Drew Peterson makes new bid for freedom in federal court

Drew Peterson, the convicted wife-killer whose fight for freedom has yet to find any traction, is now asking a federal judge to overturn his 2012 murder conviction.

Peterson’s attorney, Steve Greenberg, filed the motion in federal court in Chicago on Sunday, roughly one year after the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear Peterson’s appeal. The Illinois Supreme Court also declined to overturn Peterson’s conviction in September 2017.

Peterson, 65, was found guilty in September 2012 of the murder of his third wife, Kathleen Savio. A judge then sentenced the former Bolingbrook police sergeant to 38 years behind bars. Then, in 2016, Peterson landed a second conviction for a murder-for-hire plot that targeted Will County State’s Attorney James Glasgow. For that, Peterson got another 40 years.

None of that may have come to pass had Peterson’s fourth wife, Stacy, not gone missing in 2007. She still has not been found. Nor has anyone ever been criminally charged in connection with her disappearance. Peterson is the prime suspect.

However, Peterson is now sitting in a federal prison in Indiana. He is not due out until May 2081. It’s unclear how even a favorable ruling in the Savio case would help him in the murder-for-hire case.

Peterson’s latest legal filing, known as a petition for writ of habeas corpus, revolves in part around the bombshell testimony delivered by divorce attorney Harry Smith. Smith testified during Peterson’s first trial that Stacy asked him before she disappeared if she could get more money in a divorce if she threatened to tell police “how (Peterson) killed Kathy.”

Peterson also pointed to that testimony in his unsuccessful bid to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Smith offered that damning evidence after Joel Brodsky, Peterson’s lead attorney at the time, called him to the stand. Peterson argued in Sunday’s filing that he was deprived of effective assistance of counsel. He wants a judge to reverse his murder conviction and either order his release or send the case back to Will County for a new trial.

In an emailed statement, Brodsky said that “the trial court, the Illinois Appellate Court and the Illinois Supreme Court have unanimously rejected Peterson’s claim of ineffective assistance of counsel. The reasons that Peterson was convicted have nothing to do with me or any of his counsel. The Illinois Supreme Court put a great deal of work into its well written opinion, and anyone who wants to know why Peterson was convicted should read it.”