Lenny (The Real Ashley)

[Lorie Taylor]

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[Lorie Taylor]

UPDATED: Peterson amused by former friend’s online
impersonation

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By Danya HookerLenny Wawczak sits at the computer where he posed as Ashley, a 29-year-old Web site designer from southern Illinois who flirted with Drew Peterson online. Photos

By Danya Hooker, [e-mail]
GateHouse News Service
Fri Jul 25, 2008, 02:40 AM CDT

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Bolingbrook, IL -
Drew Peterson said Thursday he was impressed by former friend Len Wawczak’s online impersonation of a woman for two months and called the stunt “comical.”

Earlier Thursday, Wawczak admitted he had posed as a woman named Ashley and began an online romance with Peterson in order to gather information on the former Bolingbrook police sergeant suspected in the Oct. 28 disappearance of his wife, Stacy.

“I was very taken,” Peterson said. “I’ve been playing practical jokes for most of my life and for someone to get me like that, I’m impressed.”

The revelation came just one day after news broke that Wawczak and his wife, Paula Stark, at the alleged behest of state police, had been secretly recording their conversations with Peterson for nearly seven months.

“My idea was to show people that he really is what they think he is,” Wawczak said of the online affair. “He’s a liar.”

The idea for the online spoof came when Peterson showed Wawczak chats he was having with other women online. Wawczak said he memorized Peterson’s username, went home to set up his own account and began creating his alter ego, Ashley, a 29-year-old Web designer from southern Illinois.

Ashley’s last name, Gabrys, was really the name of someone he used to know. He picked Granite City as Ashley’s hometown because he knows someone who lives there who could provide local information if needed.

“I had everything covered,” Wawczak said.

Within days, Peterson started opening up to Ashley. The chats, which Wawczak has posted clips of on a blog he created, show Peterson expressing his love for Ashley, asking to meet her and making several racy comments.

“One day I went over to his house and he said ‘Hey, look at this, look at this chick I’m talking to.’ And he pulls out the picture of Ashley,” Wawczak said. “I found it hard to keep a straight face then.”

The online romance ended in May when Ashley told Peterson that she had driven by his house and saw him sitting with another woman on his porch. Wawczak said he had heard that Peterson was with this woman and that he decided to make Ashley seem jealous.

Wawczak said police have seen the chats and that he published them online after receiving approval from state police. He said they also asked permission to go public about the wiretapping operation, which ended in June.

Illinois State Police Sgt. Tom Burek declined to comment Wednesday.

Peterson would have found out about it shortly anyway, Wawczak said, because authorities are required to notify the subject of such investigations after the recording ceased. Although the notification would not identify Wawczak and Stark, he said they were the only ones around Peterson enough to make the operation useful.

“It wouldn’t take him very long to figure out that it was us,” Wawczak said.

But the couple was also motivated to come forward because of decreasing media coverage of the investigations into Stacy Peterson’s disappearance and the March 2004 murder of Kathleen Savio, Drew Peterson’s third wife.

“Obviously it did what I wanted it to do, which was it got it back out in the news,” Wawczak said. “It got Stacy back out there, it really did in a big way, and Kathleen, too.”

Drew Peterson is the sole suspect in his wife’s disappearance, which police are calling a “potential homicide.” The case also prompted police to reopen the case of Savio’s drowning, which was originally ruled an accident. Authorities exhumed Savio’s body in March and two pathologists, one at the request of Savio’s family and one on behalf of the state, performed separate autopsies. Each recently ruled the death a homicide. Police have not named a suspect in the death.

Peterson has maintained his innocence and has not been charged with a crime in either case.

Peterson and his attorney Joel Brodsky said the couple are simply looking to profit off Peterson’s notoriety. Peterson lambasted the couple for befriending his children and then ceasing contact with them.

“It’s a shame these people warmed up to my kids and now my kids are missing them,” Peterson said. “They used my kids to get to me. But, when people smell money, there’s no parameters of who your victims are going to be.”

Wawczak said he and his wife have not profited from the publicity and that the hardest part about going public about the undercover operation was losing contact with Peterson’s children.

“They’re great kids. Tom and Kris (Peterson’s sons) probably aren’t too fond of me right now,” Wawczak said. “Hopefully, somewhere down the road they’ll see my point, they’ll see why I did it

[Lorie Taylor]

Ex-Friend: I Posed As Woman To Snag Drew Peterson
Len Wawczak Says He Was 'Ashley' In A Mock Online Romance With Drew Peterson
Reporting
Mike Puccinelli
BOLINGBROOK, Ill. (CBS) ¯


Len Wawczak shows CBS 2's Mike Puccinelli how he posed as a love interest with Drew Peterson.



Len Wawczak did more than just talk with his former friend Drew Peterson using a wire. CBS 2's Mike Puccinelli talked with Wawczak overnight about Peterson professing his love online to what he thought was another woman.

When Wawczak wasn't wearing a wire to tape his former friend Drew Peterson for the police, he was often on his computer setting a different kind of trap. It involved lust and a made-up girl named Ashley.

Peterson was boasting last winter and spring about having a secret admirer named "Ashley." In late January, Peterson said he had been talking to the mysterious "Ashley." At the time, "Ashley" was reluctant to go public with her reasons for reaching out to Peterson.

For the first time we're learning who is the real Ashley. It is Len Wawczak.

"He became real fond of Ashley, and Ashley would be me," he said. "I am the real Ashley. I'm the one who did the blog. I'm the one who romanced Drew. I'm the one that typed to him in that pink font, and I'm the one that said that he said he wanted to take a bite out of my cute little a**. It was me."

Wawczak says as "Ashley," he and Peterson had an online relationship for more than two months.

"I started talking to him in March," Wawczak said. "I don't know, according to Drew, in his own words, he fell in love with me within the first day."

When Drew Peterson went on CNN's "Larry King Live" in April, Wawczak says he told Ashley he would show his love for her on the air.

"He said every time he pulled on his ear, that meant he loved me," Wawczak said. "He tugged on his ear three different instances."

Wawczak said Peterson cried crocodile tears on "Larry King."

"Drew was trying to make it seem like poor little Lacy is without her mom and everything, and he tried to choke up some tears, and at the same time he was pulling on his ear," Wawczak said. "It was all just staged, is what I'm saying."

During the interview, Wawczak logged on as the real Ashley and printed out instant messages he says were exchanged between Peterson and "Ashley," whose instant messaging screen name was "real ashley" and who claimed to be 29.

Peterson: "Get my message?"
Ashley: "Um no... what message?
Peterson: "My Larry King message."
Ashley: "You made me smile so big."
Peterson: "That was my intention."
Then Ashley seeks to clarify: "We're talking about you pulling on your earlobe to say you love me correct?"
Peterson: "Yep."

Wawczak says he and his wife decided to cooperate with police because they became suspicious of their former friend about two weeks after Stacy disappeared. He said going undercover was difficult, and at times, he and his wife would leave the Peterson home only to find the car covered in spit.

Wawczak had maintained blog entitled "Justice Soon for Kathleen and Stacy," and in the most recent entry, said he was "Ashley." He signed the post, " "Happy Birthday Joel - Love Ashley/Lenny - Hugs & Kisses :-)," referring to Peterson's attorney, Joel Brodsky.

The blog shows numerous screen shots of instant message sessions between "real ashley" and purportedly Peterson, some of which have sexually suggestive content. The blog also shows a shirtless photograph of Peterson, and several profiles from adult dating Web sites which are suggested in the blog to be Peterson's.

There were also a screen shot of an e-mail in which Peterson purportedly claimed to be going on the Oprah Winfrey Show and hoped to propose to "Ashley" on the air.

Peterson's attorney says his client did correspond with "Ashley." He says some of what is on the blog is true, but a lot more is fabricated

[Lorie Taylor]

Paula with Drew not even 2 mos after Stacy went missing! Looks like he really worried about where his missing wife is doesn't he?