find stacy peterson

These are busy times for Drew Peterson, voluble murder suspect and self-described media sensation. His second wife told reporters he once boasted he could kill her and make it look like an accident. His third wife turned up dead in a bathtub. His fourth wife disappeared.

A former fiancee said Peterson, then a police officer in Bolingbrook, Ill., gave her traffic tickets after she dumped him, then arrested her for failure to pay them. For his part, Peterson told one interviewer that his wives never lived up to the standards set by his mother. He told another that it is high time that his fourth wife, Stacy, missing since Oct. 29, reveal herself.

"Come home," Peterson said during his second appearance on NBC's "Today" show. "Tell people where you are."

Investigators assume she is dead. The Illinois State Police have named Peterson as a suspect in her disappearance; over the weekend, at their request, the FBI announced it will join the search. A local prosecutor ordered a new autopsy on Peterson's third wife, whose 2004 death was ruled an accidental drowning in a bathtub that apparently contained no water.

"There are strong indications that it was a homicide," said James Glasgow, Will County state's attorney.

Of such stuff are media sensations made. The TV trucks parked outside his house fire up their generators before dawn for the cable channels and the morning shows. The last one doesn't shut down until after the 10 p.m. news.

With attention that includes the cover of People magazine and almost-daily front-page articles in the Chicago papers, Peterson, 53, is taking his place alongside O.J. Simpson (acquitted) and Scott Peterson (convicted).

"It's been absolutely crazy. He wanted to get out in front of the media to show his face, tell the world his story," said his friend Steve Carcerano, who calls him "a jokester" and adds: "He's a happy guy, a real nice guy, great neighbor. On a scale of 1 to 10, he's a 10."

Peterson drew little attention until Stacy Peterson turned up missing. Until he suddenly retired this month, he was a career cop in Bolingbrook, a quiet suburb of about 60,000 southwest of Chicago. He wore a mustache, rode a motorcycle and, according to people who know him, was a controlling guy with a tendency to cheat on the women in his life.

When he started dating Stacy, she was a 17-year-old hotel clerk. He was 47 and married to his third wife, Kathleen Savio. They were headed toward divorce.

Stacy's friends were wary.

"We didn't advise it. He seemed to have a lot of control over her from the very start," said Pam Bosco, owner of a veterinary supply store and friend to Stacy and her younger sister, Cassandra.

Bosco described Stacy, who had two children with Peterson, as "motherly, sweet, naive, young, warm, a caretaker."

In the days before Stacy Peterson disappeared, she told friends that she needed to leave Peterson. She asked one friend about renting an apartment. She contacted the brother of a former boyfriend and soon traded messages, including some he described to reporters as sexual and teasing.

Drew Peterson, who is looking after the children and has not joined the search for his wife, told police that Stacy left him for another man. Her friends say she never would have abandoned her children.

"She's said all along she was afraid of him, that he was controlling, that he was tracing her phone calls," Bosco said. "She called us the Thursday before she disappeared, saying that she was afraid, that she wanted to move out. She was reaching out to everyone she knew."

Stacy Peterson's disappearance, and the inevitable searches that followed, drew attention to Drew Peterson's past and the death of Savio. A coroner ruled the case an accidental drowning, but her file contained details that prompted the prosecutor to arrange the exhumation of Savio's body. Results are not complete, although a coroner paid by Fox News also conducted a new autopsy, announcing on Fox his conclusion that Savio died after a struggle.

Drew Peterson's friend Carcerano recalled the day he found Savio's body. He said Peterson told him he was trying to find Savio, who was not answering the telephone. Inside their house, Peterson stayed in the foyer as Carcerano and a friend looked upstairs.

"I walked into the bathroom and noticed an exercise ball or an object that looked like a balloon. I realized it was Kathy lying there naked. She was discoloring, bluish-purple already," Carcerano said. "I was there when he came running up the stairs and saw her body and checked her pulse. Right away, he was very emotional. I thought it was very genuine. He started yelling, 'What am I going to tell my children? What am I going to tell my children?' "

Mike Miner is the media critic for the Chicago Reader, an alternative weekly. He has been following the coverage and the drama.

"I don't know that readers hunger for another grisly missing-and-probably-murdered-wife story, but when it comes along, they sure get caught up in it," said Miner, who counts himself among the entangled. "It's hard to think she's anything but dead, but where's her body?"
cover of People magazine, his photo larger than those of celebrities such as Carrie Underwood and Celine Dion.

Either the guy's dating Jennifer Aniston, or he's at the center of a mystery that has the whole country talking.

Chalk it up to unfortunate coincidence that the photos of Peterson and his third and fourth wives, under the headline, "DID HE KILL TWO WIVES?" are next to a photo of Ms. Underwood with the headline, "Carrie Underwood: On Her Bad Luck with Guys."

We already knew the People story would include a shot of Peterson in a double-breasted suit, posing on the deck outside his home, because our local news teams shot footage of Peterson posing for People's photographer.

We're also not surprised Peterson "gave People a wide-ranging, two-hour interview," because he's been dancing with the media for the last month.

Profile of a suspect
Not that the People story helps Peterson's cause. You read about Peterson's broken marriages to Carol Brown and Vicki Connolly; about the 18 calls made to police as the third marriage deteriorated; about the discovery of Kathleen's body; about the circumstances of Stacy's disappearance. You read all that and more, and you digest Peterson's comments ("I'm not a perfect man by any means, but nobody is ... you're only seeing my dirty laundry.") and you think, why is this guy talking to the media?

It might be close to impossible to put yourself in Peterson's shoes. But let's say you had all those troubled marriages, and you were truly and totally innocent of any crimes. Would you put on the suit and pose for People magazine? Would you chat it up with Matt Lauer? Or would you be so consumed by your worries over your missing wife, your interest in caring for your children, your horror over being named a suspect, that you wouldn't even think of talking to the media?

It'd be one thing if Peterson came across as a shocked, grieving husband hoping desperately for some sign his wife is alive -- or even a pissed-off husband who's sure his wife left him and resents the hell out of her for leaving her children, for putting her family through