HBO Max 'The Staircase': Where is Michael Peterson now?
The crime genre is rising to glory with new, real and mind-bending stories strategically being adapted into movies. These real-life depictions make us visualize how the actual crime might have taken place. True to its genre, there comes another such gory story of Michael Peterson's life made into a show called 'The Staircase'.
'The Staircase' is a true-crime docu-series that traverses through the life of Michael Peterson, his sprawling North Carolina family, and the not-so-suspicious death of his wife. Kathleen Peterson was found in the Peterson’s Durham, North Carolina mansion at the bottom of the staircase on December 9, 2001. What follows after is nothing but a series of drastic revelations that will leave you truly spellbound.
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'The Staircase': 5 things you need to know about the HBO miniseries
Who is Michael Peterson?
Born on October 23, 1943, Michael Peterson is the son of Eugene Iver Peterson and Eleanor Peterson. He graduated from Duke University with a bachelor's degree and then went on to pursue law at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Once graduated Michael Peterson took a civilian job with the U.S. Department of Defense and got married to Patricia Sue the same year. They had two beautiful children, Clayton and Todd.
Michael and Patricia divorced in 1987 and the two children continued to live with their mother. Later, Peterson went on to marry Kathleen Atwater in 1997 and Kathleen's daughter Caitlin joined the extended family. Michael was a famous US novelist who wrote three novels based "around his experiences during the Vietnamese conflict".
What is 'The Staircase' all about?
The crime series is based on a true crime story that went unsolved for a long time. Peterson's family was nothing less than a picture-perfect dream, but that all changed in a moment after an anxious call was made to the police claiming Kathleen 'had fallen off the stairs'. The show then takes you through various angles that will make you want to second guess the decision of zeroing in on if the death of Kathleen was an accident or a premeditated homicide.
While the defense stood strong in trying to prove Michael innocent, the prosecutors were just as sure that Michael had bludgeoned his wife to death. The story gets a little more complicated when the autopsy of Kathleen reveals that Kathleen died from multiple injuries, including blows to the back of her head with a blunt object. Now, who do you think will the jury support?
Where is Michael Peterson now?
The final verdict was not in favor of Micahel as the prosecutors were able to prove that he was guilty of the murder of his wife Kathleen. He served 8 years in prison until he was given a new trial when the judge ruled that one of the key witnesses had given a misleading testimony. This made Michael offer a guilty plea in the year 2017. When he pled guilty, he was sentenced to the time he had already served in prison and so was allowed to walk a free man. So far, post his release, the novelist has written two books carrying his experiences and tribulation, his time in prison, and also about the trial.
Trailer
'The Staircase' will premiere on HBO Max on Thursday, May 5, in the United States and other countries where the streaming service is available.