For the very first time since he was convicted of murdering his pregnant wife Laci Peterson in 2003, Scott Peterson gets the chance to share his side of the story in Peacock‘s new documentary series Face to Face with Scott Peterson.
The documentary series shows the 51-year-old speaking to director Shareen Anderson from Mule Creek State Prison about his relationship with Laci in the days leading up to her disappearance, in which he also addresses the affair he began having with Amber Frey just a month before Laci went missing.
“It’s horrible,” he says in the documentary. “I was a total a-hole to be having sex outside our marriage.”
Scott, who still maintains that he is innocent, admitted that he regrets having the affair.
“I certainly regret cheating on Laci, absolutely,” he says. “It was about childhood lack of self esteem, selfish — me traveling somewhere, being lonely at night because I wasn’t at home. And you know, someone makes you feel good because they want to have sex with you.”
He also shut down a claim Anderson raised, that the prosecution believed he killed his wife — who was eight months pregnant at the time with their son — to avoid paying spousal and child support.
“That’s so offensive, so disgusting,” Scott replied. “I just don’t get that argument and it’s just absolutely not true.”
But Scott confessed in the documentary series that he planned to keep Frey from the investigation, allegedly to keep the focus on Laci.
“I guess I understand why she tried to turn it into a relationship after the fact, and made claims that it was something more,” he says. “But it simply wasn’t. That’s a massive misconception, I think. I was absolutely wrong, but I embrace the truth on that — it’s a horrible truth.”
He later confessed, “These are thoughts that haunt me, and it’s devastating. I feel such shame and guilt that me having had sex with Amber Frey caused all that — that they didn’t look for [Laci] alive.”
Scott was arrested in April 2003 just days after the bodies of Laci and Conner Peterson were found in San Francisco Bay.
Scott is now serving a life sentence without possibility of parole. But the investigation received renewed interest this year when the Los Angeles Innocence Project took on the case.
Face to Face offers a compelling new look at the case, including alternate theories and leads that a private investigator hired by Scott and Laci’s family found that went unchecked by police.
“If I have a chance to get the reality out there, I have a chance to show people what the truth is, and if they’re willing to accept it, maybe that takes a little bit of hurt off my family, and that would be the biggest thing that I can accomplish right now,” Scott says.
All three parts of Face to Face with Scott Peterson is now streaming on Peacock.