American Murder: Laci Peterson (2024) s01e02 Episode Script

[soft piano music playing]
[Rene] Laci started the Christmas parties.
It was a yearly thing.
Like, we looked forward to it.
She went all out.
She always strived
to have the fun, happy home.
- Mm-hmm.
- She wanted everyone over.
[Stacey] But things weren't
the same for her that year.
She wasn't planning her big celebration,
and Scott wasn't gonna be there
'cause he was gonna be out of town.
He was gone a lot,
and I think that was hard for her.
She was doing a lot on her own.
[mysterious music playing]
[Stacey] I ended up having
the Christmas party that year.
We'd had the biggest storm.
The streets were all flooded,
and here comes Laci,
you know, and she was just
She looked like she'd been through it.
When I opened the door,
I'm like [gasps] "Laci!"
And and she came in,
and she's like, "Oh my gosh!"
You could tell she was kind of down
about just it not being the normal holiday
'cause it was always so big for her.
She pretty much sat in the corner
in a chair most of the night.
It took a lot out of her to come.
Yeah. That was the last time we saw her.
[traffic rumbling]
[phones ringing]
[soft music playing]
[indistinct chatter]
[Al] We're at our desks
at the police station,
and the phone rings.
And it's this lady
who identifies herself as Amber Frey.
She tells me
she's been dating Scott Peterson.
I said, "Amber,
don't tell him you called me."
"Please. We'll be right there."
[Jon] And so we jump in my car,
and we rocket down to Fresno.
We might've bent the speed limit slightly.
[Al] We're wondering,
"Can this really be happening?"
I mean, this is crazy.
But she had specifics.
This is real.
[Jon] It was a revelation in the case
because now we found
the other side of Scott Peterson
that nobody knew about.
[traffic rumbling]
[suspenseful music playing]
When I first met Scott Peterson,
I was living in Madera, Rolling Hills.
I'd just graduated from massage school,
and my really good friend at the time
told me about this guy that she had met.
She said he was funny, easy to talk to,
he was, you know, nice looking,
and that he was looking to meet the one,
and, you know, as a single mom,
that was something
I was open to and wanting in my life.
Scott and I started talking on the phone.
He had told me he lived in Sacramento,
and with his work schedule,
he traveled to Bakersfield and back,
and so I was on his way.
[soft music playing]
[Amber] I thought he was handsome.
He had a really nice smile.
He seemed like he had
a good head on his shoulders.
He was interested in my life
and my daughter,
and he was very sweet with her.
Our time together was
It just flowed.
Like, we laughed a lot.
We had some good conversations.
I asked if he had ever been married.
He said no.
I asked if he had children.
He said no, never wanted to.
[inhales sharply]
I believe he said
Ayiana would be enough for him.
There was a holiday party coming up,
and I asked if he would accompany me.
So he showed up with three dozen roses
and said he had thought about me all day.
My feelings for him were growing,
and I could see falling in love
and potentially marrying him one day.
[Sharon Hagan] Amber had finally met
somebody who treated her well.
She was attracted to him,
and she believed, like most of us,
that he was
who he presented himself to be.
[mysterious music playing]
[Jon] Scott was a masterful romantic,
and she was his tight-kept secret
for a period of time
until a guy who worked for Scott
somehow ran into one
of Amber's best friends
who introduced Scott to Amber.
Scott came up in the conversation,
and he mentioned somethin'
about Scott being married.
Amber's friend, of course, calls Scott
and confronts him with this.
She just said, "You better tell Amber
because if you don't tell her,
I'm going to."
[Amber] December 9th, I got a call
from Scott asking if I'd be home
and that he there was something
he needed to tell me.
[suspenseful music playing]
[Amber] And so he showed up.
He looked upset, almost scared.
We're holding hands at the table,
like, "I'm listening."
You know, "What is it?"
And he said
that he had lied about being married.
And at this point, he's crying
and having a hard time talking,
and said he had lost his wife,
and it'd be
the first holidays without her.
I remember just comforting him,
understanding this must be very hard.
I didn't know.
Maybe she died in a car accident.
There was all these thoughts.
I wanted to ask,
but at the same time, with his emotions,
I thought, "I don't wanna pry."
"He'll share
with what he feels comfortable with."
He was saying, "I could understand
if you don't ever wanna see me
or talk to me again,"
but he was sorry
that he had lied to me, and
"I hope that didn't change anything."
[tense music playing]
[Amber] And then a couple weeks later,
I get a call from my friend,
and he had a printout of a news article.
There wasn't a picture of Scott,
but there was a description of him
and his missing pregnant wife.
I was definitely in shock.
Couldn't stop crying, just in disbelief.
Everything was a lie.
And it was terrifying,
like, to think
this man that I was getting to know
could have something to do
with his wife's disappearance.
So I called the Modesto Police Department,
eager to tell them everything I knew.
[tense music intensifies]
[Al] During the interview with her,
she kinda drops a bombshell
on Jon Buehler and I.
She says on December 9th,
Scott told her he lost his wife.
Same day he bought the boat.
[Jon] There were
several light-bulb moments
when it came to this case.
One of 'em, of course,
was the smiling pose
of Scott and Amber,
in the tux, in the red dress.
The same night they had a party in
in Modesto that Laci was at,
eight months pregnant,
sitting there, smile beaming,
and here he is a hundred miles away
with this other girl.
Now we have some actual solidified proof
that there's something going on here.
[Amber] My stomach was in knots.
I found very little innocence
in his behavior.
It was something
I didn't want to have to think to be real.
The detectives asked
if I would be willing to wear a wire
or a piece that hooks up to my phone.
We asked her just to play along.
So I went in RadioShack,
I bought the equipment,
and I said, "When he calls,
all you gotta do is push
these two buttons and act normal."
[Amber] I always knew
when Scott was gonna call
because we had talked about it
per his schedule and mine.
That way,
we didn't miss each other's calls.
Scott had told me
he was gonna be spending Thanksgiving
with his family in Alaska.
Christmas, they were going to be in Maine,
and from there, he was going to Paris.
[cheering]
[horns blare]
[cheering continues]
- [Scott] Amber? Hey. Happy New Year!
- [Amber] Happy New Year.
- [Scott] I wanted to call you.
- [Amber] Thank you!
- [Scott] Are you there?
- [Amber] I'm here.
- [Scott] Amber?
- [Amber] I wish you could hear me.
[Scott] I'm, uh, near the Eiffel Tower.
The New Year's celebration is unreal.
The the crowd is huge.
[cheering]
[Amber] I know inside my mind, I'm like,
"You're lying through your teeth."
He was not, in fact, in Paris.
He was at a candlelight vigil for Laci.
[Scott] Amber, if you're there,
I can't hear you,
but I'll call you on your New Year's.
- [Amber] Okay. I'll hear from you then.
- [Scott] Amber?
- Amber, I miss you. I'll see you soon.
- [Amber] Okay.
I hope
[line goes dead]
[Amber] I can't say
my heart ever stopped pounding
or my hands sweating
every time I anticipated a call.
[inhales sharply] That never changed.
I got better at
[chuckles]
Um
I guess in the sense
of calming myself down.
Um, that was something I knew
was important, that he didn't know I knew.
[line crackling]
[Amber] My New Year's resolution for you
would be to not travel so much
- [chuckles softly]
- [Scott] Hmm
[Amber] and spend more time
with me and Ayiana.
[Scott] Mm-hmm.
Amber was incredibly gifted
when it came to navigating through this
with no training, with no experience.
I didn't tell her what to say.
I wasn't giving her a script
on any of this stuff.
And I think, with her, she probably
was holding out a little bit of hope
that Laci would be discovered safe
and that we were gonna be able
to clear him.
[Amber] So what do you wanna be
together with me?
[phone line crackling]
[Scott] Well, I mean, obviously, my
You know my thoughts are that I think
that we would be wonderful together.
I could care for you in any and every way.
For the rest of our lives,
I think we could care for each other.
[Al] After we found out about Amber,
we requested a wiretap on Scott's phone.
That way, we could hear
what Scott was saying to anybody.
Our goal was, hopefully,
he was gonna confess,
but there were still several leads
that we were investigating.
[reporter] A burglary
across the street from Laci's home
remains an intriguing development.
This home was broken into
sometime between Christmas Eve
and December 26th.
[Al] We still wanna find these burglars.
The Medinas live
across the street from the Petersons,
and they left on a few-day vacation
the morning of the 24th,
and they came back
on the evening of the 26th.
And during that time,
their house got burglarized.
[Ted] The problem with the burglary story
is that, even from the beginning,
it seemed to be a moving target,
and there was
nothing very concrete about it.
The Medinas were burglarized. Clearly.
When is a big one.
Originally, it's the 24th.
That's because a neighbor believes
they saw a suspicious van
outside the Medina house on the 24th.
There was people that were talking about
maybe she was abducted by the burglars,
and then people were calling in
about a van in the neighborhood
that some people had seen, some hadn't.
There was one neighbor that saw it,
originally she said it was white,
then it became tan, then brown,
as her statement continued.
Totally ruins her credibility.
In the meantime, the other burglary
detectives are working this burglary,
and they're able to develop two suspects.
[detective] We received a tip yesterday
that led us to some suspects
in the burglary case.
We are confident they are the ones
that committed the burglary.
Steven Todd and Donald Pearce
were local criminals
doing property crimes
to source a narcotics habit,
and when they find out
that not only are they being looked at
for the burglary,
but they're also being fingered
as possibly being involved
in Laci's disappearance,
their cooperation level changes
to a level that we've seldom ever seen
in a burglary investigation.
The burglars are like, "Whoa, whoa."
"We burgled the house.
We did not kidnap this lady."
"Uh, we believe we were there the 27th."
The problem with that is
they couldn't have done it on the 27th
because the Medinas were home on the 27th.
[Jon] Could they get the dates wrong?
Certainly. These guys don't have jobs.
They're not accountable for anything.
There's no reason to think
that the 27th has any more significance
than just an error in date recall
by the two suspects that did the burglary.
[Ted] Between investigators
and the burglars,
the 26th became the time frame
where the state of California believes
the Medina house was burgled.
And eventually, investigators
sort of zipped up about it.
[Janey] One day after Steven Todd
and Glenn Pearce are arrested,
the police are saying
the burglary occurred on December 26th,
and it's unrelated
to Laci's disappearance.
And at the time, nobody questioned that.
We all thought
the police had done their due diligence.
[Susan] I believed it at first,
but we kind of later put
two and two together that, on the 26th,
that would be the last place
that you would want to break
and enter someone's home
when there's a police presence
and media presence.
[Jon] Todd and Pearce told us
that when they got there,
they noticed there was media activity down
the street and thought it was interesting.
Apparently, they didn't know
about the Peterson case yet at that time.
But they were able
to successfully complete the burglary,
then they split, and that was it.
Yeah, I didn't have nothing to do
with, uh, that lady's disappearance.
[Jon] They knew they were going to jail
for the burglary,
and there's a code amongst inmates
that you don't hurt children,
and you don't hurt vulnerable women.
So not only did they take a polygraph,
they were almost begging for a polygraph
so they could have the results
to show the other inmates
that they had no part of this.
They did clear the polygraph,
and in all the property
that was recovered on this burglary,
there was not one piece of evidence,
not one piece of property, jewelry,
or anything else
that was ever found to be related to Laci.
[Al] After confessing,
turning over all the stolen property,
giving polygraphs,
their alibi for the 24th,
the day Laci disappeared,
they checked out.
They were with family.
They were checked out and cleared.
[detective] We're confident that we have
the people in custody for the burglary,
and they are not connected
with the missing of Laci Peterson.
[Susan] I'd always questioned
how they came to that possibility.
I believe that it didn't happen
on the 26th. [chuckles]
The burglars knew it happened on the 24th,
and they couldn't let the police know
that they were
in front of that house on the 24th
because I believe
that they were responsible
for an incident
involving Laci at that house.
They had nothing to do
with the Laci's disappearance.
There's nobody else I know,
other than a few media people
that just like to stir the pot
and the Petersons
that put any stock into the burglars.
[Sharon Hagan] In order
to maintain Scott's innocence,
his family has had
to endorse improbable theories
about the incompetence
of the investigators
and their belief that these burglars
are responsible for Laci's disappearance.
And in all sincerity,
I can only say that it's not true,
it doesn't make sense,
and that he is the source
of his own undoing.
[birds singing]
[reporter] Scott Peterson
started out the new year
taking a walk with his dad and his dog,
the dog that Scott told police
his wife, Laci, was going to walk
the morning of Christmas Eve
when he left on a fishing trip
and she disappeared.
[Al] Every day we sit down,
all the detectives.
You know, "What did we learn today?"
And one of the things I learned
during those sit-downs
was that Laci had been having
some fainting spells,
and her feet were bothering her,
and she was not supposed to be walking.
[Sharon Rocha] She said she'd thrown up
a couple times walking in the park.
After she'd gone to the doctor,
she did she did stop walking,
or at least not as often.
[Al] There were several people
that said they saw a pregnant lady
walking a dog on that morning.
We've interviewed every one of them,
and none of 'em could say positively,
"Oh, I've known her all my life."
"That was Laci Peterson."
[Jon] The story Scott was telling us,
none of these things were making sense.
They were raising a lot of red flags.
[Sharon Hagan] He refused
to take a polygraph examination.
He resisted questions, access to the home.
Scott essentially made it impossible
for the investigators
not to include him as a viable suspect.
[detective] We continue, as a department,
uh, the desire to eliminate Scott Peterson
from this investigation,
so if there's someone out there
that's seen him
or seen the boat or seen him in the boat,
we need them to contact us
so we can corroborate his statement.
[reporter 1] Has Mr. Peterson
continued cooperating?
Um, he's continued to cooperate
to some degree, yes.
[reporter 2] What does that mean?
- Uh
- [reporter 3] Detective?
The cloud of suspicion over Scott
was growing every day,
and the more the police released,
the more suspicious he looked.
And so that's what they did.
That was their strategy.
And they knew that they had the media
at their beck and call.
The mystery here in Modesto,
fueled in large part
by Scott Peterson's alibi,
which remains flimsy at best
[TV host] Unlike the folks on TV
who are dancing around the obvious,
what we're all thinking,
listeners to talk shows are calling in
and saying they think he did it.
[Ted] People couldn't get enough
of this story,
and Scott's family
was shielding Scott from the media.
They were offended
that we were asking questions
about the husband, the husband
that didn't wanna be on camera.
[reporter] While a number of loved ones
have given interviews,
Scott has, for the most part,
steered clear of the news media.
His sister says he's been advised,
for now, to avoid public comment,
though she declined to say
who gave that advice.
We know Scott.
We just kind of shake our head.
If you knew him,
you wouldn't be thinking that way.
I wanted to scream it
at the top of my lungs
that my brother could not have been
at the hands of Laci's disappearance.
We feel Scott has nothing to do with it,
with the disappearance of Laci.
[suspenseful music playing]
[Sharon Rocha] When I said I didn't think
he had anything to do with it,
I meant that at that moment.
But then,
by the end of that first week,
I was already having my doubts.
[tense music playing]
[Sharon Rocha] I was thinking things,
but I did not want to say it out loud
because I was thinking if she came home
and knew that I'd had these thoughts,
what would that do to our relationship?
But one evening, my friend and I sat down,
and I made a list of "did he do it"
or "didn't he do it."
And the "did he do it"
was a much longer list, and that just
It was that gut feeling
that something wasn't quite right.
[Jon] We had circumstantial evidence
that shows that Scott was misleading us,
but that was all we had.
So, on January 3rd,
uh, Craig Grogan contacted Scott
just to try to stir something out of him.
[Al] We invited Scott to the office.
We didn't ask him a lotta questions,
but we showed him the picture.
It was a picture of him and Amber
at the Christmas party,
but we ran it through the fax machine,
so it was black and white,
and so we just said, "Hey, we got a tip."
You know, "What do you say about this?"
And he picks it up, and he goes,
"You you don't think that's me, do you?"
[tense music continues playing]
Scott's reaction was typical Scott.
Very cool, noncommittal, no anger.
He he just You you
you couldn't shake his demeanor.
It was remarkable to see.
It was just a great act.
And then a few days later, he calls Amber.
[phone line crackling]
[Scott] I don't wanna do this
over the phone.
[crackling]
[Scott] I wanna tell you this. I wanna
be there in person to tell you this.
- [Amber] What are you talking about?
- [Scott] It is the worst thing.
Sorry, Amber, um
- Well, I'll just I'll just tell you.
- [Amber] Okay.
[Scott] You haven't been watching
the news, obviously.
[Amber] No.
[Scott] Um, I have not been traveling
during the last couple weeks.
I have I've lied to you
that I've been traveling.
[Amber] Okay.
[Scott breathes heavily]
The girl I I'm married to,
her name is Laci.
[Amber] Mm-hmm.
[Scott] She disappeared
just before Christmas.
[Amber] Mm-hmm.
[Scott] For the past two weeks, I've been
in Modesto with her family and mine,
searching for her.
January 6, I was sitting
in the Modesto Police Department
at a table
with, you know, a few detectives.
Scott confessed
that he had been lying to me,
that he was married,
and his wife was missing.
You told me you'd lost your wife,
and this was the first holidays
you'd spend without her?
That was December 9th you told me this,
and now, all of a sudden,
your wife's missing?
Are you kidding me?
[Al] She's on the phone with him,
and I'm thinking, hopefully,
he was gonna confess.
And she's hammerin' him pretty hard.
[Scott] I said that I lost my wife.
- [Amber] Yes, you did.
- [Scott] I did, and yes
[Amber] How did you lose her then
before she was lost?
- [crackling]
- [Amber] Explain that.
[Scott] There are different kinds of loss.
[Amber] Then explain your loss.
[Scott] I I can't to you now.
What I remember hearing then
was him trying to sound very innocent,
even though he'd just lied to me
for months.
It almost Like, listening to this,
almost sounds like he was the victim.
[Scott sobbing] Sweetie, you think I had
something to do with her disappearance?
Amber, do you believe that?
[Amber] Well, let's see.
How can I believe that?
How can I believe that?
How could I believe anything for
[Scott] I am not evil like that.
I got a sense of relief
being able to confront him
without having to carry on
the whole facade of our relationship.
But at the same time, there was a lot,
I was hoping,
in continuing those conversations,
that I might get out of him
in regards to what happened to Laci.
I am just such at a loss right now.
- [Scott] I know.
- [Amber] You wanna tell me in person.
At what point are you gonna tell me
in person, Scott?
[line crackling]
[Scott] Once we find her.
- [Amber] What was that?
- [Scott] Once we find her.
[Amber] Once we find her, what?
[Scott] Then that will be a resolution,
and I will be
[sighs]
I will be able
to explain everything to you.
[muted speech]
- [traffic rumbling]
- [birds singing]
[reporter] Hundreds of volunteers
and police investigators
have scoured the woods, rivers,
and reservoirs in five counties.
But now the focus
has narrowed to San Francisco Bay
near the Berkeley Marina.
[siren wailing]
[Al] We're in a place in the investigation
where us detectives are believing
that Laci is not coming home.
She's gone.
And we know Scott bought a boat on 12/9.
Scott told Amber he lost his wife on 12/9.
Scott told me he went to Brooks Island,
fishing, Christmas Eve,
when Laci went missing,
and so that's why we think
she's in the bay.
We had a boat
from every agency around the bay,
San Francisco, Oakland,
Marin County, Berkeley.
And we had a detective on every boat.
And while we're doing this,
we're watching Scott.
We had a tracker on his little truck,
and he drives to the bay.
And he just looks, like,
for two minutes or three minutes,
and then he drives away.
And he came back four more times.
- [seagulls crying]
- [Jon] He wouldn't contact anybody.
He wouldn't get ahold of any of our cops
or any of the people that were onshore.
He wouldn't ask 'em what was going on
on the boats out there
or anything like that.
It was more like he was going there
to check to see where we were searching
to reassure himself
that maybe we weren't gonna find her.
[reporter 1] In the search for
that missing Modesto, California woman,
searchers have discovered
a, quote, "object"
in the Berkeley, California Marina.
They found an object
in the marina by sonar.
They don't know what the object is,
but it may be a human body.
One of the sonars spots
something in the bay that looks like this,
like arms out, like a body.
[reporter 2] As Laci's loved ones
and supporters waited for word
about the search at the Berkeley Marina,
there was added sadness.
Today was supposed to be
Laci's baby shower,
her baby boy due February 10th.
[Rene] We all had a slumber party
for what would've been her baby shower,
and there was something in the water
that they were honing in on in the news.
So we were hearing that perspective
that it could be Scott,
and that was the night that I said,
"I hope we're here
with Laci and Conner next year."
And I just got a look from
from the girls.
That's when it kinda kicked in.
We've concluded our search today
of the Berkeley Marina.
The dive teams located, uh,
in the area where we were searching,
and the object
that we were concerned about
ended up being an anchor that had sunk
down into the, uh, bottom part of the bay,
and there are no other objects
located in the area.
[mysterious music playing]
[Al] It turns out just to be an anchor,
just a big old anchor.
So Sharon calls Scott,
and he doesn't answer the phone,
but he listened to his voicemail,
and we can hear that too on the wiretap.
[female voice] You have
one unheard message.
First message.
[Sharon Rocha] Hi, Scott. This is Mom.
It's about quarter to one.
Just wanted you to know
I just got a call from Ron Cloward.
He's at the marina,
and it was a boat anchor.
Of course, we knew it wasn't Laci,
but I just wanted you to know.
- Um
- [Scott] Whew!
[Sharon] I'm going to call your house
in case you don't get this message first.
- Bye.
- [answering machine beeps]
[female voice] Message erased.
[Al] I'm listening to him.
He hears the message,
and then he goes, "Whew!"
Whistles. Just like that. Like, whoa,
what a relief. I mean, you know?
[distant dog barking]
[reporter] Scott has not been cleared
as a suspect,
and the nagging question of his possible
involvement is yet another burden.
[Al] The fact that Sharon
and the rest of the family
all supported Scott in the media,
it was hard to watch that
because we knew things they didn't know
that we weren't telling yet.
But we knew there was gonna be a day
when we were gonna have to tell 'em.
[tense music playing]
[Jon] Somehow those photos of Scott
and Amber in the red dress got leaked,
and the Enquirer got a hold of them.
[Al] We got word
that they were gonna publish the story
about Scott Peterson and Amber Frey
in their next edition,
and so we had until that magazine came out
to let the Petersons and the
and the Rochas know
what was gonna be comin'.
[Jon] We contacted Ron and Sharon
and asked 'em to come down.
They were apprehensive.
We didn't ask 'em to come down for much.
[Sharon Rocha] At that point,
I didn't want to believe
that he'd had anything to do with it,
but when they told me about Amber,
it just confirmed
what I'd been suspecting.
I just got sick to my stomach.
And they didn't say it,
but I said, "Why did he have to kill her?"
"He didn't have to kill her." I
You know, not that they said that.
They didn't.
But, so obviously,
it confirmed to me that he did.
[melancholic music playing]
[phone line ringing]
[phone clicks]
- [Brent] Hello?
- [Scott] Hey, Brent. It's Scott.
[Brent] Hey, Scott.
[Scott] Hey, I was trying to find,
uh, the Enquirer but couldn't,
so I don't know
exactly what this article says, but
[Brent] Well, apparently,
there's pictures of you and the girl
- [Scott] Yeah.
- [Brent] together.
- [Scott] Mm-hmm.
- [Brent] So we know that's true, right?
- [Scott] Yeah, there was an encounter.
- [Brent] Okay.
So, since I mean, knowing that
I mean, what can you tell me
about my sister
to make me understand
that you're telling the truth
and that I I can still support you?
[Scott] Yeah.
I mean, I I know that
you know how happy we were together,
and that, you know,
never changed or wavers.
- [Brent] Right.
- [Scott] And, you know, I
I don't know if you could believe me, um
I certainly hope you can.
I hope you know me well enough.
[Brent] I I want
[Scott] We are looking for her,
and we need to find her and
[Brent] Yeah.
[Scott] You know,
I'm obviously devastated, you know?
I had nothing to do
with her disappearance.
- It's hard
- [Brent] Yeah. Do you think
[Scott] I can handle the media,
but I can't lose,
you know, the rest of my family.
[Brent] It looks like they're out
to nail you right now.
- [Scott] Of course they are.
- [Brent] We've been standing up for you.
- [Scott] I know it.
- [Brent] And now I feel like we're kinda
I don't know what to believe.
You know what I'm saying?
For the first time, the parents
of a missing California woman
are voicing suspicions
about their son-in-law.
They say Laci Peterson's husband
lied to them
about an affair with another woman.
They believe
he has lied to them about this
and possibly other things as well.
The family is asking Scott
to tell everything he knows
and to fully cooperate
with the Modesto Police Department.
[suspenseful music playing]
When I found out, I think
I was at a conference or something,
and I kinda stepped out in the hallway
to take a call.
And I just I just kinda doubled over.
And a friend of mine
was out in the hallway.
She's like, "What's the matter?"
I was like, "I guess
my brother-in-law's having an affair."
She's like, "That doesn't mean he did it,"
and I go, "Well, I know that."
You know? But I just knew that it
you know, things weren't going
to get any easier.
- [reporter] Do you have anything to say?
- No.
[Janey] It was very disappointing.
I told him, "The next time I see you,
I'm gonna slug you,
but then I'm gonna hug you because,
you know, we're gonna get through this."
[Gloria] The volunteer center
at the Red Lion here in Modesto
has closed indefinitely,
some of the volunteers saying
they feel betrayed by Scott's actions.
When that story broke,
I remember how crazy that night was.
At that point now,
not only do we have
a mystery of what happened to Laci,
now we have a mistress.
I asked him point blank if he wanted
to confirm he had a girlfriend.
He said no. I said, "Do you want to deny
you have a girlfriend?" He said no.
He said, "Bottom line,
all I wanna do is find my wife."
Make me the biggest villain in the world,
as long as it keeps her photograph
in the press.
[Gloria] You had nothing to do with this?
People are having questions now.
The focus is on her.
Let's keep her picture out there.
Let's keep the tip line out there.
Let's keep the description out there.
[Susan] He wasn't intending
on leaving Laci. It was not that at all.
My brother had
I don't even like to use
the word "affair."
I think he wanted
[exhales softly]
a sexual relationship
with someone who was willing,
and
[inhales sharply]
I never felt that it ever had anything
to do with Laci's disappearance.
[indistinct chatter]
[Susan] But we had to still push forward.
We still had to find out
what happened to Laci
amongst trying to not make such
a media circus out of Amber's discovery.
But it was exactly what it was.
It was a media circus.
[reporter 1] Scott, why don't you
answer some questions?
- [reporter 2] Scott, just
- [reporter 1] Gonna answer some questions?
Our family is committed
and will remain focused on our search.
We are opening a one-day volunteer center
here in Los Angeles
and ask Southern Californians
for their help.
I would appreciate it. I know
there's some volunteers behind all of you.
[man] Media, if you could spread to
the side, so volunteers could get through,
we'd really appreciate it.
I have to ask you people to back up
and let volunteers get in to sign in.
[indistinct chatter]
[Amber] I got a call saying
there was talk about me
and about Scott on the radio.
So I went into work,
and shortly after, there was press there.
[reporter] Amber, did you know
that Scott was a married man?
Do you know anything
about the disappearance?
How long have you been seeing Scott?
[Jon] She called me in a panic,
and I mean, she's just frazzled.
Now we're sitting there.
We didn't expect this thing to happen,
so we're trying to figure out
what we're going to do.
The only thing we could come up with
is we gotta pitch her up
in front of the media,
let her give a statement,
diffuse this thing,
and have her plead to be,
you know, at least treated
with dignity and left alone.
[woman 1] Here we go.
Here we go. Here we go.
[woman 2] Here we go. Here we go.
Here we go. Here we go.
[Amber clears throat]
[exhales]
Okay, first of all, I met Scott Peterson
November 20th, 2002.
I was introduced to him.
I was told he was unmarried.
Scott told me he was not married.
She walks up in front of all the cameras,
everybody taking this live,
making national news.
I remember her holding a paper,
and she was shaking like a leaf.
[soft music playing]
[sighs]
[sobbing] I am very sorry
for Laci's family.
And the cau the pain
that this has caused them.
And I pray for her safe return as well.
[paper rustles]
It was brief.
And then it was over.
And then I walked out with them,
and Detective Buehler said
there was some of Laci's friends
that wanted to meet me
and say thank you
for everything you've done.
[Rene] We went to the press conference.
We started to leave.
And we all stopped.
I think we all looked at each other.
- We need to thank her.
- Yeah.
- We needed to meet her.
- She was really brave.
It wasn't her choice
to be thrown into that position,
and so we just wanted
to thank her for coming forward.
At that point, it solidified everything
in our mind that
Scott was responsible
for what happened to Laci.
[tense music playing]
[Jon] After the press conference,
Scott continued to call Amber,
which seems unusual.
To us, it it shows really
the true nature of the guy.
[Scott] I was so proud of you
when you did that.
It was, uh, amazing. Just
I mean, you have an amazing character.
Um, I pulled over and
and threw up when you cried.
I was listening to the radio.
- It was so hard to hear.
- [Amber] Threw up?
[Scott] But it was just so amazing, um
your strength.
Amber, are you there?
At that point, we weren't getting
any information from her
that was any value
when it came to the case,
and so she decided just to, you know,
with our recommendation,
to stop the calls.
[Amber] I think right now, for me, Scott,
um, I think it'd be best
if you and I didn't talk anymore
until there's a resolution in this.
[Scott] Yeah, I agree with that.
- [Amber] Good.
- [Scott] You're right.
[Amber] Good.
[Scott] I hope to talk to you
in the future.
[Amber] Okay, Scott.
- [Scott] Goodbye for now.
- [Amber] Goodbye, Scott.
[line crackles]
[Gloria] The same day Amber came out,
all Laci's family
stood behind Sharon Rocha,
and they announced it to the world.
They were no longer supporting
Scott Peterson.
Since Scott is no longer communicating
with anyone in Laci's family
and because we have so many questions
that he has not answered,
I am not no longer supporting him.
I would also like to ask Scott
to fully cooperate with the Modesto
Police Department. Thank you.
[Amber] Sharon asked
if I would be open to meeting with her,
and I said I would.
And she had a calendar, and
she wanted to fill in that calendar.
I think she needed that validation
of, "Was he really working
or was he with you?"
Scott wasn't who he even led them
to believe he was.
[Gloria] It was now,
"Okay, lines have been drawn."
All of a sudden,
all the spotlight went on Scott Peterson.
[indistinct background conversation]
- [man] That's him smiling?
- [woman] Yeah, with the white T-shirt.
[man] Okay, go.
Scott, how do you feel about Amber saying
she didn't know that you were married?
Can you answer that?
[indistinct comment]
I'm afraid all you're gonna get
from me is silence.
[indistinct comment]
[reporter] Do you still have
a relationship with Amber?
How do you feel about, um,
Laci's family turning against you?
[Ted] Once Amber comes into the picture,
it's a game changer.
Now Mr. Perfect is a liar and a cheat.
[reporter] Why would you go
to the Berkeley Marina
when your wife was pregnant?
[engine starts]
[Ted] It puts him in a different category.
It just does.
And for so many people,
this was the moment
that they turned on Scott Peterson.
He was getting hammered,
but the families needed answers,
and he needed to stop running away
from answering questions.
You wanna find your wife?
You gotta speak out.
We gotta hear from you.
And I think
he was starting to realize that.
I think everybody sitting at home
wants the answer to the same question.
Did you murder your wife?
No, no, I did not,
and I had absolutely nothing
to do with her disappearance.
[muted speech]
[Al] He finally decides
to go on a little media tour,
and he told Diane Sawyer that he told me
on Christmas Eve about Amber.
Well, that was a lie.
I told the police immediately.
[Diane] When?
That was, uh,
the first night we were together.
The the police
I spent, um, with the police
- [Diane] You told them about her?
- Yeah, from December 24th on.
Did your wife find out about it?
I told my wife.
There wasn't a lot of anger?
No.
Do you really expect people to believe
that an eight-and-a-half-month-pregnant
woman
learns her husband has had an affair
and is saintly and casual about it?
Accommodating? Makes a peace with it?
Well, I
Yeah. You don't know
No one knows our relationship but us.
The Diane Sawyer
uh, Good Morning America interview
went horribly for him.
So Scott decides
he needs to do some damage control.
[reporter] For the first time,
Scott Peterson invites reporters
into his home to answer questions
about the disappearance
of his pregnant wife, Laci.
[Ted] I was among a few other journalists
who were able to interview him,
but he had it very well orchestrated.
You had a certain time
you were to be there, one camera only.
When we got there, you had
to take your shoes off in his house.
He was policing us
through the entire process.
[Gloria] I did what he told me.
I took off my boots.
So there I am in just my tights, you know,
and I sat down across from him,
and I'm looking around the house.
And I'm literally trying
to just get a sense.
[Scott] Okay.
[Gloria] I felt like I was going
into a crime scene
because if Laci passed away in there,
I wanted to see
everything about that house.
Okay
I was like, "Okay, just keep it cool."
I don't know what he's gonna say.
I just have to hope
that he's ready to talk.
Why why didn't you just come forward
at the time
when I asked you if you had a girlfriend?
- Why didn't you just come clean then?
- Right, right, um
At that time,
it wasn't appropriate to comment about
because it's not relevant.
[reporter] Taken a lie-detector test?
The polygraph is another one
of those things
I'm not saying I have.
I'm not saying I haven't.
that's within the scope the investigators
asked me not to speak about.
I told Laci about the the relationship.
In my truck, I put some of these umbrellas
that we have, these big umbrellas.
Um, it started to rain,
and I was taking them to storage.
I want people looking for Laci
'cause they're not doing that right now.
That's why I'm sitting down with you.
[reporter] What's your level
of cooperation?
Uh, it's complete.
Um, I know that Laci's family
doesn't feel that, and that's unfortunate.
Nothing he said, as predicted,
was worth anything, really.
It was just him regurgitating
in that voice of his
his version of events
and denial of killing Laci.
[versions overlapping] I had nothing
to do with Laci's disappearance.
The interview itself,
the only thing that I took away
that was surprising was his behavior.
The husband whose wife is missing
is usually an emotional wreck,
and from the first moment I met Scott,
he was always
um, very aware of his surroundings.
Yeah, this is a short newscast.
I don't know how much of these words
you're going to use or not.
But I'm not going to waste that
by defending myself
or talking about irrelevant things.
Uh, it's better served if we talk
about what happened and where's Laci.
He thought that this would go great
for him, that he would look good,
and that he would be able
to tell the public that, you know,
he's just this grieving husband
missing his wife.
Tell me what you love about Laci.
God, what you know
I think you could sum it up pretty easily
with looking at her photograph.
The photograph
of her big smile in the press.
[Gloria] It just seemed
so disconnected.
Like, you can't tell me
what you love about Laci?
I don't know. Just, um,
being able to complete each other.
That's it.
You could tell
he just didn't have the words,
and I thought, "Wow, that's telling."
[melancholic music playing]
[Lori] You're not feeling anything
towards him because you're like,
"This is what you should've done
from the beginning."
Yeah.
- What are you doing?
- It it just seems very, um
- I don't know.
- Fake. Fake.
- Fake.
- Very fake.
Yeah.
You haven't mentioned your son.
Hmm.
[melancholic music continues playing]
That was It's so hard.
Tell me about the nursery.
Can't go in there.
That door is
It's closed until there's someone
to put in there.
- [Gloria] How long will it remain closed?
- Until there's a little guy in there.
Thank you.
[Gloria] After my Scott Peterson
interview,
there was no doubt in my mind
Scott had killed Laci.
No doubt.
I just knew
that it would take time to build a case.
[suspenseful music playing]
[reporter] Hey, Scott!
Scott!
Hey, why don't you come and talk to us
and tell us the truth?
You're not fooling anybody
with your phony story.
Why don't you do the decent thing
and tell the truth?
Do you know where she is?
Why don't you just tell us where she is?
[Craig] I I'm watching some of this stuff
that's going on in the in the press.
It looks like most of that stuff is kinda
turning the wrong direction on you.
[Scott] I know.
God, you know, I did the press,
and every question I answered today,
I gave the website, the phone number.
I didn't see any of it, but I guess
they didn't put a damn thing in there.
It's just unbelievable.
They're not helping me find my wife.
[sobbing] I need her back.
Tell me there's some leads.
Tell me there's something to to look for.
[Craig] Well, I I am not
I'm not telling you
that there's there's anything
that's pointing in any direction right now
that is somewhere other than you, Scott.
[suspenseful music continues playing]
[Sharon Rocha] One evening,
Ron and I sat down for dinner.
I took a bite
and couldn't even swallow it.
And I just stood up,
and I remember saying that,
you know, the least he could do
is tell us where she is.
That's the very least he could do,
is tell us where she is.
But he wouldn't do that
because he's not gonna admit
that he had anything to do
with her disappearance, so
[tense music playing]
[music intensifies]
[newscaster] Breaking news this hour.
We have learned that Modesto Police
have now served a second search warrant
on this man, Scott Peterson.
Discoveries during the investigation
have necessitated the revisiting
of the Peterson residence
with a second search warrant.
[Jon] The search warrant
that was done on the 18th
was done more to get a layout of the house
and additional information that would help
and see how he had changed
the interior of the house
from what we originally saw
when the case started
to what it was at this point.
[tense music continues playing]
[Sharon Hagan] The house was cluttered.
Um, he had moved things around.
There was just really no respect
for Laci's things.
Scott had already sold her vehicle.
He'd made inquiries
about selling the house.
[Scott] I mean, I'd like to put it
on the market right now.
[male realtor] Okay, um
[Scott] There's no way, if Laci
comes back, that we're gonna stay there.
[Jon] The nursery
had been changed drastically.
At that time, he was using it more
as a storage facility than anything else.
[Sharon Hagan] This was not a man
who had an emotional attachment
to the crib or the rocking chair.
He was not preserving that.
I mean, it was just really
This was not somebody
who was waiting for his wife to come back.
[newscaster] Contacted by telephone,
Scott Peterson said, quote,
"I hope their efforts help
find my wife and kid."
Her father told NBC News, quote,
"I'm glad they are looking
in the right direction. I know he did it."
At this point in the investigation,
we think we know what's goin' on,
but we can't prove it yet.
He's predicting his wife is missing
two weeks before she's missing.
Maybe he made five anchors,
and we can only find one.
Her hair is wrapped up
in a pair of needle-nose pliers
in his boat that nobody knows about.
We are feeling we have enough.
Let's take him down.
But we couldn't find a body.
[Jon] We had a list of circumstantial
evidence pointing at Scott,
but the DA in Stanislaus County,
he told us privately,
he said, you know, "Bring me a body,
or you don't have a filing."
[helicopter whirring]
[suspenseful music playing]
[Craig inhales deeply] Scott,
I mean, let's be serious with one another.
[Scott] Craig, tell me what
Do you know what happened to her?
Do you do you know where she is?
[Craig inhales deeply]
- Well, I know where we're looking for her.
- [Scott] Where?
[Craig] And I think we're probably
gonna find her over there in the bay.
- [Scott] Oh
- [Craig] It's a matter of time.
[helicopter whirring]
[suspenseful music continues playing]
We can't let him get away with this.
We need to arrest him.
[dramatic music playing]
We're following him.
We've got DOJ agents in cars.
We've got an aircraft up.
[reporter 1] I think
they've got this guy dead to rights.
[reporter 2] Investigators on the case
are currently looking for him.
He had a great deal of cash,
clothing, and equipment.
He was getting ready to run.
[mysterious music playing]