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- [00:02]
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Hi, it's Katie. I'm excited to let you know that you can watch video episodes of Crime House Daily Night Watch on Spotify. It's the same gripping true crime stories you've been getting here now with added videos and photos that give you even more depth and detail into each case. Search Night Watch on Spotify and hit follow so you never miss an episode.
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This is Crime House.
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In tonight's episode, we're diving into a case that will hopefully result in crucial changes to the Colorado justice system. It involves a woman in the public eye and a man who would stop at no, nothing to be with her. Let's get into it.
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Kylie is a meteorologist for our affiliate station KDVR Fox31 in Denver, and for the last three years she has been stalked by a viewer who will not stop the moment that I saw him. When I realized that it was him walking me in my garage, the feeling in my gut, my stomach just dropped. What's wild is that this man has been stalking me for over three years now and he was let out of jail on a misdemeanor, not felony stalking like it was originally supposed to be.
- [01:32]
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Hi, I'm Katie Ring, a true crime analyst, self defense instructor, and fierce advocate for victims. And this is Crime House Daily, your essential true crime companion. Every weekday morning and night here at Crime House Daily, we dig into the true crime stories making headlines right now, where justice is unfolding, arrests are happening, and new evidence is emerging. Every morning, First Watch gets you up to speed on the biggest cases. Every night, Nightwatch takes you deeper. If you want to follow a case from the first 911 call to the final verdict, this is the place for you. Follow Crime House Daily Wherever you get your podcasts, leave a review and for ad free listening, subscribe to Crime House plus on Apple Podcasts. For video, check out our YouTube channel, Rimehouse Daily or or on Spotify. By searching Night Watch True crime Cases Daily in the Search tab, this episode discusses active criminal cases and breaking news. The information we share is based on what's publicly available at the time of recording and may change as new evidence comes to light. We aim to inform, not to decide, guilt or innocence, so everyone mentioned is presumed innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
- [02:52]
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- [03:20]
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One thing that made me hesitant about going into the true crime space was that I never wanted to have anyone feel like I was profiting off their pain. But after covering a few cases on social media, I quickly realized how much impact a single viral video can have in helping put pressure on public officials and getting justice for victims. And this applies to tonight's case more than ever because I am tired of our justice system not doing anything to protect victims of stalking until they are dead. So let's get into it. Kylie Burse is a Colorado meteorologist who has been dealing with a stalker for over three years and is currently fighting for justice in her case. But the Denver DA's office is failing her. Kylie has been a meteorologist for 15 years working in Idaho, Utah, Minnesota and is now at Fox31 in Denver as a meteorologist, Kylie wants to make her viewers feel welcome and like she's part of their morning routine, and she also enjoys engaging with fans on social media and giving them glimpses into her life. She's also an active blogger, writing about things that are not only personal to her but but important to a lot of people. She talks about everything from mental health to detailing her favorite hiking spots and restaurants and the importance of getting out there and being active. Kylie is passionate about helping people in general. Her mom has a career in healthcare and this has inspired Kylie to volunteer and participate in tons of different fundraising events, especially in support of sick children. Kylie fully embraces her life in the public eye, which lets her use her influence for good. Normally, she doesn't mind all of the attention that comes with this lifestyle. In her bio on the KD VR website, she even invites people to say hello if they ever see her out in Denver. Just looking at Kylie's social media, I can sense that she is one of those people who is as beautiful on the inside as she is on the outside. But unfortunately, being in the public eye can bring unwanted attention, especially when you're a woman on social media. Some of the messages I've gotten are absolutely unhinged, but one of Kylie's fans is starting to take things a little too far. Not only is he commenting on her social media, he attends a charity event she is at. As of this recording, this man's identity has remained anonymous and sources only refer to him as John Doe. So that's what we'll call him for the rest of this video. At the charity event. Kylie is unaware of who John Doe is, and they chat for a bit, but nothing about their conversation seems out of the ordinary to her. However, later on, Kylie realizes this wasn't her first and wouldn't be her last interaction with him. After the event, John Doe starts flooding her social media posts with increasingly concerning comments. It's not the first time she's dealt with someone she describes as overzealous, but it's enough for her to clock it in case it gets worse. For a while, things seem to calm down for a bit. But then, in the summer of 2023, John Doe dials his attention back up a notch. That August, Kylie is leading a hike for the Breckenridge Food and Wine Festival, and John Doe attends. At first, Kylie doesn't know he's there. He waits until Kylie is alone and then walks up to her and tries to give her a pair of hiking shoes as a gift. Kylie says it's a nice gesture, but that she cannot accept. He insists, and Kylie politely tries to end the conversation. But then he starts crying. He doesn't understand why she's rejecting his gift. Kylie has no idea what to do, and the situation's only about to get worse because he proceeds to say he thought they were in a relationship. Kylie is dumbfounded. He goes on to say they've been together for a year, but not only that they're married. Not only is the situation uncomfortable in general, but this Guy is almost 70 years old, and at the time, Kylie is 34. Before she can figure out a way to react, security notices what's going on and John Doe is escorted out of the event. But he's not leaving without a fight, and he repeatedly tries to get back in. Fortunately, he eventually leaves and Kylie makes it home safely. But she's left with that sinking feeling in her stomach that too many women unfortunately know too well. But this is even more insane. How could a total stranger think she's his wife? As her mind races, something occurs to her. Over the past year, Kylie has seen over a dozen TikTok accounts pretending to be her. She thinks that maybe one of these accounts pretending to be her catfished this man. And as someone who is older, it probably wouldn't be as easy to tell that this profile was just reposting her content and wasn't really her. And while it's a huge leap to believe you're married to someone you've never met before, Kylie is still sympathetic to him. So she reaches out and explains to him that she is not the person he's been talking to and tells him he's being scammed and that he should notify the police. By the end of their conversation, it seems like she got through to him and she can finally try and relax and put this whole thing behind her. But unfortunately, reality hits her hard when she logs in and it becomes clear that John Doe didn't get the message after all. He either can't or won't believe her. And now he's full on harassing her. Kylie's social media accounts, as well as her online news broadcasts are flooded with comments from him. He says he loves her and calls her his beautiful wife. Seeing no other option, Kylie blocks John Doe on social media. But then he makes a new account and continues harassing her. Each time she blocks him, he does the same thing over and over and over again. It's incessant and it's frightening. It's clear this guy will not leave her alone. Now it's not just creepy, it's scary and dangerous. Kylie decides she needs to take further action to protect herself. In September 2023, about a month after the charity event, Kylie files for a temporary restraining order against him, which the court grants her. Kylie hopes that this will finally get him to back off. But he's just getting started. In the fall of 2023, Kylie Burrs receives a temporary restraining order against John Doe, the man who has been stalking her online and claims to be her husband. But even with a legal order in place, John Doe's behavior continues. After Kylie reports the weather each morning, he emails her or comments on her social media, sharing his thoughts on how she looked that day. In one instance, he's commenting in real time and points out that the microphone cord is showing in the frame. When the production team also notices and fixes it, he comments about that too. But it's not just Kylie's work life that John Doe is closely tracking. He's also keeping tabs on her personal life. When she posts pictures of herself on vacation, he comments quote, can't wait to go there with you. Kylie's feeling increasingly alarmed. John Doe clearly has no respect for the legal boundaries she's put in place. But it's still only the beginning. One day, he manages to get a hold of her personal phone number and contacts her. She immediately blocks his number. But then John Doe contacts some of Kylie's friends and family members on social media and begins flooding them with comments as though they know each other. Within just a few months, John Doe violates the temporary restraining order 53 times. Kylie realizes that the Temporary order isn't going to stop him. So she goes back to the courts and In January of 2024, Kylie, Kylie is granted a more permanent order. This one legally prohibits John Doe from contacting her in any way or physically coming near her. There are a lot of things that piss me off about the laws around stalking, but one of the things is that for victims of stalking, you can't just show up to the court and immediately get a restraining order. You have to fill out forms detailing who this person is, their address, height, gender, eye color, and the onus is on the victim to prove the person is stalking them. On top of that, they are responsible for serving the papers to the stalker themselves or have to hire someone to do it on their behalf. And Kylie was having to take PTO days to make these court dates and go through this process. Personally, I think Fox should have handled that on her behalf. Luckily, after the second order is granted, things start to calm down. Six months go by and she hasn't heard from him. Then a year, then a year and a half. Kylie is starting to relax and thinks maybe John Doe is finally out of her life for good. But unfortunately, he's secretly doing the opposite. Almost all victims of stalking know that a hiatus doesn't mean that they are done stalking and that even many times, it's a way for the stalker to avoid the law for a bit and and lure their target into a false sense of security. It could also be a sign that they may have just gotten more sneaky for this very reason. Judges are told not to factor in disparate time frames when they're granting civil protection orders and instead assess each incident objectively. Unfortunately for Kylie, John Doe's sudden lapse is only going to complicate things down the line. Because all this time, John Doe has simply been waiting for the right time to make his next big move. And In September of 2025, he strikes. It's around 11am on the 11th and Kylie is driving home from work. As she pulls into her driveway, she suddenly notices a truck pulling in after her. She doesn't recognize the truck, but when she squints into the rear view mirror, she immediately recognizes the driver. It's him. He either followed her home or somehow learned her address and was waiting nearby. And now he won't take no for an answer. He starts rolling down his window to say something and then pulls up right behind her car, blocking her in. But luckily, Kylie's already closing the garage door. As she watches the garage door lower, she's terrified, thinking about how there's not much she can do if John Doe wants to become violent. Once the garage door is fully closed, she darts inside. But John Doe starts ringing the doorbell repeatedly. Kylie wants to get as far away from him as possible, so she grabs her dog, calls 911 and runs out the back door. When police get there, John Doe is still outside. Police arrest him and they tell Kylie they're bringing him in on felony stalking charges. But she soon finds out that they set a fifteen hundred dollar bail and he is released after a few days. When he was arrested and she thought he was going to be charged with a felony, she felt relief and a sense of safety. But that was all stripped away and she's left dumbfounded. It turns out that despite being arrested for felony stalking, his charges had been lowered to violating a protection order, which is just a misdemeanor. He's required to wear an ankle monitor while he awaits trial, but that won't necessarily stop him from violating his restraining order. Again. Kylie can't understand their decision. She thinks maybe there was a miscommunication and that they might not fully understand the scope of what's been going on. So she calls the DA's office herself. But as she tries to explain things, she feels like they're not taking her seriously. The prosecutor in her case tells her that because it had been 18 months since any prior incidents, John Doe's behavior doesn't constitute multiple instances of harassment. She looks at the law herself and sees that there's no specified timeline. And so she asks them what the minimum amount of time between incidents has to be. But they don't have an answer and end up saying it's just a, quote, judgment call. Kylie responds, your judgment call is putting my life in danger. If you're not familiar with our justice system, there is something called prosecutorial discretion. It is the authority of an attorney, or in this case, the da, to decide whether to prosecute a case and how to pursue it. This discretion is exercised at various stages, including the decision to charge, negotiating a plea deal or pursuing alternative outcomes, and involves factors like the strength of evidence, the seriousness of the crime, public interest, and the defendant's circumstances. This means that according to the way the law is written, they could charge him with a felony. They are just using their discretion to not charge him. Now she's fed up. And I personally believe we should all be up in arms about the complete disregard for women's safety. And if you're in Denver, this is an elected position, which means if you don't agree with his discretion, you can vote him out. It also means that if you make enough noise, there's a chance you can pressure them into changing their decision. Kylie is done waiting around for justice to be served. Her first move is to take measures to protect herself. With John Doe back on the streets, she moves out of her house so he hopefully can't find her again. But she refuses to simply hide. Instead, she goes public with her story. As a member of the media herself, Kylie turns to news outlets to try and bring attention to her case. She hopes that if she can get the full details of her story out there, then she'll be taken more seriously and so will others who go through the same thing, and that hopefully public pressure can change their decision. In her interviews, she says that law enforcement has been dismissive and that it's too easy for those in charge to wave off these situations as the victim being overly dramatic. Let's hear her talk about it in her own words.
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I did everything right, assuming that the system was in place and the law there to protect me and to put this man in jail for a period of time. And so it was really disappointing and disheartening. When it doesn't work, he is wearing an ankle monitor, so he is not allowed to come within a certain distance of where I am and, of course, my work and whatnot. But even then, you get a heads up of a couple of minutes. The police can't get there in time. If this person wanted to be violent, they could do so within that period of time.
- [18:08]
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And it's not just hating to win awareness that Kylie's after. She wants to change the system. After Kylie Burse realizes she's not going to get the protection she deserves in the current justice system, she starts advocating for prosecutors to go harder on stalkers. For starters, stalking is already a hard crime to prosecute because so much depends on the individual discretion. Most stalking cases involve people who already know each other or who were in a romantic relationship, so it can be hard to prove whether someone crossed a line. And when it comes to someone stalking a public figure, especially over the Internet, it's even harder since there's less precedent for those situations. The law simply doesn't account for obsessed fans. And when it comes to the precedents that are in place, many still feel like they're not enough, including a similar case out of Colorado with a lot of parallels to Kylie's. From 2014 to 2016, a man named Billy Counterman stalked a woman identified as cw. CW was a local singer, and Billy sent her Hundreds of Facebook messages over the years. If she blocked him, he'd simply make a new account. In some messages, Billy pretended the two were in a relationship. He'd even ask about errands he should run, as if they lived together. But others were scarier. Billy would tell CW he was watching her while she was out in public. And soon, when his affections weren't returned, he began making death threats. CW Felt so unsafe, she canceled gigs and stopped seeing her friends. Eventually, she was unable to sleep after CW filed charges and the case went to trial. Billy's defense argued that in order for his messages to be considered a crime, he would have had to have been aware that he was causing distress. But since he didn't actually know cw, he. They said there was no way he could have known that. The issue sparked a lot of debate, and eventually the case went all the way to the supreme court. And on June 27th of 2023, their ruling partially agreed with Billy's lawyers. Now, prosecutors not only have the burden of proving that the victims are being threatened, but they have to prove the stalker understands the impact of their behavior. Which could mean that public figures will have to post on social media about harassment and how it affects them. Or they'll have to contact their stalkers in some way to tell them they're upset. Which puts the victim in even more danger, because stalkers take any kind of contact as further proof of a relationship. This even includes blocking them on social media. Any engagement, even bad engagement, can encourage a stalker. But Kylie had no choice. She repeatedly told John Doe that his advances were not welcome, and now she's using her public platform to make her feelings on the matter abundantly clear. But as of this recording, none of this has led to John Doe being charged with felony stalking charges. Which is especially frustrating for Kylie, because not only is she following the law's guidance, but she's confident that the DA's reasons for not pursuing the case are wrong. Remember, she says they told her that the recent incident doesn't count as felony stalking because it happened over 18 months after the last one. But Kylie claims she's consulted with multiple lawyers, including other DAs in Colorado, and they've all told her that there is no timeline when it comes to stalking charges, meaning it doesn't matter how far apart these incidents were in her case. So Kylie believes that John Doe could be charged with felony stalking if the Denver DA wanted to. As of this recording, John Doe's charges remain at the misdemeanor level, and the next plea hearing is scheduled for tomorrow. The Denver District Attorney's office doesn't comment on open cases, but hopefully Kylie will at least start to get some answers, like how John Doe learned where she lived. We'll be keeping a close eye on this case and make sure to bring you all of the major updates as I roll in. What did you think of tonight's case? Drop your thoughts and theories in the comments. See you next time. If you haven't already, subscribe to our YouTube channel Rimehouse Daily and follow us on social media Rimehouse24.7 for for real time updates because the pursuit of justice never stops.
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It'S okay not to be perfect with finances Experian is your big financial friend and here to help. Did you know you can get matched with credit cards on the app? Some cards are labeled no Ding Decline, which means if you're not approved you they won't hurt your credit scores. Download the Experian app for free today. Applying for no Ding Decline cards won't hurt your credit scores. If you aren't initially approved. Initial approval will result in a hard inquiry which may impact your credit scores.
- [23:37]
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Experian Looking for your next crime House? Listen, don't miss Crimes of with Sabrina Deanna Roga and Corinne Vien. Crimes of is a weekly series that explores a new theme each season from Crimes of the Paranormal, unsolved murders, mysterious disappearances and more. Their first season is Crimes of Infamy, the true stories behind Hollywood's most iconic horror villains. And coming up next is Crimes of the Paranormal, real life cases where the line between the living and the dead gets seriously blurry. Listen to Crimes of every Tuesday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music or wherever you listen to your podcasts this holiday.
- [24:23]
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