 1985.  The Bollingbrook Fire and Police Commission found Drew Peterson guilty of disobedience and failing to report a bribe, along with a myriad of other infractions.  He ended up being terminated from the police force, but after his grievance went through appeals, he was reinstated the following year.

In 1992, Drew Peterson began dating Kathleen Savio, and let me just point out that, yes, at this time he is still married to Vicki.  Vicki filed for divorce after this extramarital affair and on February 18th, 1992, the divorce was finalized.  Drew Peterson married Kathleen Savio just two months after the divorce was final.

The couple seemed like everything was going along swimmingly, they produced two children together, two boys who would be named Thomas and Kristopher, they were born just 19 months apart.  But this marriage, like all of his others soon became unhappy.  Things quickly became so bad that Kathleen was granted an order of protection from Drew Peterson in 2002.  This order included claims that Peterson had physically harmed Kathleen. The police were dispatch to the Peterson house eight separate times for domestic disturbance calls and issues with court ordered visitations between 2002 and 2004.  The couple legally divorced in 2003, however; the couple had made no arrangements to finalize the split of their financial assets. 

In October of 2003, Drew Peterson married his fourth wife, a woman named Stacy Cales, who Peterson had been having an affair with during his marriage to Kathleen.  Stacy was also 30 years younger than Drew.  Kathleen and Peterson had a court date set to settle their outstanding issues as they pertained to their divorce.  The impending date was in April of 2004, but Kathleen Savio would never make this court date, because on March 1st, 2004, Kathleen Savio was found, in her home, dead.  Her body was found battered and bruised, laying in an empty bathtub.  There was a large gash in the back of her head and the back of her torso was covered in bruises and scrapes.  The coroner’s jury quickly ruled her death as an accidental drowning.  Sitting on this jury was a police officer, who personally knew Drew Peterson and assured the other jurors that Drew was a great man and he could never have hurt his ex-wife. 

So, life went on, Drew and his fourth wife, Stacy Ann produced two new children, Anthony born in 2003 and Lacy born in 2005.  Stacy even legally adopted Kathleen Savio’s children she had, had with Drew Peterson, and by all accounts, treated them as her own and at least attempted to create a loving home for her family.  Stacy was working to complete her nursing degree from Joliet Junior College, something she had always dreamed of accomplishing. 

And then, Sunday, October 28th, 2007.  

Stacy was now 23-years-old and she was planning on going to her sister, Cassandra Cales’ home to help her with some painting.  But Stacy, never showed up.  The official missing person report was filed in the early morning hours of Monday, October 29th, 2007, and the report was filed, not by her husband, Drew Peterson, but by her sister Cassandra.  When police questioned Drew about Stacy’s whereabouts, he claimed to have received a phone call from Stacy on the night of October 28th, and in this phone call, Stacy told him that she was leaving him for another man.  She also, supposedly told Peterson that she was leaving her 2002 Pontiac Grand AM at Bolingbrook’s Clow International Airport.  But Stacy’s family knew that this was not true and that she would have never have left her children.  

Extensive searches were conducted immediately by authorities as well as volunteers, but no trace of Stacy Peterson was found. Friends of Stacy Peterson made it known that she had been planning on leaving Drew Peterson and may have been making preparations for this.  Drew Peterson was quickly made a person of interest in the case.  This should not be surprising, because typically the spouse is always looked into first, but for Peterson, he had a long past which also followed him.  Following his wife’s disappearance, Drew Peterson, seemed unconcerned about the whole affair.  He would joke with the media present for the search and investigation and he would make flippant remarks regarding Stacy.  On an appearance on the Today show, Peterson brushed off speculation about Stacy wanting to leave him by saying, “I’m not trying to be funny here, but Stacy Peterson would ask me for a divorce, on a regular basis, and it was based on her menstrual cycle.”

After Stacy’s disappearance and consequent to the investigation, detectives decided to relook into the death of Kathleen Savio, Peterson’s 3rd wife.  On November 16th, 2007 the body of Kathleen Savio was exhumed and it underwent a more detailed forensic examination.  The exam was conducted by Michael Braden, a former New York City medical examiner, who performed the exam at the behest of Kathleen’s family and Fox News.  The new exam concluded that she had died of drowning following a physical altercation and her body was placed into the bathtub.  The results of the official autopsy ordered by the county have yet to be released to the public.  Will County State's Attorney James Glasgow told the press that, after examining evidence in the case, he believed that the death was a "homicide staged to look like an accident". On February 21, 2008, Glasgow announced that a pathologist had determined that Kathleen's death was, in fact, a homicide, adding that the death had been investigated as such since reopening the case following the exhumation.

Stacy had confided in a pastor at her church, Reverend Neil Schori, she had told the pastor that Drew had murdered Kathleen Savio and that he had staged it to look like an accident.  She also told the pastor that she was afraid of her husband.  Now Stacy had provided Drew Peterson’s alibi for the evening when Kathleen had died, something we are still not sure was true or not. 

With Stacy missing and Kathleen’s exhumation, this case quickly became one of the most publicized cases in Illinois, if not all of the United States.  The Investigation was led by the Illinois State Police but they also had FBI involved in the case as well.  Four search warrants were issued for the Peterson’s property, including the seizure of Drew Peterson’s firearms and both his and Stacy’s vehicles.  

Drew Peterson then announced his plans to retire as a Bolingbrook police sergeant effective December of 2007. And if your head is spinning with my last statement, let me clarify that, yes, even with everything happening, one dead wife, one missing wife, calls for domestic disturbances happening over and over again, Drew Peterson was still working as a Police Sargent! On November 15, the Bolingbrook Police Pension Board voted to allow Peterson to collect his pension of $6,061.71 per month, they said that current law game them no other option, because at this point, he had not been convicted of any crimes.

Drew Peterson’s life-long friend, Rick Mims, admitted that he and Peterson had purchased three large blue plastic containers from a cable company where the two also worked part-time during 2003.  Rick also provided photos of the barrels for investigators.  Rick also then went to the tabloid newspapers and sold his side of the story for an undisclosed sum of money.

Thomas Morphey was Drew Peterson’s stepbrother and Thomas had a history of drug and alcohol abuse.  Thomas attempted suicide two day after helping Peterson move a large blue plastic barrel from his home in Bolingbrook into his SUV.  Thomas feared that he may have, unbeknownst to him, helped to dispose of Stacy’s dead body.  And neighbors also corroborated the movement of this barrel, as they had seen Peterson and a man not know to them, hauling a 55-gallon barrel out of the house shortly after Stacy’s disappearance. 

In the mist of this investigation, Drew Peterson, was just making his way through the media circus surrounding the case.  Peterson appeared on CNN’s Larry King Live on April 11th, 2008, with his attorney present to tell him which questions to answer or not.  Peterson then made appearances on radio station WLS-AM with Mancow Muller.  After this radio appearance, Will County Judge Stephen White severely limited Peterson’s access to the media.

As 2008 began to come to a close and December rolled around, Peterson’s publicist, yes, his publicist Glenn Selig confirmed the news that Peterson was now engaged to a 23-year-old, Christina Raines.  This would be Peterson’s 5th marriage, but on January 30th, 2009, Raines suddenly moved out of Peterson’s house following an ultimatum by her father, Ernie Raines.  Ernie was concerned about his daughter because of the way Peterson tried to control her.  After moving out Raines said that she had come to her senses and that the engagement was simply a publicity stunt to try and keep Peterson in the media spotlight.

An indictment for murder was issued on May 7th, 2009 and Drew Peterson was arrested.  His bail was set at twenty million dollars. In October of that year, Peterson sued JP Morgan Chase for revoking a home equity line of credit, which he intended to use to cover his legal fees.  I guess his $109,000 a year income was not enough.  Prosecutors made the argument that he would pose an eminent danger if released on bail, so Judge White ruled that Peterson would remain in the Will County Jail for the remainder of his trial and subsequent appeals. 

On July 21, 2010, it was revealed that hearsay statements indicating Peterson killed two of his wives were not reliable enough for a jury to hear at his trial. After presiding over a lengthy hearing, Judge White issued a four-page sealed ruling in May obtained by the Daily Herald. White ruled that prosecutors proved Peterson killed both Kathleen and Stacy "by a preponderance of the evidence," but nearly all statements attributed to Stacy "do not provide sufficient safeguards of reliability." (The standard of proof in homicide cases is "beyond a reasonable doubt"; "preponderance of the evidence" is the standard for fact-finding on questions of admissibility of evidence, even in a criminal case.) Stacy's statements were crucial to the prosecution's case, as it lacked significant direct evidence. In April 2012, an Illinois appellate court ruled that prosecutors could use eight statements made by both the victim prior to her death and by Peterson's still-missing fourth wife Stacy prior to her disappearance, reversing White's earlier decision. Peterson's defense had contended that introduction of these alleged hearsay comments constituted a violation of his Sixth Amendment right to confront any witnesses testifying against him. 

The Illinois State Legislature attempted to help the prosecution with the passage of a new Illinois law, nicknamed "Drew's Law", which allows prosecutors to enter hearsay statements into evidence under certain conditions. Passed while investigators were looking for Stacy, the legislation permits courts to consider statements from "unavailable witnesses," provided that prosecutors are able to prove that the witness was killed to prevent his or her testimony and that the hearsay statements are reliable. Analysis by the trial court under this new law led to eight out of fourteen hearsay statements being ruled inadmissible because they were insufficiently reliable. On appeal, however, the Court of Appeals reversed the trial court, ruling that the common law doctrine of forfeiture by wrongdoing, which is less restrictive than "Drew's Law", would allow the statements to be admitted. 

On August 22, 2012, Jeff Pachter, a witness at Peterson's murder trial, said Peterson offered him $25,000 to hire someone to kill Kathleen and told him it would be a secret he would take to his grave. 

Peterson's trial, proceeding in July 2012, was jeopardized when prosecutors attempted to introduce evidence that was not allowed. The Chicago Tribune reported that the judge would rule on a mistrial on August 2, 2012. On August 15, Peterson told a judge that he wanted to withdraw a request for a mistrial. His lawyers said that he wanted the current jury to decide if he killed his third wife.

On September 6, 2012, Peterson was found guilty of the premeditated murder of Kathleen Savio. Jurors admitted that the most compelling evidence was based on the hearsay statements allowed under "Drew's Law". On February 21, 2013, Peterson was sentenced to 38 years in prison for the murder of his third wife. He was incarcerated at Menard Correctional Center in Chester, Illinois, but later moved to the Federal Correctional Institution, Terre Haute in Terre Haute, Indiana. Within a month, he was attacked by another prisoner who hoped to sell his belongings on eBay. 

After a number of appeals, on September 21, 2017, the Illinois Supreme Court upheld the conviction.

In December 2019, Peterson was released from federal custody and transferred to a state facility outside of Illinois. His location is not being disclosed for security reasons. 

The Illinois Department of Corrections stated, "Drew Peterson has transferred from the Federal Bureau of Prisons to a state facility outside Illinois. He remains under the jurisdiction of the Illinois Department of Corrections. For safety and security purposes, the department does not discuss details concerning the placement of offenders who have transferred under the terms of the Interstate Corrections Compact Agreement." 

Stacy Peterson is still considered a missing person. Her family has launched a website to help find her. While talking with Marcia Clark during Marcia Clark Investigates “The First 48”, defense attorney Joel Brodsky claims to know what happened to Stacy and that he believes that after Drew passes away, Stacy will be found. However, he refuses to elaborate further.

And this is not the end of this story.  On February 9th, 2015, Drew Peterson was charged with murder for hire, when he tried to put a hit on James Glasgow, the Chicago-area prosecutor in his murder trial.  A fellow inmate tipped off the prosecution office and agreed to wear a wire to capture evidence against Peterson. "So how long before you think your uncle can take care of business?" Peterson asks the informant on a hidden recording. "It'll be done by Christmas," the informant replies, to which Peterson says, "It'd be a nice Christmas present." As a result, in May of 2016, Peterson was, again found guilty of solicitation of murder and solicitation of murder for hire.  He was sentenced to an additional 40 years in prison.

Prosecutor James Galsgow stated "He's deluded. A psychopath. A patronizing conman. He'll spend the rest of his life in prison, and that's exactly where he belongs." 

The Chicago Sun Times reported that in 2018, the Supreme Court rejected Peterson's attempt to appeal his sentence. Almost a year later to the day, he appealed again, as NBC Chicago reports, clearly seeking any kind of trivial legal recourse. This time, Peterson's attorney Steve Greenburg attempted to invoke the writ of habeas corpus to invalidate hearsay testimony from Peterson's still-missing wife Stacey.

Peterson is currently eligible for parole in 2081, at the age of 127. Also, upon his conviction Peterson is no longer collecting his police pension. 

So where is Stacy Ann Peterson?  Maybe only Drew Peterson knows, and I would bet that he is going to take that information to his grave.  Stacy’s sister Cassandra runs SearchingforStacyPeterson.com, which I will link in the show notes.  She alone continues the search for her beloved sister and money raised on this site helps her gain the use of cadaver dogs, ground penetrating radars and other search related expenses.  And she will continue to search until she can finally bring her sister home.  I’m John Dodson, take care of one another and thank you for joining us today on The Secret Sits.  Audio Eng. by Gabriel Dodson.  Orig. artwork provided by Tony Ley.