JUSTICE FOR LACI

SCOTT PETERSON DENIED MURDERING HIS WIFE, BUT HIS ALIBI AND A SECRET AFFAIR TOLD A DISTURBINGLY DIFFERENT STORY

- Michael Crooks

Standing inside the Modesto, California home of missing mum-to-be Laci Peterson in early 2003, journalist Frank Swertlow noticed something odd about the nursery. Eight months pregnant, Laci had disappeared on Christmas Eve 2002 and her husband, Scott Peterson, had become a “person of interest” in a case that was quickly captivating the world. At the time, Peterson had been giving interviews to protest his innocence and encourage people to keep searching for his 27-year-old wife.

“A photographer and I went into his house,” Swertlow tells WHO. “The funny thing about the nursery was there was no crib, no changing table – there were just filing cabinets. To me, it was clear the baby wasn’t coming back.”

Months later, that hunch was tragically proved to be true when the remains of Laci and her unborn son, Connor, were found washed up in San Francisco Bay. Peterson was charged with the murders, then convicted and sentenced to death in his 2004 trial. At the time of press, he was seeking a retrial over juror misconduct.