May 14, 2009 5:28 pm US/Central
Peterson Stepbrother Goes Before Grand Jury
JOLIET, Ill. (CBS) ―
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Thomas Morphey, Drew Peterson's stepbrother, testified before a special grand jury about the disappearance of Stacy Peterson.
CBS
Three people who may become key witnesses in the case against Drew Peterson testified before a special grand jury Thursday. CBS 2's Mike Puccinelli reports it's the same jury that sent Peterson to jail just last week.
Exactly one week after Drew Peterson was arrested and charged with murdering his third wife Kathleen Savio, some of the key players in the
disappearance of Stacy Peterson, 23, stopped by the Will County Court Annex in Joliet to testify before the special grand jury.
Thomas Morphey, Len Wawczak and Paula Stark were present to talk to grand jurors investigating the October 2007 disappearance of Stacy, Drew Peterson's fourth wife.
The trio had nothing to say to reporters about their appearance before the grand jury.
Morphey, Drew Peterson's stepbrother, has claimed Peterson roped him into disposing of his wife's body. Morphey first told his story to The Herald News.
Morphey has told investigators he fears he unwittingly helped Peterson load a closed blue barrel containing Stacy Peterson's body into the back of Peterson's Yukon Denali.
Morphey was so distraught over what he might have done, he attempted to kill himself the next day by overdosing on pills. Drew Peterson has long maintained that his stepbrother is mentally unbalanced.
"I think he's attempted to take his own life a few times," Peterson said in a Feb. 8th interview with CBS 2. "And now all of a sudden he's become this hero to his family where before he was nothing but a loser to the family."
Stark and Wawczak are former friends of Peterson who wore a wire for state police investigators and secretly recorded some seven months of conversations between themselves and the former police sergeant.
When Wawczak broke his silence about the wires their friendship ended. Peterson lashed out at the time.
"Lenny made friends with my little boy and now all of a sudden these people have just coldly disappeared from their lives," Peterson said in a February interview. "I thought, Lenny and Paula, that was a cruel thing."
Wawczak and Stark say what would really have been cruel would be to do nothing and let the children continue to be raised by a man who the couple believes killed two of his wives.
Peterson, a former Bolingbrook police sergeant, was arrested last week on two counts of first-degree murder in the 2004 death of this third wife, Kathleen Savio.
Initially, Savio's death was ruled an accidental drowning. The case was reopened after the disappearance of Stacy Peterson. A new autopsy concluded that Savio was the victim of a homicide.
Drew Peterson remains in custody at the Will County Jail on a $20 million bond. He is to appear in court Monday for arraignment. At that hearing, his attorney Joel Brodsky is expected to push for a reduction on his bond.
Two friends of Drew Peterson also testified before the grand jury today, including one man who was among those who found the body of Kathleen Savio five years ago.
Stacy's disappearance has been called a potential homicide and state police list Peterson as their sole suspect.
CBS 2's Mike Puccinelli and the STNG Wire contributed to this report.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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