Drew Peterson says missing wife ran off

BOLINGBROOK, Ill., Jan. 1 (UPI) -- Drew Peterson, whose wife vanished more than two months ago in Illinois, says his wife likely ran off with another man.

The former Bolingbrook, Ill., police officer pointed to the case of Anu Solanki, who disappeared near Chicago on Christmas Eve.

After a four-day search at a cost of more than $250,000, the woman disclosed she met up with a California man to escape her marriage. "This happens a lot more frequently than people are talking about. This is just another case of what happened to me happening to someone else," Peterson told the Joliet (Ill.) Herald News.

Police suspect Peterson in the "potential homicide" of Stacy Peterson. The state police also are re-investigating the mysterious March 2004 death of Peterson's third wife, Kathleen Savio.

A coroner's jury determined Savio was the victim of an accidental bathtub drowning. At the time, police Special Investigator Herbert Hardy told jurors he saw no indications of foul play, the newspaper said.

In a recent petition to have Savio's body exhumed for more testing, Will County State's Attorney James Glasgow said the woman's death scene appeared "consistent with the 'staging' of an accident to conceal a homicide."

Peterson said strange occurrences are not as unlikely as they may seem to people.

"Here's another case," he said. "People run away. People drown in the bathtub. And it happened to me."