Dana Pretzer Show On Scared Monkeys Radio - September 22, 2008 - Drew Peterson And Joel Brodsky

The Dana Pretzer Show On Scared Monkeys Radio - Monday, September 22, 2008 - Guests Include Drew Peterson and Attorney Joel Brodsky; Craig Glazer, Author of “King of Sting”; Aden McEvoy and Rhonda Wheelus Update Us On The Becca McEvoy Case; Bail Bondsman Leonard Padilla Discusses The Casey Anthony Case and Dana Speaks With Tim Miller of Texas Equusearch About New News Regarding Both The Natalee Holloway Case And The Caylee Anthony Case. *****************************************************

PRETZER: Now, if you've been watching the cable news shows and in particular some of the pundits, the hosts, the whatever you want to call them, have gone and stepped forward and made predictions about some certain high profile cases and I want to go on the record right now that Geraldo Riveraand his producers were invited to the program tonight and they chose not to attend. One of the high profile cases we're talking about is former Bolingbrook police officer Drew Peterson and I have Drew Petersonand his attorney Joel Brodsky on the line with me. Good evening gentlemen. BRODSKY: Good Evening, Dana. PETERSON: Good evening Dana. PRETZER: When you talk about high profile hosts like this and Geraldo, and I'm going to start with you Drew, if that's OK, you've said on my program before that you were disappointed with Geraldo and I'm paraphrasing here a little bit that he almost, well he didn't almost, he coached you as far as what to say. You wanted to answer a question one way and he told you, no here, this is how you should say it and it just kind of spiraled down from that to the fact that he’s made predictions as far as when you were to be arrested. Etc. etc. Your thoughts? PETERSON: Well, my thoughts on it is it's all about ratings for these people and they really don't care what they're doing to individuals' lives. The whole system seems to be ratings driven and it creates rating to keep me sinister and keep me looking nasty or guilty. It's about the gold rather than...it's the truth. Me being a good upstanding citizen doesn't sell newspapers. PRETZER: That's...you've said that before, I'm not laughing at you I'm just saying that's a fact when it comes to cable news. Joel Brodsky, attorney for Drew Peterson, Geraldo was very bold in some of the predictions he made. Do you remember what those were? BRODSKY: Well I think the last prediction he made when I was on a show with him was that Drew would be arrested before the end of August, which obviously didn't happen and I mean, he just came up withthis number, this date out of thin air and I asked him, "What are you going to do when you're wrong?" and he didn't have an answer for that. I think that's the problem. Nobody holds him to account. He's made two predictions that Drew will be arrested by a particular date. Both of them turned out to be wrong and nobody holds him to account for this. It's wrong. Used to be if a guy made a prediction like that and it turned out to be wrong, they used to force him to resign. It's a very troublesome thing to have a major media

outlet say somebody's going to be arrested for a murder by a certain date and what it does to the person, what it does to their right to an unbiased trial or an unbiased presumption of innocence. It's just, it's all contrary to that. But nobody is holding anybody to account for these Russian roulette-type predictions. PRETZER: I want to make it very clear that Geraldo and his producers were invited on the program and at the last minute they decided not to come on the program. I seem to remember Joel, that broadcast where you did challenge Geraldoas far as if he was wrong what would he do and he just didn't answer the question. Are you and Drew coming out publicly now to ask for an apology from Geraldo Rivera or his resignation or what? BRODSKY: Well Drew, what would you like to see Geraldo do? PETERSON: Jump off a cliff maybe? (Laughter) BRODSKY: yeah, I'd love to see him come out and take responsibility. Say, yes, I was ... He really owes it to both his own listeners and to Drew and to the public in general to come out and take responsibility and say look, I'm wrong and I'm not going to make any predictions again. It's not the right thing to do. But I think he really does and I'd love to see him do it. Love to see him take responsibility. PRETZER: Now Drew you said, in jest I'm sure, you'd like to see him jump off a cliff but this is a direct, I guess I'll use the term 'attack' on you when he predicted that you would be arrested and it didn't happen. Would you sit down face to face with Geraldo Rivera and accept a response from him if it was an apology? PETERSON: Oh sure. I'm an open-minded guy. I'll talk to anybody about anything but if you get Geraldo in a situation that he clearly that he showed with Joel, when he doesn't know what he's talking about he tries overpowering you with a barrage of garble like he did with Joel on one of his shows and just tries to overpower you with his language and he talks a lot but he doesn't say nothing but he doesn't allow the other person to get a word in edgewise and it’s pretty much his style on this. [Crosstalk] Some sort of confrontation with a guy who is an experienced newscaster can be kind of tough. PRETZER: Right. And you were going to say, Joel? BRODSKY: I'd love to see him get on the news - some sort of situation where ...I was hoping he’dbe on this show where he's not in charge, where he doesn't control who can talk and when. I would like to have that type of situation with him. Where he's in control of the interview and he's in control of the, where the camera points and when the microphone's on and off it's kind of unfair. But in a broader sense these predictions are, really get to be troublesome. I mean every time that Drew and I have, we have court on his gun charge we always get a, some sort of media person now who, somebody from the media's calling us and telling us that they got an inside tip that Drew is going to be arrested at the courthouse and it's always false and we laugh them off at this point but it's trouble… These predictions are really troublesome and they are so often inaccurate and nobody's holding anybody responsible

for the inaccuracy of these predictions and to me it just seems to me like there should be some sort of consequences for making a public inaccurate prediction. PRETZER: This isn't just about Geraldo. I want to make that perfectly clear although you've decided to focus on him because he was bold enough to go on his program and actually pick a date. In fact, I believe you guys decided to extend it a little bit before he decided to question him on it but I want to go back, Drew, if possible to the very early days of the disappearance of your wife, Stacy, and Geraldo Rivera was one of the first media people that you actually sat down and talked with or am I wrong? PETERSON: He called me up a couple of times on the telephone wanting to take me to lunch and just talk and then he showed up at my door when I didn't respond to him and basically his celebrity status got him in the front door. PRETZER: Right. PETERSON: we sat at the…my kitchen table...my sister and my brother for about an hour. He talked basically how we both had younger wives and it was a very cordial meeting and when he asked me questions about, specifics about the case, he goes, “tell me in your own words” and he’d say, “Say it like this” and then it's not my own words but, “It sounds better. Say it like this.” and he did that with pretty much every question that he asked me and then he walks outside and as soon as he stepped out, we're watching it live on television, and as soon as he stepped outside my front porch he goes, “There's Drew Petersoninside. I just talked to him. There is a man feeling the noose around, closing around his neck.” (laugher) That's not what we talked about! He was like a Doctor Jekyll switchup on me and he became a whole different guy and then when he went next door to Sharon Bychowski's house with all Stacy's family and friends he talked about people coming over to my house and weren't they afraid of being held hostage and this that and the other thing. It really made me look like this sinister crazed person when Stacy's family was over at my house and they were just collecting ashes from, that belonged to, Stacy's deceased sister. It's like I'm doing the family a favor and helping them out and he's making me look like this crazed person (unintelligble) behind the house, taking people hostages. Just total sensationalism for no particular reason other than ratings. PRETZER: Joel Brodsky, sensationalism. I was just going to bring up that term. A while back we were hearing lots about wire tap evidence or wire taps and I know you made a court appearance here the other day, here. Responded to some media reports on the so-called recordings and again that was sensationalized a while back that that was the last nail in the coffin so to speak and I'm not trying to be ignorant here. Your comments on that? BRODSKY: Yeah, well, I mean we always suspected that there was some sort of electronic surveillance going on with Drew. I think when Drew picked up his cars, when he finally got his cars, got a court order to get his cars back I think he sat in the car while the TV cameras were on him and he was going, "testing, 1,2,3" so it was no surprise to us that there was a some sort of electronic surveillance and you know these tapes that the judge confirmed in court exist. We still don't know if they're just the tapes of the cars or bugs that they put into Drew's house or in fact if there were wired informants. We just don't know and to tell you the

truth one thing I find very interesting is that the State's attorney doesn't really even know 100% what's on these tapes because the judge has to review all the tapes to make sure that they conform with the court orders before the State's attorney can get to see them so to have people come out and get on TVand say we're the source of the tapes and this is what the tapes contain is, I think probably, A. inaccurate and B. counterproductive. Where you have responsible law enforcement officers and responsible judges that are really evaluating and looking over these matters. I think the sensationalism of it is ridiculous especially like, what did Lenny say, that Drewwouldn't make his September 10th court date because he would be locked up by then. There's another false prediction. Believe me, once again he doesn't take responsibility for his false prediction. PRETZER: And that was on Geraldo's show was it not? BRODSKY: Yeah, exactly and I think having met Lenny once or twice, and I know Drew said this: when Lenny says an arrest is imminent, the man never used the word imminent in his life so somebody's feeding him his information. Somebody's instigating what's going on here. I don’t know who. Maybe it's some media personality. I don't know. PETERSON: When Lenny confronted me in the barbershop parking lot there was media people there and they seemed to be egging him on into a physical confrontation too. So again trying to get a story where there is really not a story. PRETZER: When it comes to this, and we're not here tonight to talk about guilt or innocence. We're here tonight to talk about media sensationalism and some certain media people and in particular Geraldo Rivera who has made predictions about my guests this evening as far as their arrest and all of that. When it comes to this, Drew, again we're not here to talk guilt or innocence but you get lumped into a sensationalized media story. We have other stories about O.J. and there's this poor story about this young girl missing in Florida - the Caylee Anthony story - and there's all these high-profile cases. I think you can relate to the fact of these people in Orlando with the 24/7 news coverage on your front lawn, the protesters, all of this stuff going on. It just swallows up your life. Your thoughts? PETERSON: It does in fact. Even as late as last Saturday night I had Sharon Bychowski and her goofy son Elroy out in front of my house, out in front of her house. I guess he even made up a song to the tune of London Bridgesand they were playing that on a loud speaker and laughing and yucking it up and posting signs, "redrum" in the lawn and I mean this is all stuff they were doing in front of my children. We were coming and going and this has to have some effect on them. I say I'm an adult. I'm fair game. You want to come say something to me, say it but they're doing this in front of the kids and not having thoughts as to the consequences it having to their (little minds?). I think these are some pathetic people. PRETZER: Joel Brodsky, you and I have discussed this on past programs but you may end up in court some day. It's hard to say. We can't predict that one way or the other right now but this publicity spiral regarding your client has gone 360 degrees every direction right down to like we're talking about predictions from the media to almost a vilification to many media appearancesto you name it. How do you handle that as far as the process of being a defense attorney?

BRODSKY: For example, we have Drew's gun charge, weapons charges gonna go to trial in December. We had to spend a lot of time and money getting a jury questionnaire of almost a hundred questions and that's just the beginning. To try to weed out jurors when they have a bias or prejudice in the case and the judge even indicated we're probably going to have to go through three or four times as many jurors as usual in trying to pick a jury and it's going to take a lot of time. Obviously the time and expense is borne by the defense to some extent. It's also cost the prosecution time away from other cases, judge's time, deputies' time, it’s a drain on taxpayers as well as the defendant. It puts a bias on the system and a pressure on the system that really doesn't belong there. I've tried to make my responses and people will say it's our fault too, we've definitely, that Drew and I have tried to pursue media coverage but I think when you really look at it, this was, that it, we've always been reactive. In other words, we've only appeared in reaction to some leak or some revelation or some statement. We really haven’tgone out there and been the leaders. We've been getting out and when something comes out we want to get our side out. If nothing had come out, if there was no leaks, if there were no statements, if there weren't trucks parked in front of Drew's house, probably we wouldn't ever have gone out and gone into,on any of the network or cable shows. We were trying to be reactive rather than proactive and I just think that's the problem. We really should, people should, there should be some acknowledgment of the effect that this type of extreme media coverage has both on somebody's right to a fair trial and also the cost and the effect it has on the system, which is great. Here we're going to have a simple UUW or Unauthorized Use of Weapon charge in the state of Illinois usually would take half a day to try a case like that, three quarters of a day - tops, where it's gonna go for three weeks and that's only because of the publicity. That's a shame and it's really a burden on the system that doesn't need to be there. PRETZER: And watch the media coverage when that starts. Drew Peterson, Joel Brodsky are here. You know, Drew, former police officer, all of these fingers and eyes pointing towards you. You're mad at Geraldo and there's other media outlets too that I'm sure that you're disappointed in as far as how this has been covered. If you had a chance in the format of my program ... which is when I bring my guests on, whether I agree with them or not, to sit down and actually speak their mind and be fair with them. If you had a chance to sit down with Geraldo Rivera and not have him tell you what to say, what would you do and what would you say to him? PETERSON: Well, I'd just probably confront his threats andstuff. He's threatened to, on occasion, to come after me. He goes, "I'm coming after ya and I'm gonna get ya!" and my response to that is, "What are you gonna do, misquote me to death?" That's pretty much my biggest fear. He has, like I sayhe's a skilled newsperson and every time I've seen him be involved in any type of confrontation with anybody he just overpowers them with rhetoric which really is saying nothing but he just talks and really, in this gun case I sat there and listened to him just shaking my head on how much he didn't know what he was talking about. So basically on an even format I’d like to justset the record straight with him and I'd really like to know, well I know why - he's chasing ratings. So again, it pays better and it's sells better to keep me sinister.

PRETZER: Joel Brodsky, if that time ever came, and actually I even threw that idea out to Geraldoand his producers. I said, "OK, you come on my show and then maybe then the three of us can come on your show and we can do it all over again but let's be fair and allow Drew and Joel to speak and get all sides on the table. Would you consider that because Geraldo didn't want to come on and do that here? PETERSON: Yeah, I, like I said in a format where he doesn’tcontrol the microphone and the camera yeah, I would love to. I'd like to talk to him about some of his explanations, you know they put them on ... he was talking about the gun charge and was talking about a sawed off barrel which is ridiculous or that a short barrel puts a bigger spread but we're talking about a rifle which fires a bullet. There is no spread. I'd like to ask him how he comes up with these type of things. I really would like to...and he says them as authoritative and it goes off nationwide as an authoritative statement and it's so blatantly wrong and I'd just like to understand the process of how this happens. If he's wrong, get him to say, you know, look I made a mistake and acknowledge that. My researchers were...I should fire my researchers or whatever but I would love to sit down with him and have a fair where he doesn't have total control over the microphone and the camera and go over some of these things because there's, it's, it's disturbing. To tell you the truth it is a little, it's not just a little bit, it's disturbing that inaccurate information and these type of Russianroulette predictions. If he's right...if he's wrong he doesn't get called on them. If he's right he looks like a hero because he predicted it right. I'd just love to talk to him about that - those situations. PRETZER: Yeah, and hopefully...well I'm pretty sure his producers will be listening and if he's listening to this he's heard what you guys have to say. Drew, I'm going to give you the last word. PETERSON: What would you like me to say? (Laughter) PRETZER: You can recite poetry. You can sing. You can do whatever you like. I just want you to comment just one last time as far as how you feel the media's treated you. PETERSON: Well again, everything's sensationalized. ...a couple of producers early on talked to them and they were pretty frank about the system and I'm not going to tell you who they were but they said everything is ratings-driven and just the fact that they were talking to me, got their employers to give them congratulations that they were getting the top guy and the top story and it was again all ratings-driven. They look at me and they says, "A news show is all about ratings." and it really has no consequences at all to them what they're doing to my life so... PRETZER: OK. Well fair enough. Drew Peterson, Joel Brodsky thank you. PETERSON: Thank you, Dana.