Scott Peterson arrest months after Laci disappeared Christmas Eve may have been strategic: former homicide cop

Laci Peterson, 27, disappeared on Christmas Eve, 2002, and her husband, Scott Peterson, was charged with murder, just days after her remains were found months later.

Law enforcement officers don't always wait to find a body before bringing a murder charge, though, like in the cases of missing Texas realtor Suzanne Simpson and missing Massachusetts real estate executive Ana Walshe. Fox News contributor and former Washington, D.C., homicide detective Ted Williams explained why investigators sometimes pursue charges before a body is found.

As authorities continue to search for Simpson, a 51-year-old mom of four who disappeared more than two months ago, her husband, Brad Simpson, remains behind bars, accused of killing his wife of 22 years. Unlike in the Peterson case, law enforcement did not wait to find Suzanne's remains before charging Simpson with murder.  

"Homicides are like a puzzle," Williams told Fox News Digital. "Investigators are forever putting together pieces of the puzzle, and once they feel that they have enough evidence – circumstantial evidence or physical evidence – they will then move forward."

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Laci Peterson was seven-and-a-half months pregnant at the time she vanished on Christmas Eve in 2002 from the Modesto home she shared with Scott, sparking a widespread search for the mom-to-be. Four months later, in April 2003, a pedestrian found her unborn son's decomposed body in the San Francisco Bay, and authorities found Laci's remains in the Bay the following day. 

Within a week of the discoveries, authorities arrested and charged Scott Peterson with two counts of capital murder in the deaths of his wife and unborn son. 

"I think in the case of Scott Peterson, they were still gathering evidence . . . they wanted to wait, and they had time on their side. And while gathering the evidence, they were able to make a very concrete case against Scott Peterson," Williams said. 

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The former homicide detective explained why, in cases like Peterson's, law enforcement might wait until a body is found before bringing a homicide charge, elaborating on the risk involved in charging an individual too soon. 

"Investigators have to get it right the first time," he said. "Once a person is charged with murder, then they are put on trial, and if they are found not guilty and later found to have actually committed the murder, they can't be charged a second time because of what we define in this country as double jeopardy."

Double jeopardy refers to a clause in the Fifth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits anyone from being prosecuted twice for the same crime.

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Williams said investigators must gather enough evidence to sustain a murder charge, given that they only have "one shot."

"That's the key . . . investigators realize that the evidence in order to go forward with a murder charge has to be strong," he added. 

"Prosecutors realize that they only get one bite of the apple," Williams said. "If a jury comes back and finds the person not guilty of the crime of murder, and they later subsequently find evidence that shows that the person did, in fact, commit the murder . . . because of double jeopardy in our country…they cannot retry that person again, that that person will have gotten off with the killing."

In another homicide investigation in Massachusetts, Ana Walshe, a mother of three young children and a real estate professional who worked in Washington, D.C., disappeared on New Year’s Day 2023 and was reported missing a few days later. Though her body was never recovered, her husband, Brian Walshe, was charged in his 39-year-old wife's murder. 

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Williams explained why, unlike with the Peterson investigation, authorities in both the Simpson and Walshe cases did not wait to find the victims' remains before bringing murder charges against the suspects.  

"Over a period of time, if investigators realize that they are not going to find or come up with a body, but that they believe that they have enough physical evidence to move forward, they will move forward, and they will present that to a prosecutor, and that prosecutor will make a decision as to whether he or she wants to go forward with charges," he said.

On Dec. 3, Brad Simpson was indicted on two first-degree felony charges – murder and aggravated assault with a deadly weapon causing serious bodily injury to a family member. He was also indicted on charges of tampering with a corpse, two additional counts of tampering with physical evidence, and possession of a prohibited weapon. 

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"In the case of Suzanne Simpson, it appears as though investigators have come up with physical as well as circumstantial evidence to show that she is no longer here. And as a result of that, they have moved forward," Williams said. 

Suzanne Simpson's DNA was reportedly found on a "reciprocating saw" that Brad Simpson is accused of hiding, according to indictment records obtained by Fox News Digital and KABB reporting. Authorities said there are no signs of Suzanne being alive since her husband allegedly assaulted her on Oct. 6, and that this has been verified by her cellphone records, financial records, family, friends and co-workers.

A neighbor reportedly saw Simpson assault his wife the night of her disappearance and later heard screams coming from the woods nearby, while the couple's five-year-old child told a school counselor that on the evening of Oct. 6, her father allegedly had "pushed her mother against the wall, hit (physically) her mother on the face and hurt her mother's elbow inside their residence" and also "turned off her mother's phone because they were fighting," according to the affidavit. 

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Investigators tracked Simpson's unusual behavior in the days after his wife vanished, including shutting down his phone, driving with suspicious items in the bed of his truck, going to a dump site and cleaning his truck at a car wash. 

"There is a bottom line and a common thread," Williams told Fox News Digital. "Among all of these cases . . . they happened in various jurisdictions, and those jurisdictions handle homicides differently, but all homicides are based on the evidence . . . that investigators over a period of time are able to come up with."

Fox News' Audrey Conklin contributed to this report.