Tom Sandoval Likens Himself to Scott Peterson in New ‘Vanderpump Rules’

Remember when Tom Sandoval compared himself to George Floyd on the record to the New York Times in February? In the event you don’t, allow me to remind you: “I’m not a pop-culture historian really,” the Vanderpump Rules star said when asked about #Scandoval aka the affair that shook the Bravoverse, “but I witnessed the O.J. Simpson thing and George Floyd and all these big things, which is really weird to compare this to that, I think, but do you think in a weird way it’s a little bit the same?”

Well, if you thought that was the only time this man would clumsily grasp for cultural touchstones to compare himself and the deserved karma he’s now receiving, you’re sadly mistaken!

On this week’s episode of Vanderpump Rules, the man without whom #Scandoval might’ve never been typed bemoaned being “cut off” from his former paramour, Rachel “Raquel” Leviss, following her stint in a mental health facility where she no doubt learned that the man she had an affair with is…not a great guy.

“Rachel cutting off from me. That pain, it comes in waves,” Sandoval said on the show. “Me journaling, not drinking was like me trying to connect with her in a way because I knew she was journaling and she wasn’t able to drink.” The sacrifice!

“I lost pretty much all of my friends and now I’m losing Rachel, it’s a lot for me emotionally,” he went on. “There’s part of me that thought when she gets out [from the mental health facility] maybe we can both be in a healthy place to see each other again and connect but I’m figuring out like that’ll never happen and it really, really fucking breaks my heart.”

Since Leviss left the facility in July 2023, she started a podcast, did not return to the show, and recently, filed a revenge porn lawsuit against both Sandoval and his former partner and co-star, Ariana Madix. In the suit, Sandoval and Madix are accused of revenge porn, eavesdropping, and invasion of privacy. The first charge refers to the way Madix discovered Leviss and Sandoval’s affair: an explicit video of Leviss that was saved to Sandoval’s phone. Leviss claims the video was recorded “illegally” without her knowledge or consent during a FaceTime call, only to be seen by Madix and presumably circulated among some of her then-colleagues. Sandoval, nor Madix have publicly commented on the suit.

Of course, longtime Sandoval-apologist, Tom Schwartz, tried to offer some support to his friend in the episode—and throughout this entire season. “Tom, if it’s any consolation, I feel this in my heart and soul, I’m telling you, dude, you are at the tail end of this,” he ham-handedly assured.

“No, that’s not even remotely accurate. I’m being treated like I’m fucking Scott Peterson and it will fucking linger with me, like fucking Scott Peterson,” Sandoval shot back, likening himself to a man convicted for killing his pregnant wife in 2002.

“You’re not Scott Peterson, didn’t he murder his wife?” Schwartz prompted only for Sandoval to answer: “Allegedly.”

A man convicted of killing his wife, a man who was famously not convicted for killing his wife, and a man killed by police…who will Sandoval equate himself to next?!

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