Missing Woman 'Feared for her Life,' Sister Says

Nov. 4, 2007 — -- Friends and family scoured forests near a Chicago suburb this weekend in the hopes of finding clues about the fate of 23-year-old Stacy Peterson, a mother of two who disappeared from her home nearly a week ago.

About 40 people gathered to look for the missing woman Saturday morning, said her younger sister, Cassandra Cales. By early afternoon, the search had turned up nothing, but volunteers vowed to continue their hunt Sunday.

"Everybody is looking for her," Cales told ABC News. "She's a very loved girl, and she wouldn't just disappear like that."

"We've got search teams coming from around the world to help," she added. "We're just gonna go back at it [Sunday]."

Stacy Peterson vanished from her house in Bolingbrook, Ill., last Sunday. Her family members say they grew concerned when she was supposed to meet her sister to help paint a house, but never showed up.

Suspicion has since mounted that the missing woman's husband, Drew Peterson, 53, a sergeant at the local police department, may have played a role in his wife's disappearance.

"She told me Friday night, 'If anything happens to me, I fear for my life,'" said Cales, who described her sister's marriage as abusive and said Stacey was considering divorce.

Cales said she filed a missing person's report as soon as she realized her sister wasn't returning her calls.

"I didn't sleep," she told ABC News of the day her sister disappeared. "I still haven't slept."

But Drew Peterson insists he had nothing to do with his wife disappearance, and has suggested she left him for another man.

"I miss her," Peterson told reporters from the doorstep of his home Thursday. Peterson has said his wife suffered from "mood issues" since one of her sisters died from colon cancer last year.

The couple's two young children, Lacy, 2 and Anthony, 4, are staying with neighbors, according to family members.

Stacy Peterson's marriage to Drew Peterson was her first, but it was his fourth. His third wife, Kathleen Savio, drowned in a bathtub in 2004, in a death that was ruled accidental.

Before she died, Savio had filed an order of protection against her ex-husband, which read in part, "He wants me dead, and if he has to, he will burn the house down to shut me up."