Laci Remembered

Seven years ago there were a lot of preparations surrounding December 24.  Preparing for Christmas, the baking, shopping, wrapping, and decorating as well as preparing for birth.  Christmas, the birth of Jesus, a celebration, and the birth of another, a first son was just around the corner.  It was a busy time of last minute scheduling, gifts to be picked up and delivered, as well as tending to personal needs of the season.

Being 8 months pregnant is exhausting and topped with all of the other things to do, Laci Peterson still managed to attend a Christmas party, dressed in red silk and a dimpled smile, she went alone, her husband away on a business trip.  She didn't know that would be one of the last pictures taken of that smile, and yet, it's that smile that captured the hearts of millions. 

Laci was last seen on December 23 while attending to the last minute appointments and errands surrounding the coming festivities planned with her family and friends.  The world stopped for her that day and we were all breathless, waiting on news that she had been found.  Her husband made calls to her family searching for an answer to where she could be.  It was December 24, Christmas Eve, dinners planned and Laci had prepared a recipe for French Toast for their breakfast.

Massive searches of the area disrupted the carefully planned holiday for several families in the Modesto, California area.  Horses, dogs and people combed the park where her husband said she had gone to walk the dog.  The dog returned home, Laci did not.

Days, weeks and months went by, and no sign of Laci.  Her family looked distraught on television interviews, her mother, Sharon, frantic with worry, and yet, Laci's face held that famous smile with a twinkle in her eye looking like she would return at any time and start chattering about where she had been.  A massive awareness campaign was being carried out, flyers posted, media coverage and we waited for any word of what happened to Laci and her unborn son, Connor.

All the while her husband was being looked at in a different light.  He seemed to be avoiding contact with the press, avoided being seen with tears, avoided begging for help in finding his wife.  It seemed like unusual behavior, but, there are no set patterns on how to act when your wife is missing.  At the candlelight vigil it's reported he was in almost a jovial mood, making calls on his cellphone and caught by the camera with a smirk on his face.  His behavior in light of his wife and unborn son being missing was disarming.  Many started to wonder.


As the months wore on to the Easter season, Laci and Connor washed  ashore near the Berkeley Marina, a place it was proven that her husband had been that very Christmas Eve, fishing.  The media coverage was extensive when her husband was finally arrested and brought to trial, convicted and sentenced to death.

As we are in the same week of preparation for the Christmas holiday, the celebration of the birth of Jesus, there is another high profile case of a missing mother with a big bright smile in the news.  Susan Powell, the mother of 2 toddlers, disappeared sometime in the night of December 7.  Her husband, Josh, unexpectedly bundled up the two children and took them camping on a freezing cold night after midnight.  When he returned the next day, Susan was gone, leaving behind her cell phone and purse.

A husband's strange behavior is being revisited each day on the media reports. Josh Powell, at this time, is the only "person of interest" until such time as he can be eliminated.  Time will tell. 

As you gather with your family this Christmas, hold your children tighter and remember those little ones who are spending Christmas without their mothers, and the big ones, too.


Remember the brown eyed girl, Laci Peterson, whose dimpled, smiling face we will never forget.

Justice Coming For Mary Jane Zich?

Mary Jane was wife #5 in the lineup for 6 time married, Thomas Zich. In 1991 little Desiree Anaverde was only 3 years old, witnessing something that she will soon be called on to testify about.

Mary Jane and Tom Zich met while she was a waitress in a small restaurant and he was a customer. They married and Mary Jane's life changed dramatically. Family members say Tom was quite jealous and abusive to Mary Jane soon after they were married. They say that she was isolated from them, that even though Mary Jane was very family oriented, there was no contact with them on a regular basis.

November 29, 1991 was the last time that Mary Jane Zich was seen alive. She and her daughter, Desiree, had just returned to their Toledo, Ohio home after visiting her parents for Thanksgiving. While on her visit, Mary Jane discussed the violence in her marriage to Tom Zich and told her parents that she was planning on divorcing him. According to reports to police given by Tom at the time, she received a phone call, left the house and didn't return, leaving 3 year old Desiree behind.

Apparently when Mary Jane returned home on November 28 from her family visit, she announced to Tom that, although they had been married less than a year, she wanted a divorce. No one knows what happened next or how Tom took the news, but on December 7, 1991 Tom reported her missing.

On December 18, 1991, Toledo police got a tip, found Mary Jane's car, opened the trunk to find her body, frozen. Tom Zich said "he didn't do it" and time marched on, Tom married wife #6, and little Desiree grew up.

In 2005, 14 years after Mary Jane's frozen body was found, cold case investigators took another look at the case, reinterviewing several witnesses, including Tom, who still denies having anything to do with Mary Jane's frozen body. Finally, in 2007, Tom Zich was indicted for the murder of his then wife, Mary Jane Zich.

Desiree Anaverde is now Desiree Pena, married and a mother herself, who grew up with a secret that is only now coming to light. Desiree will testify in her mother's murder trial that she witnessed Tom Zich murder her and put her body into the trunk of her car. I'm sure there will be a lot of legal wrangling on the testimony of a then 3 year old, however, I'm sure that Desiree will rest easier knowing that she will be a part of bringing justice to the memory of her mother.

"[The years after her death] were very difficult. It was very hard," she said. "You have the rest of your family; but to not have the one person you depend on, it's just really hard."

Three of Tom's former wives were also granted their turn to testify. It seems that Tom had a history of attacking the throat when he got angry. Mary Jane Zich's cause of death was found to be strangled with a ligature. So it seems that 4 out 6 wives have had Tom Zich's hands around their throats, and one of them is no longer alive.

So many red flags were waving around Thomas Zich as a choice for a husband, why did these women not see them? This type of controlling, manipulative, chameleon-like man is recently coming to the forefront, although they have been around since the beginning of time. Drew Peterson, the poster boy for Narcissists, is still able to get attention from behind bars!

Maybe with attention and education on the issues of domestic violence and spousal murder from advocates like Susan Murphy Milano, we could see less of these cases. In her new book "Time's Up" she will give you step by step directions on how to safely leave an abusive home and not wind up strangled, frozen and found in a trunk.

Dateline NBC, a weekly television newsmagazine, will be taping the trial of Tom Zich for a future episode of the program, which usually airs on Friday nights.



UPDATE: JUNE 18,2009

A JURY FOUND TOM ZICH GUILTY OF THE MURDER OF MARY JANE ZICH

Where Have All The Children Gone?

Where have all the flowers gone

Long time passing

Where have all the flowers gone

Long time ago

Where have all the flowers gone

Young girls have picked them, every one

Oh, when will they ever learn

Oh, when will they ever learn

Although there are motherless children all over this world, my question is what happens in a child's life who has lost it's mother to violence? Whether she has gone missing, never to return, or was murdered, sometimes right in front of that child or left for that child to find. What kind of defense mechanisms or coping skills do these children find to get along in life?

I'm finding that there are millions of children who are now adults, who have survived the horror that tore their mother away from them, and yet, somehow have been able to make it to adulthood. Where are they? Do they look like me? Would I know them if I saw them? They are everywhere, hiding behind the mask they put on to show the world that they don't want to be thought of as "different".

Many say that they go through the remainder of their childhood without hope. Hope being an uplifting emotion for humans, it's an important part of daily life, a way to reach for something in good faith. Without hope there is too much room in a person's psyche for despair, depression and darkness.

Adult survivors lives take many different paths, some lose everything, their potential to succeed is greatly diminished, while others take a different, stronger track, showing the world one face, but keeping another facing inward constantly keeping busy to avoid the pain and heartache.

I'm sure there are studies done somewhere, in language I probably wouldn't understand, giving explanations and psychological resources for this population of our society. However, it doesn't explain to these child survivors why this had to happen in the first place. No one can answer the basic question, "Why me, God"?

So as we read the newspapers and hear the reports of a mother who has gone missing, or a mother who has been violently murdered, ask yourself, "what will happen to the children."

While at the time the "crime" is making news and the attention is focused there, the children have to find a way to go on, find a way to cope with this tragedy and make a way in this world and grow into adulthood. They are often forgotten in the flurry of the crime, lost in the shuffle, sent into a world who forgot who they are and who they will become.

This will be the subject of Susan Murphy Milano's BlogTalk Radio show this Wednesday at 4PM EST. Join Susan and her guest, as adult survivors of violent childhoods, and hear what happened to them as they grew to adulthood.

We will discuss the topic of children whose fathers have killed their mothers. It is an a subject rarely discussed in the media. As the lives of the children who witness violence and terror in their homes if they survive, live the remainder of their days on earth often in darkness and without hope. Joining me on today's show Pam Munson discussing her survival after her mother's murder.