Drew Peterson once grabbed his wife around her neck and asked, "Why don't you just die?" according to a friend of Kathleen Savio's who testified in Peterson's murder trial today. 
 
 Peterson, 58, is on trial for killing Savio, his third wife, and making it look like an accident. She was found dead in her bathtub in 2004 and the death was initially ruled an accidental drowning. After Peterson's fourth wife, Stacy Peterson, vanished from their home in 2007, police exhumed Savio's body and reexamined it for signs of murder, finally charging Peterson. 
 
 Today, Savio's friend Mary Parks testified about conversations the two women had regarding Peterson. 
 
 "Kathy told me that her husband, Drew Peterson, said he could kill her, make her disappear," Parks said on the stand, according to ABC News affiliate WLS. Parks teared up as she recalled the conversation about Peterson grabbing Savio's neck. 
 
 Savio told Parks that her estranged husband told her, "Why don't you just die?" 
 
 "She unzipped the top, it opened and I saw marks on her neck," Parks said. 
 
 According to her testimony, Parks took nursing classes with Savio, but did not see her again after their graduation in December 2003. Savio died in February 2004. 
 
 When Parks heard of the death, she called the Will County State's Attorney's Office and asked if the case were being investigated, she testified today. 
 
 The testimony today marked the second day hearsay statements were allowed into the court transcript, following a significant decision Wednesday by Judge Edward Burmila to allow Savio's friends to testify about Peterson's alleged threats. 
 
 Kristen Anderson, who lived in Savio's basement after Savio and Peterson split up, said that Savio slept with a knife under her mattress because she was so afraid of Peterson. 
 
 "She showed me a knife that she kept in between her mattresses for protection," Anderson said. 
 
 Anderson recalled a conversation in which Savio confessed that Peterson once told her, "I could kill you and make it look like an accident." 
 
 After the statement, Anderson broke down in tears and had to leave the courtroom, according to WLS. She returned later and continued testifying about Peterson's threatening behavior, including an incident in which Peterson broke into the home, dressed in SWAT gear, and held a knife to Savio's throat while threatening her. 
 
 Anderson said she called police three times about Savio's case in 2004, but those calls were never returned. 
 
 Burmila's decision to allow the testimony was hailed by the prosecution, which has no physical evidence tying Peterson to the scene of the crime. 
 
 "Judge Burmila made an historical ruling today," prosecutor James Glasgow told WLS. 
 
 Defense attorney Michael Lopez said his client was disappointed in the ruling. 
 
 "He's upset," Lopez said, according to the report. "But you have to deal with the cards they give you." ||||| Jurors convicted Drew Peterson of murdering his third wife Thursday, capping a sensational, five-year legal saga that began after the swaggering former Illinois police officer's fourth wife vanished. 
 
 FILE - In this May 8, 2009 file photo, former Bolingbrook, Ill., police sergeant Drew Peterson leaves the Will County Courthouse in Joliet, Ill., after his arraignment on charges of first-degree murder... (Associated Press) 
 
 Peterson, 58, faces a maximum 60-year prison term when sentenced. Illinois has no death penalty. 
 
 The prosecution built its case almost exclusively on circumstantial and hearsay evidence, including testimony about what Peterson's wives had told friends and acquaintances before the one died and the other disappeared. The verdict was a vindication for Will County prosecutors, who gambled by putting on such a case and then committed numerous stumbles during testimony that drew angry scoldings from the judge. 
 
 Over the course of the investigation and prosecution, Peterson had seemingly taunted authorities, joking on talk shows and even suggesting a "Win a Date With Drew" contest. His notoriety even inspired a TV movie starring Rob Lowe. 
 
 A neighbor found Kathleen Savio's body on March 1, 2004, face down in a dry bathtub of her suburban home outside Chicago. Her thick black hair was blood-soaked and she had a 2-inch gash on the back of her head. 
 
 The drowning death of the 40-year-old aspiring nurse was initially deemed an accident _ a freak slip in the tub. After Peterson's fourth wife, 23-year-old Stacy Peterson, went missing in 2007 was Savio's body exhumed, re-examined and her death reclassified as a homicide. 
 
 The 12 jurors, who raised eyebrows by donning different color-coordinated clothes each day of testimony, deliberated for XXdays/hours before reaching a decision. The seven men and five women included a poet, a letter carrier and a man who said his favorite TV show was "Criminal Minds." 
 
 Peterson had divorced Savio a year before her death. His motive for killing her, prosecutors said, was fear that a pending settlement, which included their $300,000 home, would wipe him out financially. 
 
 Fascination nationwide with the former Bolingbrook police sergeant arose from speculation he sought to parlay three decades of law enforcement expertise into getting away with murder. 
 
 Prosecutors suspect he killed his fourth wife because she could finger him for Savio's death. Stacy Peterson's family hoped a conviction in Savio's murder could lead to charges against Drew Peterson in Stacy's disappearance. 
 
 Jurors weren't supposed to link the fourth wife's disappearance to the third's death. Prosecutors were prohibited from even telling jurors Stacy Peterson is presumed dead or that her husband is the lone suspect in her disappearance. He says she ran off with another man and is still alive. 
 
 Prosecutors faced enormous hurdles. 
 
 They had no physical evidence tying Peterson to Savio's death and no witnesses placing him at the scene. They were forced to rely on typically barred hearsay _ statements Savio made to others before she died and that Stacy Peterson made before she vanished. In 2008, Illinois passed a law tailored to Peterson's case, dubbed "Drew's Law," permitting hearsay at trials in rare circumstances. 
 
 The hearsay included friend Kristen Anderson testifying that Savio told her Peterson once warned her at knife point, "I could kill you and make it look like an accident." Savio so feared for her life that she kept a knife under her mattress. 
 
 And Stacy Peterson's pastor, Neil Schori, testified she told him that her husband got up from bed and left their house in the middle of the night around the time of Savio's death. Crying and hugging her knees, she said Drew Peterson later coached her on how to lie to police. 
 
 There was damning testimony not based on hearsay. 
 
 A former co-worker of Peterson's, Jeff Pachter, testified that Peterson offered him $25,000 to hire a hit man to kill Savio, though he never followed through. After Savio was found dead, Peterson told him, "That favor I asked you _ I don't need it anymore." 
 
 Prosecutors had to establish the most basic fact for a murder trial: that there was actually a murder. 
 
 Pathologists testified for the defense that Savio's wounds indicated an accident. But equally well-respected pathologists for the state said it was impossible for a single fall to cause both the wound on the back of her head and bruises on the front of her body. 
 
 In their three-day case, Peterson's lawyers endeavored to cast doubt on the reliability of key witnesses. They accused Savio's sister, Susan Doman, of jazzing up her testimony to profit from a movie and book deal. 
 
 The last defense witness was Peterson's and Savio's 19-year-old son, Thomas Peterson. The polite, well-spoken college student cut a sympathetic figure, telling jurors he has never believed his father killed his mom. 
 
 Both sides blundered parts of their presentations. 
 
 Prosecutors angered the judge several times by broaching subjects previously ruled inadmissible. And as they sought to blunt the credibility of hearsay evidence, the defense ended up prompting their own witness to emphasize that Stacy Peterson was convinced her husband did kill Savio. 
 
 Peterson could still win release someday. His lawyers have said they may appeal all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court on grounds Illinois' hearsay law is unconstitutional. 
 
 Some legal experts worried about the precedent a conviction at a trial dependent on hearsay would set, saying it could open the floodgates for the admissibility of such evidence in Illinois and elsewhere. 
 
 ___ 
 
 Follow Michael Tarm at http://www.twitter.com/mtarm ||||| Drew Peterson's third wife told a friend a year before she was found dead in her bathtub that the former suburban Chicago police officer once broke into her home, grabbed her by the throat, pinned her down and asked a threatening question, the friend testified Thursday. 
 
 FILE - In this May 8, 2009 file photo, former Bolingbrook, Ill., police officer Drew Peterson leaves the Will County Courthouse in Joliet, Ill., after his arraignment on charges of first-degree murder... (Associated Press) 
 
 FILE - In this May 7, 2009 file booking photo provided by the Will County Sheriff's office in Joliet, Ill., former Bolingbrook, Ill., police officer Drew Peterson is shown. Peterson is charged with first-degree... (Associated Press) 
 
 "She said that her husband said, "`Why don't you just die?'" Mary Parks told jurors, her voice quivering as she delivered more of hearsay evidence that's at the heart of the state's case. 
 
 Peterson, an ex-Bolingbrook police sergeant, has pleaded not guilty to first-degree murder in the 2004 death of his third wife, 40-year-old Kathleen Savio, who once studied nursing with Parks. 
 
 As Savio recounted the attack, she unzipped a top she was wearing to show dark red bruises on her neck, saying they were a result of Peterson's attack, Parks testified. 
 
 "She looked as if she was in shock," Parks told jurors. 
 
 She said Savio told her the incident occurred on the stairs of her suburban home the night before the women spoke around Thanksgiving in 2003. 
 
 A year later, Savio's body was found in a dry bathtub at her home _ a gash on the back of her head. Her death was only reclassified from an accident to a homicide after Peterson's fourth wife, 23-year-old Stacy Peterson, vanished in 2007. Peterson, now 58, is a suspect in her disappearance but hasn't been charged. 
 
 Parks and Savio spoke again in October 2003, with Savio describing another encounter with Peterson. 
 
 "Kathy told me that her husband ... had told her that he could kill her and make her disappear," she said. 
 
 At one point, Parks began sobbing and the judge asked jurors to leave while she regained her composure. 
 
 The hearsay testimony is critical because police who investigated when Savio was found dead quickly decided it was an accident and didn't collect any physical evidence. Illinois adopted a law in the wake of Peterson's case _ dubbed "Drew's Law" _ that allows hearsay evidence in rare circumstances. 
 
 Peterson, who has looked on intently during testimony, suddenly beamed when his and Savio's son, Kristopher, walked into court and sat behind him to chat during a break. The 18-year-old and other Peterson children are on a witness list and cannot sit in on testimony. 
 
 During the cross-examination of Parks, defense attorney Steve Greenberg suggested Savio was paranoid, and that her descriptions of clashes with Peterson may have been exaggerated to elicit sympathy. 
 
 But Savio's friend stood her ground. 
 
 "Everything that she told me, I had no reason to doubt," Parks said. 
 
 Before the trial began, Judge James Burmila left open the possibility he could prohibit most or even all of the hearsay prosecutors wanted to enter as evidence. But in recent days, he has permitted several such statements, potentially boosting the odds of a conviction. 
 
 Thursday morning, Burmila refused a defense request to bar Parks' hearsay testimony. She went on to testify for more than four hours and was the sole witness of the day. 
 
 In contentious exchanges Thursday, Greenberg said Parks' accounts of what Savio told her have been inconsistent. He even asked Parks why she kept looking to her left at jurors as she answered questions. 
 
 Parks shot back, "Is it inappropriate for me to do that?" After Parks asked the attorney another question, Burmila admonished her, saying "Don't fence with counsel, ma'am." 
 
 Constant legal arguments about the hearsay have slowed the trial. Jurors are frequently asked to leave the courtroom so attorneys can argue over the admissibility of hearsay statements. 
 
 If Peterson is convicted, defense attorneys have said they could appeal all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court on grounds the hearsay should have been barred. 
 
 There was some levity amid the otherwise weighty proceedings. 
 
 As the trial got under way in the morning, Burmila announced he had received a letter from an Illinois inmate who claims to have information about a link between Peterson and Abraham Lincoln's assassination. 
 
 The judge said the unnamed inmate asked him to follow up with him if he wants more details. 
 
 "I won't be communicating with him," Burmila said, prompting laughter in the courtroom. 
 
 ___ 
 
 Follow Michael Tarm at www.twitter.com/mtarm
– Former suburban Chicago cop Drew Peterson once choked his wife, and then asked her: "Why don't you just die?" a friend of his third wife, Kathleen Savio, testified yesterday. Peterson is on trial for allegedly killing Savio and trying to make it look like an accidental drowning in her bathtub. Peterson's fourth wife mysteriously vanished from their home after police opened an investigation into the death of Savio. Savio's pal, Kristen Anderson, also testified that Savio once described how Peterson boasted that he could kill Savio and "make it look like an accident." It was the second day that hearsay testimony from Peterson's late wife was allowed by the judge in the case, reports ABC. There's no physical evidence linking him to her murder. A police officer testified that Peterson's fourth wife, Stacy, was very distraught as they questioned her about Savio's death, and that Peterson "corrected" her answers as she spoke, reports AP.