(MCT) — After more than a month of behind-the-scenes struggles and public skirmishes among members of Drew Peterson's defense team, longtime lead attorney Joel Brodsky withdrew from the case Tuesday after Peterson threatened to fire him, sources said.

Brodsky asked a Will County judge to withdraw after Peterson told Brodsky at a meeting just before Tuesday's court hearing that Brodsky could either leave or be forced out, sources said. Peterson, a former Bolingbrook police sergeant, was convicted last month of drowning his third wife, Kathleen Savio, in her bathtub in 2004.