Both Ill. Cop's Wives Feared 'Accidents'

Stacy's Family Suspicious

Stacy's friends and family remain equally suspicious of Drew's possible involvement in her disappearance.

"He's not asked anybody if we know where she is. Maybe because he already knows where she is?" said Sharon Bychowski, a friend of Stacy's.

Bychowski said she's particularly concerned about the four Peterson children, who remain in Drew's custody.

"It's just very sad that the older children have to endure losing one mother in a bathtub, losing another mother just several years later, and now the possibility of losing their father. Their whole world is upside down," Bychowski said.

In an interview broadcast on NBC Wednesday, Drew proclaimed his innocence and made a public plea for a defense lawyer. He also sent an unusual message to Stacy: "Come home, tell people where you are, and that's all I can say," he said in the interview, while laughing.

Drew also said that his young wife's numerous recent requests for a divorce were "hormonal," explaining that she had become depressed after the recent cancer death of a sister.

"Every woman in the world should be appalled by that," Bychowski said. "For him to say that, it's really, really ridiculous. He should be ashamed by that."

Drew says he believes Stacy ran off with another man. Her friends and family tell another story.

"'Sharon,' she used to say constantly to me, 'just remember, if I disappear, it is not an accident. He killed me.' She said it all the time," said Bychowski.

Stacy's stepsister Kerry Simmons said, "As controlling as he was, for him to switch off and act like he doesn't care that she left with another man? That would never happen."

Stacy disappeared the day before she was scheduled to meet with a divorce lawyer, friends said.

Drew has reportedly told the two younger children that their mother Stacy is on vacation.