Where Are Michael Peterson’s Kids Now? All About His Blended Family and What They've Said About The Staircase By Christopher Rudolph

Michael and Kathleen Peterson’s blended family became entangled in the troublesome death of their matriarch.

Kathleen’s startling passing in 2001 and Michael’s subsequent murder trial in 2003 have been retold in a French docuseries in 2004, and an HBO Max show in 2022, both called The Staircase.

Not only are Michael and Kathleen featured in the dramatized version of The Staircase, which is now streaming on Netflix, but so are their five children, three of whom they had from their respective first marriages and two whom they raised together.

While the case played out in the media and the court, their kids — Clayton, Todd, Caitlin, Margaret and Martha — were spoken of, and the family was inevitably consumed by what happened to their matriarch.

Now, years have passed since Michael was convicted of killing Kathleen, and eventually set free from prison in 2017.

So, where is Michael Peterson’s blended family now? Here’s what to know about the lives of Clayton, Todd, Caitlin, Margaret and Martha.

Michael welcomed two sons with his first wife

Michael married his first wife, Patricia Sue, in 1968, and they had two sons, Clayton and Todd.

After Michael and Patricia divorced, Clayton and Todd lived with Patricia for a period before joining Michael in Durham, N.C., where they were raised.

According to The News & Observer, Clayton now has a family of his own, who live in Baltimore as of 2022. Todd has mostly stayed out of the spotlight as well.

Clayton spent four years in federal prison for a pipe bomb

Michael isn’t the only Peterson family member who has had trouble with the law.

According to The Herald Sun, Clayton was arrested at age 19 after planting a pipe bomb in a Duke University building.

In April 1994, Clayton submerged the device in gasoline and placed it in a closet on the second floor. He later said in an interview that he “took steps to prevent” the explosive from going off while trying to steal equipment in order to make fake IDs.

Clayton was convicted of possessing a destructive device and served four years in federal prison. The outlet reported that after his release, he went on to attend North Carolina State University, where he was named a valedictorian for the 2002 class.

Kathleen had a daughter from a previous marriage

Before Michael, Kathleen was previously married to Fred Atwater. The couple welcomed their daughter Caitlin together.

Caitlin leads a private life these days, but according to The News & Observer, she married in 2012 and is now a mom who most recently lived in Virginia.

Michael and Patricia opened their home to daughters Margaret and Martha

While living in West Germany, Michael and Patricia became friends with another couple, George and Elizabeth Ratliff. After their sudden deaths, Michael and Patricia were named the guardians of the couple’s daughters, Margaret and Martha.

The family moved back to the U.S., and following Michael and Patricia’s divorce, Margaret and Martha decided to stay with Michael in Durham.

The sisters later moved out west. According to The News & Observer, Martha moved to Utah, and Margaret resided in California as of 2018.

The children were divided on their support during Michael’s trial

Initially, all of them stood by him, claiming he was innocent of murdering Kathleen.

But Caitlin changed her mind after reading the autopsy report of her mother’s body and later became an important witness for the prosecution during Michael’s murder trial.

“After the closing arguments, when all was said and done, I felt confident that I knew what happened. I knew what happened to my mom,” Caitlin told Indy Week in 2017.

She continued, “While there’s no true closure that can ever come for an event like this, for a loss this deep, I was ready to walk away and start moving forward with my life.”

Caitlin filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Michael in 2002

In October 2002, Caitlin filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Michael so he wouldn’t be able to profit from Kathleen’s death, according to WRAL. They agreed to a $25 million settlement in February 2007.

“With this settlement, I believe that Michael Peterson is agreeing to an offer great enough to begin to speak to the value of my mother’s life and the loss I must continue to deal with,” Caitlin said. “By entering into this agreement, I can only hope I’ll be able to put some of this behind me.”

After Michael was sentenced to life without the possibility of parole for Kathleen’s murder in October 2003, he served over a decade before a judge ordered a retrial in December 2011, per The News & Observer.

Michael submitted an Alford plea to voluntary manslaughter in February 2017, which meant he acknowledged that there was enough evidence to convict him, but didn’t confess to the crime. Shortly after, he was sentenced to time served and officially freed that same month.

Later that fall, in October 2017, Caitlin filed a second complaint against Michael, claiming that he hadn’t paid her anything, ABC11 reported. In a June 2022 interview with Variety, Michael mentioned that he intended any potential earnings to go to her.

“I don’t want any money. Any amount of money that I got would go to my stepdaughter — Caitlin,” he said.

Margaret worked on a documentary in response to The Staircase

Following The Staircase docuseries and show, Margaret produced a documentary, Subject, which premiered at the 2022 Tribeca Festival.

The project, which lists her as Margie Ratliff, sheds light on how Hollywood approaches documentary filmmaking, including the impact it can have on individuals after they appear on screen.

“I’d like to be stripped from The Staircase completely,” she later told Variety about working on her own retelling of the case.