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- [00:00]
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- [01:15]
Mike Ferguson
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- [01:45]
Mike Morford
is a true crime podcast that may contain discussion about violent or disturbing topics. Listener discretion is advised.
- [02:22]
Mike Ferguson
Hello everyone and welcome to episode 408 of the Criminology Podcast.
- [02:26]
Mike Morford
I'm Mike Ferguson and this is Mike Morford.
- [02:29]
Mike Ferguson
Morph, what's going on this week, buddy?
- [02:31]
Mike Morford
Not a whole lot. What's new with you?
- [02:33]
Mike Ferguson
It's like 42 degrees here today and I'm not happy about it because.
- [02:37]
Mike Morford
42?
- [02:38]
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, we're almost May, dude, and it's 42 degrees.
- [02:42]
Mike Morford
It's like 82 here.
- [02:44]
Mike Ferguson
I figured it was. I figured it was. Let's go ahead and get into our Patreon shout outs. We had new support from Michelle Chappell and Tiffany Ann White. So great, great new support. We really appreciate it.
- [02:57]
Mike Morford
Thank you so much, Michelle and Tiffany and thank you to everyone else that's helped support the show. It helps us out a lot. If you want to get started you can go over to patreon.com criminology so,
- [03:07]
Mike Ferguson
speaking of 42 degree weather morph, you know, we just wanted to remind everybody that Crimecon is coming up in less than 30 days. And if you're one of those people that puts things off until the last second, don't wait. Book your trip now. CrimeCon Vegas is happening at Caesar's Palace Las Vegas from May 29th through the 31st. And if you want to save a few bucks booking it, use our promo code, Criminology, when you check out@crimecon.com that'll save you 10% off your standard badges.
- [03:39]
Mike Morford
And just another reminder, too, that we'll be on Creators Row. And spoiler alert, we'll be alongside some hosts to some of the biggest podcasts in true crime universe. So that'll be fun. And we'll also want to see listeners stop by, hang out with us at our annual Criminology TCAT meetup. And that's happening on Saturday the 30th at 8pm in the Vista Cocktail Lounge right on premises. So please stop by, hang out. Should be a lot of fun.
- [04:04]
Mike Ferguson
All right, so now that we have all of that out of the way, let's get into this week's case. You know, we recently covered the abduction of Nancy Guthrie, and shockingly to most people, after two months of her being missing, there's still no sign of her. And we're no closer to understanding why she was targeted. But one of the main theories is that it's because of who she's related to. One of Nancy's daughters is Savannah Guthrie, a co anchor of NBC's Today Show. So this got us thinking about celebrities who have been targeted over the years. And. And there have been more than a few we aren't talking about targeted for a burglary due to their lavish lifestyles or Hollywood homes, but targeted for harm by dangerous people simply because they had a face seen on television and movies. Their attackers were drawn to them. And after this episode, you'll probably understand just why it is that most celebrities are very conscious and wary of their safety and security.
- [05:13]
Mike Morford
There are a few different subtypes of people who stalk. I think the most common type that comes to mind is a rejected lover, someone who just refuses to believe that it's over and can't let go of the relationship. They still try to be in a person's life well past their welcome. Maybe the person they target might have to block them on social media or change your phone number or in more serious cases, even file for an order of protection if the person's behavior is erratic or threatening enough. This type of stalker brings to mind the whole if I can't have you, no one can kind of thing. In those cases, there usually is a connection between the stalker and the person being stalked. But there's another kind of stalker who fixates on people they have never met. And celebrities often find themselves the target of this kind of stalker.
- [05:59]
Mike Ferguson
You know, morph that whole idea, and we've heard it from many people. If I can't have you, no one can. That is so scary to me. But it is at the root, or at least a big part of, you know, a lot of the cases that we've talked about over the years. Now I don't understand a lot of the stuff that we get into. Right. It's. It's really hard to get into a person's mind who can make the decision to kill someone. But this type, I think for me is, is some of the more perplexing ones where you seemingly love someone so much that you make the decision to kill them. That. That's strange.
- [06:49]
Mike Morford
Yeah. So the whole scenario of if I can't have you, no one will. That's a common thing that we hear a lot about in some of these cases.
- [06:59]
Mike Ferguson
But that's not what we're talking about in this episode. Right. We're talking about people who really don't know the individual who they're targeting. And that's scary in a different way. And I think it's easy, especially with today's social media, for people, people to latch on to different celebrities and learn pretty much everything about their lives and backgrounds. I mean, heck, you can do some of that just by reading their Wikipedia pages and following them on Instagram. As Kendall Jenner, who has been the victim of stalkers in the past, explained to Entertainment Tonight, being in the public eye is pretty crazy just because people actually feel like they know you. Unfortunately, some of these starstruck, obsessed and so called fans have been able to harm the object of their desire. And one of the most infamous cases of that was the case of actress Rebecca Schaeffer. She wouldn't survive her encounter with her Stalker in 1967.
- [08:04]
Mike Morford
Rebecca Schaefer was born in Oregon with big dreams. When she was 16, she spent a summer in New York City working as a model and decided to pursue it more seriously. She stayed in the city and studied at the professional Children's school in Manhattan. She was just a bit too short for the professional modeling world, but during this time, she began to book Acting jobs. She had a small role on Guiding Light and went on to spend six months on One Life to Live. She briefly moved to Japan to try and find modeling jobs there, but ran into the same problems. She just didn't have the right look that towns that agents were looking for. She ended up back in New York working as a waitress and auditioning for acting roles. Her career started to pick up in 1986. After high school, she ended up moving to Los Angeles, California to work on the show My Sister Sam. It was her first real big break and she'd be working alongside actress Pam Dawber, who had starred in the hit show Mork and Mindy. Things were looking up for Rebecca, but it was also the same year that she caught the eye of a man named Robert John Bardo. He was around 16 years old the first time he saw Rebecca on My Sister Sam.
- [09:11]
Mike Ferguson
Bardo had been looking for an outlet with his obsession since the last actress he had been fixated with died tragically in a plane crash. It's not clear how long he had been obsessed with child actress and peace activist Samantha Smith, but she died in 1985 when she was just 13 years old. Bardo reportedly tried to meet her in person at least once, traveling all the way to Maine. But he was pulled over for a traffic infraction and it threw his whole plan off. He left without ever meeting her. He would have kept trying if her plane hadn't crashed. With Samantha Smith gone, he turned his attention to Rebecca Schaefer. He started out by writing her multiple letters. We know that she answered at least one, sending him a headshot along with a short note. She likely answered most fan mail when she had the chance, especially since it was so early in her career and it was probably really exciting for her.
- [10:13]
Mike Morford
In 1987, Bardo traveled from his home in Tucson, Arizona to Burbank, California to visit the Warner Brothers studio where My Sister Sam was filmed, hoping to be able to meet Rebecca and give her a bouquet of flowers and an oversized stuffed teddy bear. This was likely not his first time there because security were already somewhat familiar with him. They definitely knew that he had been trying to call there a lot by phone. The head of security at the studio had Bardo sent to his office and explained to him that he wouldn't be able to get to Rebecca and that they don't deliver gifts like that. A security guard even drove Bardo back to where he was staying in Hollywood. Since it was such a long drive. Bardo was taking the bus and he had been so Polite to the security team. The last thing Bardo said to the guard was that he was going back to Tucson.
- [11:00]
Mike Ferguson
Bardo seemed harmless at the time, maybe just more of an overzealous fan than a stalker. In fact, the guard didn't even report it, even though there was a policy to log and report all encounters like this for the safety of the actors. But just a month later, Barto tried to get on the lot again, but security stopped him. Only this time, he had a knife. Being turned away had angered him. And this time around, unlike the previous time, he did cause a scene. He threatened the security staff. Luckily, once again, he and Rebecca never crossed paths because he was thrown off the property. But more importantly, no one ever told Rebecca about the man who kept showing up at her place of work trying to find her. In hindsight, she definitely should have been made aware of what was happening. Angry and dejected, Barto gave up on Rebecca for a while. He was briefly interested in Madonna, Tiffany and Debbie Gibson, all very popular pop artists at the time. But none of them really grabbed his attention like Rebecca Schaer did. Plus, he didn't really feel like he would be able to get close to any of them in New York. Rebecca lived on the west coast and was much closer to his home in Tucson. And more if I. I think we're starting to get a. A real picture here of Bardo, and it's a scary one. You know, the thing that really jumps out at me about him is that he does kind of at times jump from celebrity to celebrity as far as his fascination slash obsession. Right. We talked about him being obsessed with, you know, this child actress Samantha Smith. Then he turns his attention direct to Rebecca Schaefer. But in there is also, you know, some of the bigger pop stars of the time. Now, obviously, Madonna has been a star for a very long time, but it's hard to dismiss how big Tiffany and Debbie Gibson were back then. You know, you think about the mall scene, which is not a thing today, but it was back then. I mean, some of these pop stars would go to the mall and people would just swarm them. They would actually perform at malls and stuff. It was. It was kind of strange.
- [13:36]
Mike Morford
Have you been to any Tiffany concerts?
- [13:38]
Mike Ferguson
I have not. I have not. I never. I never did. I was not a Tiffany slash Debbie Gibson fan, but I don't think I was really in their demographic.
- [13:52]
Mike Morford
Yeah, I think they were a little bit out of the heavy metal genre that I was listening to. But, you know, on one hand, with this guy being interested in multiple celebrities, I. I can understand that. I have a big autograph collection that I've accumulated over the years, writing to different actors and musicians and stuff, and just cool to have a keepsake. But where he crosses the line is he's going to these places multiple times to try and meet these people, and then the second time he's bringing a knife. So there's some signs there that he might not have the best intentions there.
- [14:32]
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, well, I don't think it's unusual for people to. To get enamored with celebrities that. I mean, that's kind of the. The whole thing about celebrities. Right, but you mentioned it. There are things that people do that are, quote, unquote, normal. Right. Writing, asking for an autograph, things like that. And then there's definitely crossing the line. And here with this latest incident, we know he crossed the line. I mean, he's got a knife. You're not bringing a knife and threatening security unless you've got, you know, some bad intentions.
- [15:11]
Mike Morford
And one part I'm surprised about is that they never warned Rebecca that this guy had been there multiple times and that he showed up with a knife because maybe she would have taken some
- [15:22]
Mike Ferguson
precautions if she knew that well, and we'll talk about it, you know, probably more towards the end, but I think the case of Rebecca Schaefer changed a lot of things as it relates to celebrities and their safety. I don't think there's any doubt about it. There's a difference about how things were handled before, what we're going to talk about and how things were handled after.
- [15:54]
Mike Morford
In 1989, after the third, and what would prove to be the final season of My Sister Sam, Rebecca earned a role in the movie Scenes from the Class Struggle in Beverly Hills. In this movie, her character, Zandra Lipkin, appears in bed with a man. Barto watched the movie, excited to see Rebecca on the big screen, but he was absolutely furious after seeing her character in bed with another man. He felt she had betrayed him, and he decided it was time to teach Rebecca a lesson. And thanks to other stalkers like Arthur Richard Jackson, he knew exactly how he would accomplish his goal.
- [16:28]
Mike Ferguson
Arthur Richard Jackson was obsessed with actress Teresa Saldana for years before he paid a detective agency to track her down. The private detective there was only able to get as far as a private number for Teresa's mother. Sadly, Jackson was able to trick Teresa's mom into giving up her home address. He claimed he was an assistant to Martin Scorsese, who was considering her for a role, but she would be replacing an actress and filming was already taking place in Europe, so it was urgent that he spoke with her. Jackson showed up outside of Teresa's apartment in West Hollywood and waited for her. Once he saw her, even though it was in broad daylight and there were plenty of people nearby, he stabbed her 10 times. Luckily, she survived the attack, though it was a long and hard recovery process. She spent four months in the hospital due to a punctured lung, which we'll talk more about Teresa and how she helped change laws to protect future victims later on.
- [17:38]
Mike Morford
The attack on Teresa Saldana made headlines, lots of them. Robert John Bardo, while not fixated on Teresa, had read articles about how Jackson hired a private investigator and how he ultimately did get the information he was looking for. So Bardo hired a private investigator of his own to track down Rebecca Schaefer. He had been unable to get to her at her work twice, and my sister Sam had been canceled, so it was of no use trying to the Warner bros. Studio a third time. He paid the private investigator $250 and in exchange received Rebecca's Los Angeles home address. The PI used records from the Department of Motor Vehicles to find otherwise private information. Because Bardo was too young to purchase a gun in the state of Arizona, his older brother helped him obtain a firearm, a Ruger GP100,357 caliber revolver, thinking that his brother wanted to do some target practice. Then at 7pm on July 17, 1989, the Greyhound bus Bardo boarded headed from Tucson to Los Angeles. He was going to see Rebecca one last time and Morph.
- [18:43]
Mike Ferguson
I don't know if you remember this show, my sister Sam, but I do. Again, it only ran for, what do we say, three years, but I definitely remember it. I was a huge Mork and Mindy fan back in the day. So, you know, Pam Dawber was a known commodity, a known actress. And I remember Rebecca Schaefer very well. I probably would have been maybe 14, 15 years old at the time. And I remember kind of having a crush on her. Now, of course, this was back at the time where you really only had, you know, a handful of channels. There wasn't as much to watch. And so a lot of us watched, you know, one of the, the big three networks a lot more than people do today, for sure.
- [19:38]
Mike Morford
Yeah, I was a big Mork and Mindy fan too, and I knew Pam Dawber, but I didn't really know Rebecca Schaefer. So she was a. A fresh face. And maybe since Rebecca Schaefer was sort of new to the scene of Acting and being on tv. Maybe that's why Bardo was drawn to her.
- [19:56]
Mike Ferguson
When Bardo arrived in Rebecca's West Hollywood neighborhood, he spent some time walking around. He asked around, trying to figure out whether the information he received from the private investigator was accurate. He likely blended in with other sites here around la, walking around the area with a headshot of Rebecca and asking people if they had seen her in the area. Once he felt sure that he had the right address, 120 North Suitzer Avenue, Apartment 4, he walked right up and rang the building's doorbell. Rebecca answered it because she had been expecting a courier to deliver an important script. She also had to answer it because the building's intercom system was broken at the time. She would usually be able to figure out who was outside from the safety of her own unit, but not this particular day. And she couldn't risk missing that very important package. Rebecca was planning to meet director Francis Ford Coppola later that day to audition for the role of Mary Corleone in the Godfather Part 3. So when Bardo showed up at her doorstep with a manila envelope, she eagerly opened the door. But inside the envelope, there was no script, just a photograph of her, which she had autographed and the letter she had sent back to him.
- [21:23]
Mike Morford
Rebecca was taken aback when she realized that a fan had been able to find her private home address. And though she was dating director Brad Silberling at the time, she was living on her own. It wouldn't just be annoying to have to be always on because a fan could pop by any time. It was a little creepy. And as we know, because we're discussing Rebecca on this episode, it's dangerous. Rebecca, obviously upset by the intrusion, asked Barto not to contact her that way in the future. So he left. He walked to a nearby dinner and sat there and ate a meal. He thought about their interaction and how she wasn't grateful he showed up. As he ate, he probably thought about how angry it made him to see her in bed with another man in that movie. At home, Rebecca was getting ready for her big meeting that afternoon. Sadly, she would never make it there because Bardo decided to head back to her place once he was done at the diner.
- [22:13]
Mike Ferguson
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- [22:32]
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- [23:18]
Mike Ferguson
911 what's your emergency? We just walked in the door and there's blood. She's in the foyer.
- [23:22]
Advertiser
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- [23:41]
Mike Ferguson
At around 10:15am Rebecca answered the door for him again. According to LA Times. Rebecca, surprised to see Bardo there again, said, you came to my door again and hurry up, I don't have much time. Which Bardo thought was a very callous thing to say to a fan. He was angry and this was the last straw for him, and in response to this perceived slight, he pulled out the Ruger.357 caliber revolver that his brother helped him by and he shot Rebecca in the chest from just inches away. According to Bardo, Rebecca began screaming, why? Why? As she collapsed. Bardo fled the scene and ultimately got on a Greyhound bus back to Arizona. One witness, who was a neighbor who lived across the street from Rebecca, was interviewed on Entertainment Tonight and said, I heard a shot that followed by two cries, cries of pain. The neighbor ran back home to grab towels to try to stop the bleeding. Rebecca was immediately taken to Cedars Sinai Medical center, but it was already too late. After 30 minutes in the emergency room, she was officially pronounced deceased. The bullet had struck her right in the heart, causing irreparable damage. The cold and senseless murder of the 21 year old actress was shocking to everyone who knew her. Her agent, Jonathan Howard, later told the LA Times that she didn't have an enemy in the world. So obviously more. If this is a tragic scene that unfolded that we're talking about, there's a couple of things that really jump out at me. The first is that, you know, Rebecca spent three years on this television show. I mean, it was a, you know, fairly big show. Shows were just bigger back then because there wasn't, like I said, as much or as many options. But yet she's living in this apartment with seemingly very little security. And the fact that the intercom wasn't working makes it even less secure. And then you have the actual shooting itself. I mean, a.357 from inches away. I mean,357 is a no joke caliber. It's not the biggest, but it's a sizable caliber. And shooting someone in the heart from just inches away is almost certain death. And, and obviously it was in this situation.
- [26:29]
Mike Morford
Yeah, 357 is a very serious weapon. Maybe she could have survived if she shot in the shoulder or something, but unfortunately it was the heart. But I want to go back to the security aspects you mentioned because as an actress, you know, you could kind of have in your mind that maybe she's going to have some kind of security team, some kind of things in place to protect her from fans that might not have the best intentions. And I, I wonder if maybe part of that is because she wasn't an A list actors yet. Maybe she didn't have the, the income to allow her to have better security, maybe live in a more secure place. Maybe that would have been coming up in her future as her career progressed. That could have something to do with it as well as back then. It just doesn't seem like stalking was as big a thing that we hear about now because it's all over the place. You can hear about it with all the news apps, things at your fingertip on your phone back then. You probably didn't hear about it as frequently. So she probably wasn't as concerned as an actress might be today.
- [27:38]
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, I think all of those are valid points.
- [27:42]
Mike Morford
Police were tasked with trying to find the man who had murdered Rebecca Schaeffer in her doorway. When Bardo fled from the scene and to the bus station, he tossed a copy of the Catcher in the Rye onto the roof of the Beverly Palms Rehabilitation center on Beverly Boulevard at the corner of Crescent Heights and Beverly Boulevards. He threw a long sleeve yellow T shirt onto the roof of Target Cleaners and Stroud's Linen. Investigators also recovered a holster from a rooftop about a block away from the location of the book he threw the copy of, the Catcher in the Rye may have been a nod to Mark David Chapman. He was the obsessed fan who killed John Lennon while carrying a copy of the same book. It could have also been a nod to John Hinckley Jr. Who tried to murder President Ronald Reagan. He had a copy of the book as well.
- [28:28]
Mike Ferguson
And you know this book, Catcher in the Rye, it used to be required reading. I know it was when I was in high school. I don't know if it is anymore. But it is strange how many killers, and even some serial killers, some well known serial killers, were in possession of this book, Catcher in the Rye. Bardo made it back to the Tucson area, but he didn't make it all the way to his home. He may not have been captured immediately if he had played it cool and simply walked away from the bus stop. Instead, he started running through traffic on Interstate 10, which made people call the police. According to Entertainment Tonight, he was apparently also screaming at passing drivers that he had killed Rebecca Schaefer. He would later explain that he was trying to take his own life by getting hit by a car. Interestingly, it was actually authorities in Tennessee who were first looking at Bardo as a suspect in Rebecca Schaeffer's murder, thanks to a letter he mailed to his sister in Knoxville before heading to LA to carry out his deadly plan. Tucson police took Robert John Bardo into custody without incident, and it was quickly pieced together that he had murdered the young actress. Investigators never recovered the gun he used to kill Rebecca.
- [29:57]
Mike Morford
Bardo chose to have a bench trial rather than face a jury and allow them to decide his fate. According to Entertainment Tonight, Bardo tried to blame the song exit by U2, which includes the lyrics the pistol weighed heavy heart beating for causing him to murder Rebecca. It was so central to his defense that the song was actually played during his trial. He rocked in his chair, played air drums and seemed to really enjoy the whole thing. On October 29, 1991, Bardo was found guilty of first degree aggravated murder. He was sentenced to life in prison with no possibility of parole.
- [30:33]
Mike Ferguson
And you know, one thing that we haven't talked about yet, and I don't know that there's a ton of information out there on it, but I think you have to ask the question more. What was Barto's mental health during all of this? I mean, obviously there's the fixation on Rebecca Schaeffer. There's the thought in his mind that she, for the lack of a better term, cheated on him in a. In A movie scene. And then after the murder, this scene plays out where he's running across the interstate, according to him, trying to. To get hit by a car, but also yelling out that he killed Rebecca Schaefer. It's kind of hard not to think that he was not experiencing some type of mental health issues. Now, I don't know what the extent was, but he's also trying to blame the murder on a song by U2.
- [31:41]
Mike Morford
Yeah, that aspect of the case is somewhat familiar because I remember that parallel sort of how in the 80s, there were cases in which heavy metal music was played in courtrooms because the person that was accused or on trial was influenced supposedly by them. And there was a whole pushback on things that could be played in heavy metal music. So that part of it was something
- [32:11]
Mike Ferguson
that was going on, but probably not too hard for a judge to weigh the evidence and find him guilty. And I think his sentence was justified. Life in prison with no possibility of parole. I mean, this is the type of individual to me that should not be, you know, walking around ever again.
- [32:39]
Mike Morford
Ed was clearly premeditated. He took a bus to get there. He had a plan. He had tried to contact her multiple times. So it's. This clearly wasn't a case of something that happened in the. In a split second decision that he
- [32:54]
Mike Ferguson
made In July of 2007, nearly 18 years to the day that he killed Rebecca Robert. John Bardo was stabbed 11 times by a fellow inmate. At the time, he was being housed in the maximum security unit of Mule Creek state prison in California. He was in the prison yard heading to breakfast when he was attacked. Authorities found two handmade ships at the scene after the incident. Articles note that the inmate who attacked him was serving a sentence of 82 years to life on a charge of second degree murder. But his name isn't listed in any articles. Bardo was able to survive the attack, and now, at 56 years old, is still serving his life sentence behind bars. He's currently housed at Avenal state prison in Avenal, California. And it's kind of hard morph to believe that, you know, this guy's only 56 years old. And I say only because he's around our age. I mean, this happened so long ago. But he wasn't a that old when he took the life of Rebecca Schaefer.
- [34:07]
Mike Morford
Yeah, the fact that he's just a little bit older than we are kind of puts this into perspective that maybe while we were out doing what we did our age, hanging out with friends, going to school, having fun, he Was already in the stalking pattern, trying to meet and eventually kill Rebecca Schaeffer. The takeaway from Rebecca Schaefer's murder is that you never know who a disturbed person might latch onto and target. Rebecca had never met Robert John Bardo, and besides sending him a letter and photo, never had any interactions with him until he showed up at her door. It proves you really never know who a stalker might target as part of their twisted reality. Obviously, the person a stalker is actually obsessed with should be concerned for their safety. But just because you're not the target of the stalker doesn't mean you won't end up tangled in their web. For example, in 1981, John Hinckley Jr. Tried to kill President Ronald Reagan because he thought it would impress actress Jodie Foster, who he had been stalking. She caught Hinckley's attention in the movie Taxi Driver, which does feature a plot to assassinate a presidential candidate.
- [35:16]
Mike Ferguson
Before trying to kill President Reagan. Hinckley wrote multiple letters to Jodie Foster and even left messages on her answering machine. It was when these letters and messages failed to get her attention that he decided he would have to do something more drastic if he ever wanted her to notice him. Before trying to carry out his assassination plan, he wrote one last letter to Jodi. According to famous trials.com, it read, in part, as you well know by now, I love you very much. Jodie Foster had never responded to any of his letters, and he wasn't under the false impression that Jody was in love with him. He actually knew she wasn't and didn't care that she didn't actually like his letters. The last time he wrote to her, he said, by hanging around your dormitory, I've come to realize that I'm the topic of more than a little conversation, however full of ridicule it may be. Knowing that Jodie Foster didn't return his feelings, his goal became only to try to change her mind and make sure that either way, they would be linked together in history. As Hinckley prepared for his trial for the assassination attempt on President Reagan, he learned that Jodie Foster would be in the courtroom to testify about the lack of a relationship with Hinckley. John Hinckley was thrilled by the news, telling his parents, mom, dad, I'll be right there in the same room. John Hinckley was found not guilty by reason of insanity. In 2022, after spending 30 years in psychiatric care, Hinckley was deemed to be rehabilitated, insane, and was released and is now a free man in the suburbs
- [37:11]
Advertiser
of D.C. a woman fails to show up for work and is found brutally murdered.
- [37:16]
Mike Ferguson
Nine, one, one, which emergency? We just walked in the door and there's blood in the foyer.
- [37:21]
Advertiser
For the next two decades, the case remained unsolved until new technology allowed investigators to do what had once been impossible. A new series from ABC Audio in 2020, blood and water. Listen now wherever you get your podcasts.
- [37:39]
Mike Morford
There are other cases of celebrities who were stalked. One of them involved Monica Seles, a tennis player who was stabbed by the stalker of one of her rivals, Gunter Parche, a fan, to say the least, of Steffi Graf. He was so desperate to see his favorite player make it to the top. But Monica Seles was in the way of that. So at the Citizen cup in Hamburg, Germany, Gunter waited until a break in one of Monica's matches and then rushed at her. While her back was turned to the sidelines, he stabbed her right between her shoulder blades with a boning knife. His only goal was to take Monica out of the competition so that Stephie could be number one. Parche was found to be mentally ill and given a sentence of two years of probation and psychiatric treatments. Thankfully, Monica Sellis survived the attack.
- [38:26]
Mike Ferguson
And I do remember the attack on Monica Seles. I mean, it was big news. But attacks on celebrities are always going to make the news. You just don't think that some of these things are going to happen. Right. We watch sports all the time. There are spectators, right. You think about a basketball game, a tennis match, there's a bunch of spectators there. You don't think about somebody rushing onto the playing surface and stabbing one of the athletes. But that's exactly what happened to Monica.
- [39:05]
Mike Morford
Yeah, a lot of times when somebody runs out onto the field, it's to get like 15 seconds if that of attention because most of the time they don't show it. But it's usually not to attack somebody on that's out there.
- [39:18]
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, I always like it when they, they kind of rush the football field and one of the big guys just tackles the you know what out of them. That always cracks me up because I mean, what do you think's going to happen? There's a bunch of 300 pound dudes in equipment. Somebody is going to lay you out. Now there is a delusional disorder called erotomania which sometimes ties into stalking cases. People with erotomania experience the strong belief that someone is in love with them, often secretly, when the object of their fixation is more of a public figure. There's usually a belief that they're doing or Saying certain things as kind of a special private message to the person with erotomania. One of the earliest recorded cases of erotomania was described as a patient who believed the King of England was in love with her. The proof was that sometimes the curtain in the windows of Buckingham palace would move to her. This was obviously the king sending her a message that he was thinking of her.
- [40:33]
Mike Morford
Rejecting stalkers with erotomania does not deter them in most cases, but it does enrage them. In 1996, US army veteran Gerald Atkins met a woman in a bar, and she became the object of his obsession. She wasn't into him the same way, though. She wasn't really into him at all. And she told him that very Clearly. According to UPI.com, she actually called him a pest and said to him, why don't you move on down the road, because you're not going to get any. She was annoyed by his refusal to take no for an answer, but he didn't believe her. He felt that there must be something or someone getting in the way of their relationship and keeping them apart. So one morning, he went to the Ford assembly plant in Wixom, Michigan, where she worked, ready to propose to her.
- [41:18]
Mike Ferguson
And I truly don't know how Atkins could have expected that this woman's answer was going to be yes. I guess that's why you would classify this as erotomania and not just a lack of common sense. But he showed up expecting that everything would go perfect, perfectly. But the security guards at the plant didn't let him in. He didn't work there and had no real business being there. He was furious that he wasn't allowed into the plant. So he came back with an AK47 and just opened fire. He killed the plant manager, shot at responding officers, and even shot at passing cars as he fled into nearby sewer tunnels. And he was taken into custody. And he entered a plea of not guilty by reason of insanity, basically admitting that he did attack the plan, killing the manager and wounding others, but also asking for mercy because he wasn't in a good state of mind when he did it. At trial, he tried to claim that the attack was an attempt to save the woman he was obsessed with. The jury didn't believe that Atkins was insane at the time he attacked the Wixom assembly plant. He was found guilty of first degree murder and multiple other charges and sentenced to life in prison.
- [42:41]
Mike Morford
According to San Diego psychologist J. Reed malloy in a sandiegoreader.com interview, believing the other party loves you is a Key to erotomania. You have to actually believe in the face of evidence to the contrary, that you are loved by the other. You have to be delusional to believe it. Despite a tremendous amount of data to the contrary, Though the defense of raratomania was used in John Hinckley's trial, to some he doesn't actually seem to fit the definition of someone with a disorder. He was fully aware that Jodie Foster wasn't in love with him. He decided the assassination would be a way to show her he was important. He may have had delusions and his actions were certainly anything but rational, but he didn't believe that Jody was in love with him.
- [43:24]
Mike Ferguson
Be it mental illness or something else that was responsible for Rebecca Schaefer's death. Her friends and family focused on reform. They wanted to change things to stop other Robert Bardo's from murdering people. They seem to have left Bardo in the past, not even allowing him to take up the required space in their brain to be angry at him. Rebecca's mother Dana Schaefer told the LA Times. I'm angry at the system that allows things like this to happen, that allows a deranged person to get his hands on a deadly weapon.
- [44:03]
Mike Morford
In 1989, the California governor ordered that DMV offices begin to withhold or make it hard to get certain bits of information about people. According to Entertainment Tonight. In 1989, actor Mark Harman, who's married to Rebecca Schaeffer's My Sister Sam co star Pam Dawber said, whether that will prevent anything, who knows, you know, but through Rebecca's death, people are forced maybe to take a little bit of a different look at the structure of how things are done. In 1990, the first anti stalking loan in the United States was enacted in California, thanks in part due to what happened to Rebecca Schaeffer and Teresa Saldana. In 1994, Congress passed the Driver's Privacy Protection act, which prevents the DMV from giving out a driver's personal information to just anyone. Now, a private investigator can't just track down your mom and help someone trick her or hand out your address right to your killer just by looking at your car's registration paperwork or calling the
- [45:02]
Mike Ferguson
DMV and more of, you know, we do talk about this quite a bit, but you know, these changes that are made in the wake of tragedies, they're usually good changes. I think the problem is we are, you know, a very reactionary society, right? We react to things, we make changes because of things. It would be Great if we could change some of these things before the bad things happen. But obviously that's not how life works.
- [45:37]
Mike Morford
Yeah, it seems in general that as a society, we're reactive instead of proactive.
- [45:43]
Mike Ferguson
And obviously, you know, these changes didn't solve or eradicate the problem of stalking. It continues to affect people every day. And with social media and various technology advances, stalkers actually have more tools at their fingertips to target people. Not just celebrities and not just women. You never know who will decide to fixate on you. And that's part of what makes it so scary. There's definitely a lot of work to be done to keep stalking victims safe and actually get to a point where something can be done legally but before someone is harmed. However, we have come a very long way since 1990, when stalking laws were first put on the books. Now, the DMV can't give out your personal information, but does that mean no one can get it? No, obviously not. Look at the number of people, finder websites that will pull up addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, and even people associated with the person you're looking up. Personal information for many people is just a Google search away. And with modern maps, stalkers can even scope out pretty much every inch of an area without having to actually visit and alert anyone to their presence. Let's just hope that there are no more cases with tragic outcomes like that of Rebecca Schaefer, murdered on her doorstep at the age of 21 by a deranged fan. And we did talk about a number of other people, but I don't want to lose sight of Rebecca Schaeffer, 21 years old. And we mentioned it. Right. She had stints on a couple of different daytime soap operas. She had this three year stint on a major network television show. There's no way to tell what she would have gone on to do. She was only 21 years old. And I want to go back to the situation that kind of led to her answering the door. She was waiting on this very important script for a big movie. Godfather 3, huge director, right? Francis Ford Coppola. I think more if the role that she would have been auditioning for actually ended up going to Coppola's daughter, who is now a big time director.
- [48:27]
Mike Morford
A lot of people are critical of her performance in that movie. And maybe Rebecca Schaeffer, if she had gotten that part, could have pulled it off better, gotten good reviews for it. Maybe that would have led to other roles. She would have gone up the ladder a little bit as far as her acting chops and her Resume.
- [48:47]
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, we talk about it a lot, but when somebody is murdered young, it's hard not to have that thought of what would they have gone on to do. And with a person like Rebecca Schaeffer, she'd already done so much and at the age of 21, she was just barely getting started. I think the, the term the sky is the limit definitely applies to her. She had amazing things ahead of her and her life was, was cut short. And it is tragic, no doubt about it. But this idea of stalking or having a stalker, again, to me it's a very scary thing, whether it is stalker of a celebrity or it's just an everyday person who's not famous. But like we said, someone gets it in their head because they had a relationship with the person that ended that if that person can't have her or him. Right. It can work both ways. Nobody else can.
- [50:00]
Mike Morford
Yeah. And it's frightening her as an actress being on a TV show seen by millions of people that would shine more of a light on her and open her up to potential stalking anybody that's on the TV show. And as podcasters, I know several podcasters who have had so called stalkers run ins with stalkers. I've had my own issues with people that, you know, we're not on tv, but we sort of are known to people. And I think anytime you're putting yourself out there, you do open yourself up to interacting with people that don't have the best intentions or maybe they have the aptitude to do bad stuff. So I think you're, you really have to be careful if you're putting yourself out there, even if it's behind a microphone like we're.
- [50:49]
Mike Ferguson
Yeah, that's why I always say you got to keep your head on a swivel whether you're known to people or not. But that's also easier said than done. Right. In some situations. You know, Rebecca wasn't doing anything wrong. She wasn't putting herself in a situation where she would be more likely to be harmed. This wasn't late at night. She wasn't in an area that she shouldn't have been in. She wasn't doing something she shouldn't have been doing. And that makes it to me just, you know, that much more tragic. But that's it for our episode on Rebecca Schaeffer and other celebrity stalkers. As always, if you love the show but haven't done so yet, take a minute, go out, leave us a rating, a review, all of that helps. Also keep telling your friends word of mouth about The Criminology Podcast really goes
- [51:45]
Mike Morford
a long way if you want to find us on social media. We're on every major platform, so just search for Criminology Podcast on your favorites. And for news, old episodes and more, head over to our website, criminology podcast.com and if you want to join a discussion group about the show and the cases we discuss, head over to Facebook and search for Criminology Podcast discussion and fans.
- [52:07]
Mike Ferguson
So that's it for another episode of Criminology. But Morph and I will be back with all of you next Saturday night with a brand new episode. So until then for Mike and Morph, we'll talk to you next week.
- [52:20]
Mike Morford
Take care everyone.
- [52:52]
Mike Ferguson
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