Drew Peterson was a Bolingbrook police officer, convicted recently of killing his third wife. His son, Stephen Peterson, was an Oak Brook police officer, fired during the height of his father's very public murder investigation.
Stephen Peterson went looking for justice in federal court. He filed a $10 million lawsuit claiming wrongful termination. And, like his father, he has lost in court.
Stephen Peterson was terminated by the Oak Brook Police Department in February of 2011. The oldest son of convicted wife-killer Drew Peterson was fired after his testimony before a grand jury that was investigating the disappearance of Stacy Peterson.
Stephen Peterson testified that he had voluntarily accepted guns from his father so the guns wouldn't be confiscated by authorities.
After Peterson's firing, last July, he filed the multimillion-dollar federal lawsuit accusing Oak Brook's former police chief of conspiring with another official to throw him off the Oak Brook police force by filing sham disciplinary charges.
Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Samuel Der-Yeghiayan has thrown out the suit.
In the federal court opinion obtained by the I-Team, Judge Der-Yeghiayan sides with Oak Brook and the village employees who fired Peterson, suggesting that the lawsuit was based on speculation.
A lawyer for Stephen Peterson had no comment on the suit being dismissed, telling the I-Team that he hasn't seen the opinion.
This legal blow comes in the same week that state police and the FBI renewed their search for Stacy Peterson in a nature preserve and dog park in southwest suburban Shorewood. State officers and federal agents were in the park again Wednesday with cadaver dogs and shovels, looking for the remains of Drew Peterson's long-missing third wife.
