Laci Peterson’s dad and stepdad both died in 2018
Credit: Courtesy of Netflix; Modesto Police Department/ZUMAPRESS.com/Alamy; David Paul Morris/Getty
NEED TO KNOW
- Sharon and Dennis Rocha are the parents of Laci Peterson, who was found murdered in April 2003
- Laci’s husband, Scott Peterson, was found guilty of killing his wife and their unborn baby in 2004
- Dennis died in 2018, while Sharon has continued to speak about her daughter’s case
It’s been more than two decades since Laci Peterson’s parents, Dennis and Sharon Rocha, learned that their daughter and her unborn baby had been murdered.
At eight months pregnant, Laci disappeared on Christmas Eve 2002. She and her unborn son, Conner, were later found in the San Francisco Bay in April 2003. Laci’s husband, Scott Peterson, was arrested that same month, and in November 2004, he was convicted of first-degree murder of Laci and second-degree murder of Conner.
Sharon testified during Scott’s trial and, years later, joined her son, Brent Rocha, and Dennis’ daughter from a previous relationship, Amy Rocha, at Scott’s resentencing in December 2021, when his sentence was reduced from death to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
“You betrayed her, your son and everyone else,” Sharon told Scott directly as she faced him during the hearing. “You ended two beautiful souls.”
In 2024, Scott’s case was taken up by the Los Angeles Innocence Project. His latest petition to overturn his conviction — documented in the 2026 docuseries Scott Peterson: The New Evidence — was denied in April. Responding to his claims of new evidence, Sharon said, “There is no new evidence.”
Here’s everything to know about where Laci Peterson’s parents are now.
Sharon and Dennis welcomed Laci in 1975 and divorced two years later
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Laci was born to her parents, Sharon and Dennis Rocha, on May 4, 1975, as the younger of two children. Her older brother, Brent, was born in 1971. Dennis was also a father to Amy Rocha, whom he welcomed in a separate relationship.
Sharon and Dennis had met in high school and owned a dairy farm together in Escalon, Calif. When Laci was a baby, her parents split and Sharon moved with Laci and Brent to Modesto, Calif., but the children still regularly visited their father.
“I always knew she was going to be a good, happy baby,” Sharon told The Modesto Bee in December 2002. “Within a few days, she was sleeping through the night. When I would go get her out of her crib, she would always wake up with a smile on her face. All her life, she has been a happy person.”
Sharon met her longtime partner, Ron Grantski, when Laci was 2 years old. While Laci maintained a close relationship with her father, Grantski also stepped into a paternal role and was by Sharon’s side during the 2004 trial.
He died in 2018 and was buried next to Laci and Conner, per The Modesto Bee.
Sharon’s first impression of Scott was wary
Laci first introduced Sharon to Scott soon after she began dating him in 1994 while she was a student at California Polytechnic State University. Sharon recalled to The Modesto Bee a phone call in which Laci told Sharon she was convinced she’d found the man she’d marry before they even went on a date.
When Sharon drove down to meet them at the restaurant where they met, she was surprised to be greeted by a bouquet of roses — a dozen red for Laci and a dozen white for Sharon — placed there by Scott. However, as she shared in the Netflix docuseries American Murder: Laci Peterson, she was soon wary.
“Laci was telling me all these things about Scott,” Sharon said. “And I remember saying, as her mother, ‘I hope he’s not filling her with crap.’ ”
Since then, Sharon said she’s “learned to go with my gut feeling.”
Laci’s parents helped with the search after she disappeared
Credit: Netflix
On Dec. 23, 2002, Sharon spoke to her daughter for the last time. The following day, Laci disappeared. What followed was a manhunt that lasted several months until Laci and Conner’s bodies were found in April 2003.
Four weeks after Laci’s disappearance, Dennis told The Modesto Bee that he was living “every parent’s nightmare” and was purposely staying out of the media’s attention because he “shows [his] emotions” and was worried he would say something that would affect the case. He also threw suspicion on Scott, sharing that he believed his daughter’s husband to be lying since he was caught having an affair.
“He was questioned early on, and he said ‘no,’ ” Dennis told the outlet, referring to Scott’s original denial that he had an affair. “Then it came out he had one. It showed he lied.”
Shortly after Laci and Conner’s bodies were found, Scott was arrested.
Sharon testified during Scott’s trial, sharing that when she heard the news of Laci’s disappearance, she ran to East La Loma Park in Modesto, where Laci and Scott lived, desperately trying to look for her daughter and screaming her name, per The Modesto Bee.
She said she saw Scott about “20-30 feet” away, but when she called his name, Sharon recalled that Scott never acknowledged her. Later, while at Laci and Scott’s house, Sharon said she observed Scott standing alone in the driveway.
“I was walking up to give him a hug,” Sharon said. “I felt all upset. His family wasn’t here, and I wanted to console him myself, but I was never able to do that. He kept kind of angling away from me.”
On Nov. 12, 2004, Scott was sentenced to death after being convicted of both murders.
Sharon said it was “very hard” to suspect Scott at first
Credit: Robert Gauthier/Los Angeles Times/Getty
In 2017, Sharon sat down for a two-hour ABC special, Truth and Lies: The Murder of Laci Peterson, where she shared that it was “very hard” to believe Scott could murder her daughter after having a close relationship with him during his marriage to Laci.
“I mean, it’s not like this is a total stranger that you might be suspecting,” she said. “This is somebody that’s been a member of your family for several years now, and it’s really, you know, the back and forth and the guilt about feeling this way, and how it may have an effect on the relationship with my daughter if I’m wrong.”
Sharon continued, “That’s the last person you want to think had anything to do with the disappearance of your daughter — her husband. The person that was a member of your family, somebody that you loved and cared about, and thought he felt the same way about your daughter. And knowing how she felt about him.”
Dennis died in 2018
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In 2018, both Laci’s father, Dennis, and stepfather, Grantski, died. Dennis was on good terms with Sharon and Grantski, even praising the latter at his funeral service in April 2018.
“Laci loved her dad, and now they will be together again,” Sharon told The Modesto Bee days after Dennis’ death on Dec. 9, 2018, at 72 years old.
While Dennis was more private during Scott’s trial, he attended when he was able and cried when the graphic photos of Laci and Conner’s remains were shown to the jury.
“He was a very kind and loving-type person,” Brent said of his father. “He was always very affectionate and loving toward us.”
Sharon accused Scott of betraying Laci at his resentencing
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In 2021, Scott’s sentence was changed from death row to life in prison without parole. Laci’s family confronted Scott in court again at his hearing, not sparing any words as they looked him in the eye and told him how they felt nearly 20 years after Laci’s disappearance.
“Nineteen years, and there’s not a day that goes by that I don’t think about my sister,” Laci’s sister Amy said. Brent added, “There are no words able to express the pain associated with not being able to experience life together.”
Sharon recalled the last time she saw her daughter when Laci allegedly told her that Scott had no interest in feeling Laci’s pregnant belly when their baby kicked.
“All the while we were there that evening, you were already planning her murder,” Sharon said to Scott. “That evening was the last time I saw my daughter alive.”
“Two things will never change,” she told Scott. “Laci and Conner will always be dead, and you will always be their murderer.”
Laci’s family felt “relief” after Scott was denied a new trial
Credit: Jeff Chiu/AP
Shortly after his resentencing, Scott’s lawyers pursued a new trial for the convicted murderer, alleging that a juror in the case lied about denying being a victim of a crime before. However, in December 2022, a judge ruled that the juror’s misstatements were honest mistakes and denied Scott the trial.
A source in close contact with Laci’s family told PEOPLE that the ruling was a “tremendous relief.”
“This is the best news we could’ve gotten,” they said. “It really felt like next year was going to be very difficult, reliving the whole thing yet again. Now that’s not going to happen.”
Sharon made an appearance in a Netflix docuseries about Laci’s murder
Credit: Richard Koci Hernandez-Pool/Getty
Sharon sat down with Netflix for the docuseries American Murder: Laci Peterson. Ahead of the show’s release, Sharon spoke with PEOPLE about her continued assuredness of Scott’s guilt.
“He is guilty, and that’s it. Bottom line,” she said. “Something I’ve never said publicly was how Scott — who would never take a polygraph test — never actually denied killing Laci to me. The one statement he said to me was, ‘I didn’t hurt Laci.’ When he was convicted, it was a relief. It wasn’t joyful or a celebration. He was going to prison as he should be.”
When the docuseries was released in August 2024, director Skye Borgman told Forbes that she didn’t think Sharon wanted to participate at first.
“She’d like to remember Laci the way she remembers Laci, and it’s hard to revisit this case,” Borgman said. “It’s hard to sit in front of a camera and talk about it 20 years later. The fact that Sharon was able to do it and wanted to do it and wanted to share Laci with the world in her perspective, in her own words, was brave and wonderful.”
In 2026, she denied Scott’s claims of new evidence
Scott later filed another petition for a writ of habeas corpus, but it was denied in April 2026. Responding his claims of new evidence — documented in the July 2026 docuseries Scott Peterson: The New Evidence — Sharon said, “There is no new evidence.”
“We constantly hear that they have new evidence,” she told PEOPLE in August 2024. “Twelve people found him guilty of murder, but he doesn’t admit to that.”
Sharon declined to comment on the judge’s ruling and the docuseries.
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