Newport Beach police began investigating after Peter Chadwick failed to pick up his children after school and both Chadwick and his wife Q.C. disappeared from their home on October 10, 2012.
Inside the family’s upscale home, authorities said they found a broken vase, drops of blood on the floor and Q.C.’s cellphone and wedding ring.
The next day, Peter Chadwick told authorities that a handyman had killed his wife and kidnapped him and fled with her body.


In chilling audio from the 911 call, Chadwick said in a calm voice that the handyman named Juan had drowned his wife and then forced him to drive overnight.
He told the dispatcher that he thought Juan was driving to Mexico and planned to cut up his wife’s body.
Chadwick quickly became the suspect after detectives who interviewed him doubted his story and noticed scratches on his neck and dried blood on his hands.
Chadwick was arrested on October 11 and was charged when his wife’s body was found a week later in a San Diego dumpster.

He was released on $1 million bail and at first attended court appearances.
When he vanished from his father’s California home in 2015, police said he had drawn large sums of cash and researched how to change one’s identity.
Last year, the U.S. Marshals added Chadwick to the most wanted fugitive list and a $100,000 reward was announced for tips leading to his capture.
Newport Beach police wrote and produced a six-episode ‘true crime’ podcast about the case in the hopes of intensifying the search.

Peter Chadwick quickly became the suspect in the death of his wife when detectives who interviewed him doubted his story of a handy man being responsible for the death, and noticed scratches on his neck and dried blood on his hands

Craig McCluskey, supervisory inspector with the U.S. Marshals Service, said authorities narrowed Peter Chadwick’s whereabouts to Mexico late last year.
When Chadwick first arrived in Mexico in 2015, he initially stayed at luxury resorts in various towns.
Eventually, those high-end resorts began requiring identification that he couldn’t provide. He got around that hurdle by turning to more modest accommodations at motels and hostels.
Most recently, Chadwick had been staying at a residential duplex near Puebla, just outside of Mexico City.
After he was taken into custody, Chadwick told authorities he had learned Spanish while on the run, McCluskey said.
‘He studied how to be a fugitive,’ McCluskey said.
‘What makes him so difficult to find is the fact that he fled with a decent amount of money… Approximately a million dollars,’ US Marshal Craig McCluskey told CBS 48 Hours in May.
‘We had no idea this was going to be the logistical monster that it has.’
Chadwick was born in the United Kingdom but is a naturalized U.S. citizen, and authorities said both his U.S. and U.K. passports were seized when he was released on bail.
However he found means to withdraw millions of dollars out of bank accounts and take out cash advances on credit cards.
A fugitive task force later discovered that Chadwick had been studying material about living off the grid and changing your identity.

‘Peter could be anywhere in the world,’ Police Chief Jon T. Lewis said last year when announcing the $100,000 reward and details of the podcast.
‘He’s got the financial means to avoid the restrictions placed on his travel.
‘He’s taken every opportunity to hide his tracks. We want to spread his picture and the story of his crimes far and wide.’
Authorities said that because of Chadwick’s wealth and his extensive international ties, they believe he may have fled the country.
He is expected to appear in court in Santa Ana on Wednesday. Orange County prosecutors are asking that he be held without bail.
He had been facing a maximum sentence of life in prison with parole, had he been convicted.