PETERSON: DUO 'TAKING ADVANTAGE' OF 'ANGUISH'

MEDIA FOLLOWS A BOLINGBROOK COUPLE WHO SAY THEY WORE A WIRE TO HELP POLICE COLLECT EVIDENCE AGAINST DREW PETERSON.

BOLINGBROOK -- Paula Stark stood on a neighbor's stoop Wednesday and smoked a cigarette as she watched photographers and reporters staking out her home down the street. She and her husband were the next big thing, and she was feeling overwhelmed.

"I'm exhausted," Stark said.

Her cell phone rang repeatedly with calls from television news producers. By late afternoon, she had not found time to eat anything since the Tuesday morning. Her husband, Len Wawczak, was elsewhere, possibly fishing with a friend, to avoid the media throng outside their home.

The couple was under siege, and all because they went public about wearing a wire to set up their former friend, ex-cop Drew Peterson, whose fourth wife has been missing since October and whose third wife was the victim of a March 2004 homicide that remains unsolved.

Stark and Wawczak claim they wore a wire around Peterson for nearly seven months, ending their undercover operation in mid-June. Friends of Peterson for about 16 years, the couple said he mocked investigators as "idiots"; called third wife Savio a slur and said he should have had her cremated; and predicted he'd be tried and acquitted long before fourth wife Stacy's remains were found.

As far as Peterson is concerned, Stark and Wawczak are just bitter because he refused to lend them a large sum of money about a month ago. It was the last time he saw the husband and wife, who regularly watched his youngest two children in the wake of Stacy's disappearance.

Stark and Wawczak are just looking to cash in on his misery and were sniffing around for money long before this, Peterson said .

For example, Peterson said, after he returned from New York for an appearance on the "Today" show, he autographed a baseball cap for the couple. Stark's mother put it up for sale on eBay with a starting price of $10,000.

"And on top of that, I caught Paula in my bedroom taking pictures," Peterson said. "So I have more friends taking advantage of my anguish."

And before all this, Peterson was free with his money, he said, even lending Stark $400 on one occasion.

"She did that behind Lenny's back," Peterson said.

Stark denied borrowing money and said she and her husband always had to foot the bill when she took Peterson's children on outings. Her mother did put the cap on eBay, Stark said, but the plan was to donate the money to the volunteer search effort to find Stacy. They never got the chance, as the Web site shut down the auction.

Inside the home of her neighbor, Paula holed up in the basement and watched Peterson's attorney Joel Brodsky on television. Brodsky essentially called the couple liars who are looking to make a buck. Stark and her neighbor were not that interested in what Brodsky had to say and later changed the channel from the news to the situation-comedy "Home Improvement."

For all the attention, Stark said she and her husband weren't making any money.

"They'll fly me out there (to New York) for interviews," she said. "But that's it."

In a statement released by Peterson's publicist, Brodsky said Stark and Wawczak broke the law if their claims about wearing a wire are true.

Brodsky said that "today's news would include their arrest for obstruction of justice. The police would never allow the disclosure of any such information in an ongoing investigation."

Stark said she spoke to state police Wednesday morning, and they laughed at what Brodsky and his client had to say.

Peterson also called Wawczak's character into question, saying his old friend often ran afoul of the law.

"I used to arrest Lenny on a regular basis for drunk and disorderly" behavior, he said of Wawczak, who has been arrested over the years by Bolingbrook police.

Stark wasn't surprised by Peterson's comments, recalling how he has smeared others.

"It's the same with everyone who goes against him," she said. "They're all losing their house, they all need money."