Drew Peterson Trial: Defense Attacks Character of Kathleen Savio

(CHICAGO) -- Drew Peterson's lawyer told the jury in his murder trial on Tuesday that the woman he is accused of killing was bossy, lied, had a furious temper and went to therapy.

Lawyer Joel Brodsky, Peterson's lead defense attorney, attacked the character of Kathleen Savio, Peterson's third wife, in his opening statement. Brodsky's opening argument was interrupted by objections from prosecutors, just as the prosecutor's opening statement was marked by objections from Brodsky.

The contentious start to the trial foreshadows what is expected to be a battle over the prosecutor's key evidence: comments that Savio made to others before she died in 2004, and comments that Peterson's fourth wife Stacy Peterson made to people. Stacy Peterson has been missing since 2007.

Brodsky told the jury that Savio was on antidepressants and had been known to fly into jealous rages during the time that she and Peterson were divorcing in 2004. He described her as bossy and a liar, and said she would yell so loudly that other police officers where Peterson was a sergeant could her hear over the phone.

Savio was found dead in her bathtub one Monday morning in February that year, and her death was ruled an accidental fall by state police, Brodsky said. It had nothing to do with Peterson.

The defense's portrait of Peterson was in stark contrast to that presented by prosecutors just hours earlier, as they argued to the jury that Peterson stood to gain financially from Savio's death, and had the police knowledge to stage the crime scene to make it look like an accident. Peterson was a police sergeant in Bolingbrook, Ill., at the time of Savio's death.

Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio