Sep 6, 2012 No Comments ›› Pat Dollard
Excerpted from ABC News: Former Illinois cop Drew Peterson was found guilty today of killing his wife, Kathleen Savio, and making it look like an accident in 2004.
The jury returned a verdict after two days of deliberations, just an hour after stopping discussions to ask the judge the meaning of the word “unanimous.”
Peterson now faces up to 60 years in prison. He will be sentenced in November.
Peterson’s third wife, Kathleen Savio, was found dead in her bathtub in 2004, and her death was initially ruled an accident. However, after Peterson’s fourth wife, Stacy Peterson, disappeared without a trace in 2007, police exhumed Savio’s body and reexamined it, changing their finding to homicide.
Peterson was then charged with first-degree murder.
The jury stopped their deliberations just an hour before reaching their verdict to ask the judge the meaning of the word “unanimous.”
“Just to be clear, judge, what does unanimous mean?” read a note sent by jurors to Judge Edward Burmila this afternoon.
Judge Edward Burmila, who has overseen the six-week murder trial of the former Bolingbrook, Ill., police sergeant, wrote a note back to jurors explaining the meaning and referring the jurors back to the jury instructions he gave Tuesday morning.
“The word unanimous indicates the agreement of all on the matter at hand,” the note said.
On Tuesday, after they began deliberations, they asked the judge to let them hear key witness testimony reread aloud.
Peterson has denied any involvement in Savio’s death and Stacy Peterson’s disappearance. He has never been charged in connection with Stacy’s case.
