Peterson in court to face murder charges
A bright red jail jumpsuit and a chain linking his manacled hands and feet couldn’t subdue the performer in accused murderer Drew Peterson.
(Rich Hein/Sun-Times file)
“Look at this bling,” he joked as two beefy sheriff’s deputies led him Friday morning into the Will County Courthouse in Joliet for his first appearance before a judge.
“Three squares a day and this spiffy outfit. How can I complain?” Peterson said.
Inside the courtroom, the 55-year-old ex-Bolingbrook cop presented a more solemn demeanor to Judge Richard Schoenstedt, who promptly rescheduled Peterson’s arraignment for May 18 because Peterson’s legal team wasn’t present. Peterson was set to formally enter a not-guilty plea to the murder charges.
Peterson was charged Thursday with first-degree murder in the 2004 bathtub drowning of his third wife, Kathleen Savio.
“Nothing is going to happen without your lawyer being here,” Schoenstedt told Peterson, as he delayed the arraignment.
“That would be fine, Your Honor,” Peterson replied.
None of Savio’s relatives were present in the courtroom. But Cassandra Cales, the sister of Peterson’s missing fourth wife, Stacy Peterson, sat in the gallery. Cales said she was glad to see Peterson in the courtroom facing murder charges.
“It made me feel good to see him chained up like the dog he is,” Cales said.
Peterson’s attorney, Joel Brodsky, wasn’t in court because he was making the rounds of network morning news shows. He called Will County State’s Attorney James Glasgow’s evidence against Peterson “at best a weak circumstantial case.”
“I think the state’s attorney has been under tremendous political pressure to bring a charge,” Brodsky said on CBS’ “The Early Show.”
Brodsky told a “Good Morning America” reporter that Peterson passed a polygraph test when questioned on detail’s of Savio’s suspicious death.
Brodsky also explained that humor was a coping mechanism for the former Bolingbrook cop.
“The way he reacts to pressure is with comedy,” Brodsky said. “He’s done this even when he’s been involved in hostage crises” as a police officer.
Brodsky said he was sure Peterson was holding up well behind bars.
“Drew is a tough guy,” he said, adding the two have been preparing for Peterson’s arrest.
Peterson is being held in the Will County jail on $20 million bond. He’d have to post $2 million in cash to be released.
Contributing: Staff Reporter Kara Spak and Joliet Herald News Reporter Joe Hosey