Brent Rocha, left, and Dennis Rocha at Dec. 31 vigil.
BART AH YOU/THE BEE
Posted on 01/22/2003 5:20:35 AM PST by runningbear
Brent Rocha, left, and Dennis Rocha at Dec. 31 vigil.
BART AH YOU/THE BEE
Dennis Rocha gets emotional at a news conference Dec. 27.
Dennis Rocha, left, breaks down at Dec. 27 news conference. Also pictured are Sharon and Amy Rocha.
AL GOLUB/THE BEE
A tough time to be a father
January 22, 2003 Posted: 05:05:13 AM PST
By PATRICK GIBLIN
BEE STAFF WRITER
Dennis Rocha says he knows he is living "every parent's nightmare."
His daughter, Laci Peterson of Modesto, is missing. Peterson, 27 and eight months pregnant, disappeared Christmas Eve, more than four weeks ago.
"You don't want to be in my shoes," Rocha said Tuesday at his Escalon ranch. It is the base for his tractor, dump truck and water truck service.
He talked easily about his daughter, describing her "bubbly personality," open and loving to everyone. He spoke with difficulty about her husband, Scott.
The Rocha side of the family believes that 30-year-old Scott Peterson was having an affair and lied to police about it, according to what the family said it learned from Modesto police detectives last Wednesday.
The family also claims to have learned from police that Peterson last summer took out a $250,000 life insurance policy on his wife.
In a brief interview Friday with San Francisco-Oakland TV station KTVU, Peterson called The Bee's report on the affair and life insurance "a bunch of lies." Police have neither confirmed nor denied the information.
Rocha said the family remains convinced: "He was questioned early on, and he said 'no.' Then it came out he had one (affair). It showed he lied."
Laci Peterson's mother and stepfather, Sharon Rocha and Ron Grantski, and brother and sister, Brent and Amy Rocha, were unavailable for comment Tuesday, kept from the media by family spokeswoman Kim Petersen.
"All media requests must come through me first," said Petersen, executive director of the Modesto-based Carole Sund-Carrington Memorial Reward Foundation. "And I'm not granting media requests at the moment."
Strangers helping Rocha survive
The case has attracted intense national interest. Rocha said good wishes from people around the country are helping him survive.
"It's like therapy," he said. "I hear from strangers who say they are thinking of Laci and the family. I feel like I have hundreds of new brothers and sisters, and it's comforting."
(Excerpt) Read more at modestobee.com ...
Sure is a lot of questions and no answers, the LE are keeping things wrapped up tight, hopefully that's a good thing, so no evidence gets ruined in the process.
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