peterson was going to take what's referred to as an alford plea. >> an alford plea is when you don'tu acknowledge there is enough evidence there that a jury could convict you. in the books, it goes down as a guilty plea. >>> in february of 2017, 73-year-old michael peterson ri arrived at the durham county courthouse for what would be the final saga of this. kathleen's daughter kaitlyn came to durham to see it happen, and of course kathleen's sister candace was there. she ran into michael's chief defender outside the courthouse. >> oh, david, good to see you today. pleading guilty, pleading guilty. thank you, that's what i always wanted. >> actually, we're not pleading guilty. >> you're pleading guilty. >> michael peterson would like to walk around and proclaim his innocence, but he can't. he can play with these words, but he can't play with the facts. >> the courtroom was eerily reminiscent of the 2003 trial, packed with tv cameras. >> everybody's a little bit older, but there's so much that's the same. the emotion, the tension, the anger, all of it was still there. >> how does mr. p