Bill Bickel’s Crimeweek

According to a statement Will County (Illinois) State’s Attorney James Glasgow gave to local media this week, investigations into the disappearance of Stacy Peterson (Drew Peterson’s fourth wife) and the apparent murder of Kathleen Savio (Peterson’s third wife) have been “highly productive,” and he expects “a resolution in at least one of these investigations in the near future.”

So far, almost a year after Stacy Peterson’s disappearance (she’s been missing since October 28 of last year), this is what the investigations seem to have produced: Nobody knows what happened to Stacy Peterson, and nobody has been charged in either her disappearance (though Drew has been named “a suspect”) or Savio’s murder.

There are two possibilities here: The first has Drew Peterson, whom just about everybody is convinced is guilty, cheerfully flaunting the fact that he’s gotten away with two murders. He’s being treated by the media as more a celebrity than a suspect, he has a publicity agent handling his new-found fame, and at one point a local radio station staged a “Win a Date With Drew” contest.

The second possibility is that Drew Peterson is innocent; and investigators have been spending a year trying to find evidence against  him, to the exclusion of seriously exploring any other leads.

• Related Crimeweek articles and additional information

Nobody knows what happened to Drew Peterson’s fourth wife, Stacy Peterson, who disappeared the last week in October last year. Peterson hasn’t been charged either this case or for the apparent 2004 murder of his third wife, Kathleen Savio (see earlier updates). Nonetheless, a second book about Peterson and his wives, Drew Peterson Exposed (by thriller-author Derek Armstrong), hits the bookstores on October 1 (preceded on September 1 by Joseph Hosey’s Fatal Vows: The Tragic Wives of Sergeant Drew Peterson).

According to a press release from the publisher, Kunati Inc., “we’ve guarded the contents of Drew Peterson Exposed, working under strict non-disclosure agreements …The facts and testimony assembled here presents new evidence, sheds new light on the details of the existing police investigations, the possible timelines, and the motives ascribed to Peterson. Conflicting witness accounts, false leads, widespread rumors, and red herrings that have dogged the case are analyzed and 140 photographs and documents (including many private family photos published here for the first time) go beyond the headlines to the heart of this sensational story.”

Peterson gave Armstrong “many hours of exclusive interviews;” and according to the press release, Peterson reveals for the first time his complete timeline for October 28, 2007, the day he says Stacy disappeared.

Though Drew Peterson has not been charged in either his fourth wife Stacy’s October 2007 disappearance, or for his third wife Kathleen Savio’s murder, the first book about these cases — Fatal Vows: The Tragic Wives of Sergeant Drew Peterson by Joseph Hosey – hits the bookstores today.

Coming out next month: A book “written by” Crystal Mangum (The Last Dance For Grace: The Crystal Mangum Story), the North Carolina exotic dancer whose false rape accusations against three Duke University lacrosse players created a national controversy and ended the career of the district attorney who exploited the case for political gain.

It’s unclear what Ms. Mangum really has to say here: The most charitable version of events would be that, drug-addled as she appeared to be the night of the March 13, 2006 party, she really had no recollection of what happened and got caught up in a media witch-hunt instigated by other people’s agendas.

The other alternative is that she lied, and continued to lie, and enjoyed both the attention and the gifts lavished upon her as the victim of racial and sexual injustice.

In the first case, she really doesn’t have much to say (”What happened on the night of March 13? Heck if I know!”). In the second, she’d be acknowledging her good fortune that she was never prosecuted for a deception that ruined several lives, led to millions of dollars worth of lawsuits, and made it just that much more difficult for future actual rape victims to be taken seriously — especially exotic dancers or, if we may be more precise, strippers.

As it turned out, Durham County District Attorney Mike Nifong’s abuses of the legal system were so egregious, that any move to punish Mangum’s own offenses sort of fell by the wayside.

Now that Nifong’s been disbarred, though, it might not be in Mangum’s best interests to throw herself back into the spotlight.

• Drew Peterson/Stacy Peterson/Kathleen Savio
• Mike Nifong: Why We Should Be Afraid
• Mike Nifong Doesn’t Apologize

According to Joel Brodsky, Drew Peterson’s attorney, the police have an affidavit from a college friend of Stacy Peterson’s — identified publicly so far only as “Mike” — in which he claims to have met with Stacy on October 27 of last year, the day before her disappearance. At the time, she told him that she wanted to leave her marriage, and he advised her to “take the cash money and not use her credit cards to preclude being found.”

Brodsky claims he received a copy of this affidavit during discovery for the gun possession charge against Drew Peterson.

A spokesperson for the state’s attorney would not comment.

Brodsky contends, of course, that this backs up Drew’s claim that Stacy didn’t meet with foul play, but rather left on her own and deliberately covered her tracks. Assuming Mike’s story is true, the alternate interpretation, of course, is that Stacy’s plan to leave was the catalyst for her murder.

Though Drew Peterson has not been charged in either Stacy’s disappearance or for his previous wife Kathleen Savio’s murder, the first book about these cases will hit the stores on September 1:

• Background information and earlier updates

According to the website Drew Peterson’s publicist set up to disseminate press releases about this case — yes, Peterson has had a publicist for several months now, and now there’s a website set up to disseminate press releases about the case — this is Peterson’s version of his neighbors’ claim that they wore wires to record him making incriminating statements (see earlier articles):

After a week of hearing their names on local and national news coverage, Drew Peterson says he wants to set the record straight on the couple referred by the media as his “friends,” “long time friends,” and “close friends.”  These descriptions of Len Wawczak and Paula Stark, he says, are far from accurate and he wants to the record straight, according to his publicist, Glenn Selig. 

Drew Peterson released the following statement:

“I first met Len Wawczak about 16 years ago.  As a Bolingbrook police officer I was involved in Wawczak arrests for multiple various petty offences, such as drunk and disorderly, misdomeanor gun charges, and battery.

“After that, as an officer, I would see Len Wawczak and Paula Stark while I was on neighborhood patrol in my police car. I would stop and talk to them. It was in the capacity of police work, but the contacts were friendly in nature.  I would see Wawczak and Stark about once or twice a month in this capacity, and we would engage in friendly conversation.  However, I never entered their house, and neither Wawczak or Stark ever came to my home.

“After Stacy left, and the Illinois State Police (ISP) towed my cars as ‘evidence,’ many of my police offier friends abandoned me, and the media surrounded my home. At that point Len Wawczak and Paula Stark showed up and offered to let me use their car when I needed it.  They also offered that I could come over to their home to get away from the media, and that they would help me by watching my kids when I needed. I took them up on their offers.  Len Wawczak and Paula Stark suddenly started to come over to my house quite often, and engage me in conversation, and now, looking back,  pretended to be supportive and friendly so they could record conversations to give to police. Len Wawczak and Paula Stark suddenly began to pay a great deal of  attention to my children and put effort into developing a close and loving relationship with the kids apparently in an effort to gain even more access to me.

“Len Wawczak and Paula Stark were never my close friends or long-time friends.  Further, they are people who we now know took advantage of my children and myself when he I was most vulnerable and needed help.”

In response to yesterday’s report that two of his friends recorded their conversations with him between November of last year and June of this year, Drew Peterson said today that he never made the comments they claim he made, and “if they recorded me for seven months it’s going to clear me more than it’s going to hurt me.”

Peterson suggested that since the neighbors, Len Wawczak and Paula Stark are having financial problems — Wawczak is unemploed, they’re losing their house, they’d asked Peterson for thousands of dollars and were angry when he turned them down, and they’d once sold a hat he’d signed and given them on eBay — they might be motivated by the hope of selling their story.

An Illinois State Police spokeman would not comment on whether the tapes exist. Joel Brodsky, Peterson’s attorney, said there’s “no way” the police would allow the neighbors to speak with the media if they had in fact secretly recorded their conversations with Peterson.

Wawczak and Stark are apparently the friends to whom Peterson gave one of his guns before the police seized the other guns in his home (see earlier story). When word of this “missing gun” came to light last month, Peterson and Brodsky denied that any such gun existed. Now Brodsky says that Peterson had indeed given guns to Wawczak and Stark (as well as to other people) after his gun owner’s permit was lifted, and never tried to conceal the fact that he’d done so. (more…)

Len Wawczak and Paula Stark, a married couple and long-time friends of Drew and Stacy Peterson, told the Chicago Sun-Times that last November, a few weeks after Stacy’s disappearance, they grew suspicious of him and agreed to wear surveillance wires to gather information for the police.

The Sun-Times quoted a number of comments Wawczak said that Peterson made, though it isn’t clear whether these are comments that appear on the recordings. Certainly the comment Peterson made in 2004 following the death of his ex-wife Kathleen Savio, in which he mocked the investigators saying “She was in a dry bathtub, what a bunch of f****** idiots,” came from Wawczak’s recollections alone — though it does beg the question of why, when Peterson’s subsequent wife disappeared three years later, it took Wawczak several weeks to begin suspecting him.

After Stacy’s disappearance, after Wawczak began wearing the wire, when Savio’s body was exhumed and a new autopsy determined that she had in fact been murdered rather than drowned accidentally, Drew said “I should have had the bitch cremated. It would have cost me less and I wouldn’t be going through this trouble.”

According to Wawczak. Which might or might not be on the tapes.

Wawczak also told the Sun-Times that Drew “said he wasn’t worried about them finding Stacy’s remains down the road because he figured by that time he would have been tried and acquitted, and you can’t be tried for the same case twice because of double jeopardy or something.”

Stark reports that she was afraid Peterson would discover the wire when he hugged her, tried to kiss her, “rubbing up against me, whispering in my ear, ‘I love you,’” and when he asked her to try on Stacy’s bikinis.

She also claims Peterson asked her to run off with him.

There is either a lot less or a lot more to this latest chapter than is immediately obvious.

• Additional information and previous updates

A new state law, awaiting the signature of Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, could impact the Drew/Stacy Peterson case: The law would allow a judge to accept hearsay testimony if it’s proven that the defendant murdered the witness. This is all rather specific, and of course the Peterson case was the impetus for the law.

Under this law, if Drew Peterson is convicted of murdering Stacy Peterson (his fourth wife, missing since October), her comments to her pastor that Drew told her he’d murdered his third wife, Kathleen Savio, could be admitted into evidence in a trial for Savio’s murder.

The questions remain whether this law could be applied retroactively, and whether third-hand hearsay (the pastor would testify that Stacy had told him that Drew had told him…) would even be covered.

Police detectives, anticipating its importance as evidence in the eventual trial for the 2004 murder of Drew Peterson’s third wife Kathleen Savio (her death was initially ruled accidental, a ruling that was reversed after an autopsy following the October 2007 disappearance of Peterson’s fourth wife, Stacy), have taken custody — from the home the Petersons used to own — of the bathtub in which her body was found.

Peterson is a suspect in both Savio’s murder and Stacy’s disappearance, but hasn’t been charged in either case.

Friday, Candace Aikin, Stacy’s aunt, told a grand jury investigating Stacy’s disappearance that “she wanted out” of her marriage to Drew. This can be spun two ways, of course: To the prosecution, it’s a sign of a bad marriage and a possible motive for murder. To the defense, it’s confirmation of Drew’s claim that Stacy left him, possibly for another man.

• Earlier articles

Shortly after his wife Stacy Peterson’s October disappearance, police searched Petersons home and seized 11 weapons. One of them, according to police, was a semiautomatic assault rifle with a barrel too short under Illinois law, which means a felony gun charge punishable to up to five years in jail (after the arrest warrant was issued earlier today, Peterson turned himself in and was subsequently released on bail).

This weapon is legal for a police officer to own, though, and Peterson was still a police officer — he has since retired — at the time the weapons were seized.

His attorney, Joel Brodsky, suggested that all this was just an attempt to harass Peterson, since authorities aren’t able to prosecute him either for Stacy’s disappearance, or for his previous wife Kathleen Savio’s 2004 death. I’m with Brodsky on this one.

• Previous articles about this case

“[Drew Peterson] knowingly possessed a rifle, namely a Colt model Sporter Lightweight, 223 Remington rifle, Serial #SL025365 with attached EOTech electronic sight, with a barrel less than 16 inches in length.”

Today, Drew Peterson announced that he’s offering a $25,000 for information leading to the safe return of his fourth wife, Stacy Peterson, who has been missing since the last week of October.

It probably wouldn’t be too cynical to suggest that he doesn’t expect to have to make good on the offer.

Peterson has been named as a suspect in Stacy’s disappearance (though he hasn’t been charged), and is under investigation in the 2004 death of his first wife, Kathleen Savio, which is now being treated as a murder. He claims left him, probably running off with another man, and that Savio’s death was accidental as it was ruled back in 2004 (her body was exhumed, and an autopsy performed, shortly after Stacy’s disappearance).

Peterson has set up the e-mail address stacytips@yahoo.com for tips from the public.

Additional information and previous updates

Based primarily on November’s exhumation and autopsy of Drew Peterson’s third wife Kathleen Savio — which came about because of the disappearance of his fourth wife, Stacy Peterson — a judge has re-opened Savio’s estate. This means that Savio’s family can sue Peterson to recover the proceeds of her estate, which included a million-dollar insurance policy, all of which was awarded to Peterson when her May 2004 death was initially ruled an accident.

Peterson hasn’t been charged in either Stacy’s disappearance (though he has been named a suspect), or Savio’s death.

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March 7, 2008: Divorce attorney Harry Smith said today that shortly before Stacy Peterson’s disappearance (she was last seen October 28 of last year), she consulted him about obtaining a divorce from her husband, Drew Peterson (though she ended up not retaining Smith). This backs up Stacy’s family’s claim that she was going to leave Drew, which sets up Drew’s alleged motive for murdering her.(Of course, a defense attorney could argue that it also backs Drew’s claim that Stacy simply left him)

Why Smith is announcing this more than four months after Stacy’s disappearance is unclear.

Smith represented Drew Peterson’s previous wife, Kathleen Savio, in her own divorce from Drew. Savio had agreed to expedite the divorce so Drew could marry Stacy, who was pregnant at the time and needed to be married in order to benefit from Drew’s medical insurance.

• Additional background information

Today a grand jury investigating the March, 2004 death of Kathleen Savio — Drew Peterson’s third wife — heard from Dr. Larry W. Blum, the forensics expert whose November 13, 2007 autopsy of Savio found “compelling evidence … to support the conclusions that the cause of death … was drowning and further, that the manner of death was homicide.”

Yesterday they heard from Neil Schori, the pastor who claimed this past November that in August, Stacy Peterson — Drew Peterson’s fourth wife, who went missing the last week in October — told him that Drew had told her that he’d killed Savio.

We are, of course, dealing here with multiple levels of hearsay.

Drew Peterson, who has denied involvement in both Savio’s death (and insists it was an accident as the initial autopsy determined) and Stacy’s disappearance (he insists she ran off to be with another man) wasn’t available for comment yesterday, but previously said he believed Stacy had a crush on Schori.

• Earlier articles about this case
• Earlier articles about Pastor Neil Schori

Divorce attorney Harry Smith said today that shortly before Stacy Peterson’s disappearance (she was last seen October 28 of last year), she consulted him about obtaining a divorce from her husband, Drew Peterson (though she ended up not retaining Smith). This backs up Stacy’s family’s claim that she was going to leave Drew, which sets up Drew’s alleged motive for murdering her.

(Of course, a defense attorney could argue that it also backs Drew’s claim that Stacy simply left him)

Why Smith is announcing this more than four months after Stacy’s disappearance is unknown.

Smith represented Drew Peterson’s previous wife, Kathleen Savio, in her own divorce from Drew. Savio had agreed to expedite the divorce so Drew could marry Stacy, who was pregnant at the time and needed to be married in order to benefit from Drew’s medical insurance.

Savio died in May of 2004 and an autopsy performed shortly after Stacy’s disappearance indicated that she was probably murdered. Drew has not yet been named as a suspect in her death.

• More on Stacy Peterson, Drew Peterson, and Kathleen Savio

Greta Van Susteren of Fox News reports that Drew Peterson and Kathleen Savio’s sons, ages 15 and 13, will testify today before a grand jury investigating Savio’s 2004 death (see earlier stories)

The Drew Peterson/Stacy Peterson/Kathleen Savio case has crossed over to the political arena: In May of 2004, Will County (Illinois) coroner Patrick O’Neil, signed off on the inquest finding that Kathleen Savio’s drowning death two months earlier was an accident. Savio (photo, right) was Drew Peterson’s third wife, whose divorce from Peterson was still being finalized, and a November 2007 autopsy — performed shortly after Peterson’s fourth wife Stacy went missing — indicated that she had in fact been murdered and the murder was staged to look like an accident.

“He could have stopped [the inquest] and investigated it,” charges funeral director and embalmer Chuck Lyons, a challenger for O’Neil’s elected position (though in fact, under Illinois law, coroners did not have this right before January 1, 2007).

• more about Kathleen Savio

Two odd reactions to Thursday’s official announcement by Will County (Illinois) prosecutors that the 2004 drowning of Drew Peterson’s third wife, Kathleen Savio, is being investigated as a murder:

The family of Stacy Peterson, Drew’s fourth wife who’s been missing since the last week of October said (through a spokesperson) that the announcement gave them an “eerie feeling of dread” — though they’ve been accusing Drew all along of having murdered Stacy, and the exhumation and autopsy of Savio revealed that she’d been murdered.

Drew Peterson’s attorney Joel Brodsky said today that the purpose of the prosecutors’ announcement was to goad Peterson into “taking some sort of action or making some sort of statement” — as if, you know, Peterson had up to this point been the soul of discretion.

And Drew Peterson himself told reporters — from the doorway of his home — that he was “scared”; and then apparently recovered his bravado, saying he’d come outside only if a female television reporter put on a bikini (a reference to Chicago television news reporter Amy Jacobson, who was covering the disappearance of Lisa Stebic last year and joined Lisa’s husband Craig for a swim in the family pool — see article )

“What we have here are two conflicting findings by Will County authorities… The one four years ago said an accident, and the one we have now says it’s a homicide, but there’s still nothing that points to Drew… He knows that he didn’t do anything wrong. He knows that he was not involved in Kathleen’s death, and he’s still confident that the first autopsy, which was the one closest in time to Kathy’s death is more accurate, and will eventually be shown to be the correct finding.” -Joel Brodsky, Drew Peterson’s attorney

• see yesterday’s update

“We have been investigating this as a murder since reopening the case in November of last year. We now have a scientific basis to formally and publicly classify it as such.” -Will County (Illinois) State’s Attorney James Glasgow, in an official statement released today.

Kathleen Savio’s March 2004 death was originally ruled an accidental drowning, but he body was exhumed this past November, shortly after the disappearance of Peterson’s fourth wife, Stacy Peterson.

Stacy Peterson remains missing. Drew is considered a suspect, but no charges have been filed.

“People run away. People drown in the bathtub. And it happened to me.” -Drew Peterson referring to his claim that his wife Stacy, missing since October, left on her own; and that his previous wife, Kathleen Savio, drowned accidentally

At first glance, Peterson’s “It happened to me” sounds like a narcissistic slip of the tongue. I happen to believe his phrasing was entirely intentional, because he’s been giving every indication that he enjoys the spotlight. Like O.J. Simpson before him, he knows everybody believes he’s guilty, and he’s supremely confident that he’ll never be found guilty.

Neil Schori, the pastor who claims that Stacy Peterson confided in him in August that her husband, Drew Peterson, murdered his previous wife, referred to Drew’s suggestion that he’d had an inappropriate personal relationship with Stacy as “absolutely slanderous.”

Meanwhile, at least one seminary — Lincoln Christian College and Seminary in Lincoln, Illinois — is using Schori’s actions as a specific object lesson in how clergymen should not behave: holding meetings with parishoners in coffee shops, and revealing their discussions to a national television audience.

More about Pastor Schori

Yesterday Cassandra Cales, Stacy Peterson’s younger sister, told the Chicago Tribune that last summer while she was visiting the Petersons, Drew asked Stacy to go to the garage to get a soda for him while he went upstairs to the bedroom just over the garage. A gun was fired from the bedroom, the bullet passing through the bedroom floor and hitting the garage floor near the refrigerator. (more…)

Pastor Neil Schori told Fox News personality Greta Van Susteren this week that he was “blown away” when Stacy Peterson told him that her husband Drew (who is of course now a suspect in Stacy’s disappearance) admitted having murdered his ex-wife Kathleen Savio. I’m thinking maybe Schori might have thought to mention this to somebody.

(Which might have been what Stacy was hoping for, though we’ll probably never know now)

Obviously confidentiality and the reluctance to pass along hearsay weren’t factors, since he has no problem discussing this with Greta Van Susteren now that this is all headline news.