Transcript
Madison is being stalked, and she doesn't know the identity of her stalker, picked up my phone and I had it was either 50 or 60 something notifications to my Instagram immediately. It was just hateful comments, making fun of my hair, making fun of my face, making fun of my weight, making just anything my appearance and telling me I look like, you know, a crackhead w***e. Over the past two and a half years, Madison and members of her family have been cyber bullied, slandered and threatened online, kept reaching out over Facebook only, and that ended up resulting in them reaching out to my mother and my sister and just verbally attacking them, slandering my sister's business, leaving bad reviews on her page, telling my sister, telling my mother that my mother should be so ashamed that she gave birth to such a crackhead horde junkie. Worthless, whatever. The sad thing was like they didn't want to tell me that makes that makes me so sad for them, like they didn't want to tell me. So they didn't hurt me. But like, like, I, you know, something about my life and right at the end of their life. So like, I felt responsible and I don't want anybody saying things like that to my family. Madison turned to the police, who told her their hands were tied because they said no real crime had been committed. Madison reached out to us and sharing her story on Patreon with the hopes that she can uncover the identity of her stalker. Any help that you have to offer me or are willing to offer me is very appreciated, and I feel blessed to be able to have potential help from you guys. You can learn more about Madison's story at Patreon.com/ strictly stalking. Stephanie is a public figure, and she has a huge following across multiple social media platforms, she's even appeared on a reality TV show. If someone has really opened up to her fans online and shares a lot of personal details, you know that's a really good point. It begs the question when you share something online, how much information is too much? You know, if somebody saw one of her posts and said, OK, I think I know this person, where can she draw the boundaries, right? I think our listeners will really benefit from her story. I never imagined that somebody would actually take things this far. I've gotten so many creepy comments messages before, all over my YouTube, all over Instagram, but nothing quite to this degree, so I never could have imagined that this could happen to me. I'm Jamie Beebe and I'm Jake Deptula. On today's episode of Strictly Stalking were chatting with Stephanie Matto, a YouTuber and author who formerly starred on the TV reality series 90 Day Fiancé after receiving a series of disturbing comments on her YouTube channel. She initially brushed them off as creepy comments she sometimes gets online. She blocked the user and emailed her longer, more descriptive messages claiming to be your neighbor, revealing the actual address of her new apartment and that he was watching her. He created several Google Voice numbers and sent Stephanie disgusting, perverted messages, and when she didn't answer, he became hostile and threatened to come down to her address. Now Stephanie is here to speak out about her terrifying ordeal and how she's fighting back against her stalker. Stephanie, thank you for joining us today. Of course, thank you. When did you decide to become a YouTuber? I became a YouTuber. I think it's been about seven eight years now. I never really had a huge group of friends, and I always kind of felt like I had all this creative energy and I just wanted to channel it into something. So I created a YouTube channel and it's all kind of, you know, all evolved from that. How did the fans interact with you on YouTube? Honestly, I feel that throughout the years I've been kind of a polarizing person. People either really like me or really don't. And I definitely attract a lot of, you know, interesting individuals to my channel. I've gotten a lot of love, but I've also gotten a lot of hate. And then, of course, being a girl on the internet sharing her life, you do also attract a lot of attention from lonely people who are, you know, maybe sometimes don't understand boundaries so much. Are your fans mostly men or women? It all depends on which social media network you're talking about. But as far as my YouTube channel goes, it's about 80 to 90 percent male viewership. How did you get involved with 90 Day Fiance? So about early summer last year, I started talking to a girl that I had actually met through Instagram, and she had watched my channel here and there, and we became friends at first. And then things got more serious between us because we had both. At that point, broken up with our boyfriends and we wanted to meet. We wanted to pursue a relationship. So we both decided to go on this show and document us meeting for the first time. And obviously I had I had thought it was going to be this magical experience, but it did not turn out to be that way. So, you know, it was one of those things where it was a really hard lesson and kind of disappointing. Definitely a learning experience, but it's over now. Thank God, I was a pretty controversial person. I think on before the 90 days because a lot of the plot was based around the fact that I was this other person online that I didn't end up being in person. And there was a lot of pressure put on us because we were the first LGBT couple and that was like a huge deal. And I felt like I had communicated to my partner about boundaries and about how, yes, I am this like sexy persona, this fun, sexy persona online. But you know, that's like surface level once you get down to who I really am. I'm actually a pretty like reserved, mellow, low key person. I think when I'm alone filming at home in front of a camera, I can be very extroverted. But in my personal private life, I'm more of an introvert. And I think that because we did not know each other very well, it came as a shock to her when I showed up and I was different than what she had expected. And I, you know, partly blame myself for some of that miscommunication. But it does tie in to a lot of my past experiences in my life. When ever people watch my channel or see me on social media, they get this impression of me and they expect me to be just like that in real life. And I think, you know, sometimes it's a it's a bad thing. I don't feel like I'm being fake online, but I feel like being online is my creative outlet and it and it allows me to be a certain way. And sometimes I can be sexy online and, you know, talk about certain things. But when the cameras come off, it's a little bit different. So, yeah, you know, obviously, if you watch the show, I definitely was not the best version of myself. And I wish I could go back and do things differently. I could have handled so many situations, so much better. I was very toxic and just not somebody that I enjoyed watching. So now that I watch it, I'm like, OK, those are things I want to work on and fix, and there's other things I'm working on. And also, the show has made me value my privacy even more because I used to air a lot out on the internet about my life, on my YouTube channel. And then once the show aired, I didn't really have control over curating what people. We'll see and what people don't, they kind of just edit it the way they want to and they they put whatever they want, you have no creative control. So I think that. I think that yeah, now I'm just so much more private. I think that going forward, I don't think I want to air my dirty laundry like that anymore. If I ever get into another relationship, I don't think I would want to even make it public. Do you ever think you'll do another reality show? I think I would do a reality show if it was like a game show or something with with dogs or like something just, you know, very like neutral. As far as I like, I wouldn't do something with a partner with a relationship because I feel like any time you involve a show into a relationship, it can either make or break it. And you know, I think had there been no cameras, had there been no show, I would have gone to Australia, and me and her would have probably quickly realized that we were two very different people and then just shook hands and went our separate ways. But you know, you've got lights, you've got cameras, you've got people there, and it just kind of fuels that drama between you two, and it amplifies every problem. So I, you know. I think it wouldn't it wouldn't have worked out either way, but I think it would have ended a little bit differently. How did your fans change once you were on 90 Day Fiance? I think that my Instagram following due to the show has definitely grown. I think my YouTube channel has mostly stayed the same. It is still a lot of men, but a lot of men have also started following me from the show as well. So, you know, even with the show, you get people who are obsessive to a degree who don't know boundaries, who will just like persistently message you to take you out or get your phone number. And you know, people on my social media are, to a degree at this point aware that I have this ongoing stalker situation. So when people cross boundaries like that and try to get my phone number or look me up and try to find my address, it's kind of like, Come on, guys like, you know what I'm dealing with? Like, Why are you making me feel this way? Like, I feel so uncomfortable? I actually have had a few people who are fans of the show somehow find my address, my parents address and send them packages. And it's like, it's a sweet thought. I get it, but it feels weird, you know? And with me, I'm so ultra paranoid because of everything that's been happening to me the past three years that, like, it's not a great feeling to know that there's people out there searching for private information about me and my family. So, you know, the show has opened more of that up to which it kind of sucks. What was your life like right before you met your stalker? What was going on before the stalker? I was kind of part of this group of YouTubers that would do story time videos on YouTube, and a lot of the time we would do very outrageous videos that would click baity. And we'd exaggerate things a lot. And every YouTuber my stalker is following me and like, you know, I lost my virginity and like, just like Crazy Title's crazy stories, right? And I would watch a lot of these YouTubers, and I'd be like, Oh, like, wouldn't it be great if I had a stalker, too? Because then I could make a video about it, and you know, it would be something like cool to talk about. And now that I'm in the position I'm in, I think of that and I'm like, first of all, if someone has a stalker, like, why would they ever want to make a YouTube video about it? It's like, you don't. You don't want to talk about it with anybody, you. It's not something to like capitalize off of. It's something that's really, really scary and can really, truly mess up your life. So now I'm kind of just like slapping myself in the in the face forever thinking that way. And I never I never imagined that somebody would actually take things this far. I've gotten so many creepy comments messages before, all over my YouTube, all over Instagram, but nothing quite to this degree, so I never could have imagined that this could happen to me. When you got the first messages, what did you think of him when he first started commenting, it was just like run of the mill generic, creepy comments, nothing that really stood out to me too much. Maybe they were just maybe a little bit more graphic than the usual comments, but I just kind of let it go because that's as as a girl, that's what you deal with on YouTube. If you are even, I guess, you know, remotely attractive, then you're going to attract some kind of weird attention on the internet. And I dismissed it, but they got really creepy at one point that I was like, You're like, This is this is not good. So I just blocked him from being able to comment on my YouTube channel. But then, shortly after the messages moved over from YouTube and into my email inbox and in my email, they were much more descriptive and lengthy. I actually have some. If you want me to read as an example, you have to be great. OK, I have a whole evidence folder from my investigation that I'm doing with the police. They had me screenshot and collect everything, and it's like once you really see it all, it's just it's disturbing stuff. Let's just cut to the chase. I find you so attractive and I know my comments are rude on YouTube, but it's only because I just want to give you some amazing sex. Make those pretty toes curl, give you something so exhilarating. James, who was my ex-boyfriend at the time, can't provide. I just want to eat your badge like a four course meal when you. Yeah, I'm not going to. It goes on like it's like an entire paragraph of him, like going step by step of what he would do to me. And these types of emails would happen periodically, and they were coming from an email with a fake name. But I knew that it was this particular person that was making comments on YouTube because, you know, he referenced himself. But also, he has a really specific way of spelling and putting together his sentences that it's like, very, very obvious when it's him. What was your first reaction when you started getting these emails? My first reaction when I started getting the emails was this person seriously disturbed, but there is that like disconnect. You know, it could be anybody anywhere. It could be somebody in in South America and in Europe. In Africa, you don't know where they are. So I don't think I was really afraid. I was just grossed out and also was just like, OK, well, you know, this just comes with the territory. I'm an influencer, so people are going to leave me, Hey, people are going to harass me, threaten me online. I just have to deal with it. But then, of course, things proceeded to get even worse. How did it escalate from there? So about a year or so ago, I moved into a new apartment at the time and this was in upstate New York area, and it was my first week moving in. And I just remember I was posting videos here and there on my YouTube channel, not really showing anything too specific, but I did show like a view from my window of the Hudson River. And I guess this person figured out where I was living based on those things. And I got an email from this creepy guy that's been sending me these very graphic, disturbing emails, and my heart dropped because it was the week that I moved in that he sent me an email with my address line in the subject bar of the email. And he wrote, OMG my dream has finally arrived in the form of the goddess, which happens to be you. How can I get any better than the love of my life? Moving into the building, I recently moved into two months back. How crazy is this? Will you start to stop ignoring me? What else can I do to have a normal conversation with you? And will you finally have met your mate? If I'm willing to deal with the level of crazy, let's face facts. All women have some sort of crazy difference is what is the level of crazy might someone want to deal with? I know you're a strong, independent woman. I will never get in your way, but I will be there to emotionally uplift you, care for you and make sure the little things I do will make your life easier, which will make you happy. And at that point, I panicked because I now knew that this guy knows where I live, and it's probably because he also lives in the area. I didn't know if it was true that he lived in my building. I checked with management. I showed them the email and they said, But this doesn't sound like anybody that lives there. But then he actually proceeded to send me more emails saying that he's watching me through the windows and would send me email saying, like, I see you, I see you dancing around your apartment. You had your family over last week. Like, I saw that you were a little tipsy. And yeah, like needless to say, I spent a lot of time just like staring out the window thinking, you know, who could it possibly be? I would keep the blinds on the windows closed a lot because I was just so freaked out. But it was a very small apartment building, so the odds of it being him were pretty low. But let me tell you, every single time I saw some dude in the elevator, I would just look at them like. Is that you? You know, I was like, what? You like, who is this person? But. Yeah. Come to find out. This person did not live in my building, but they did live in the area, which was pretty much like my worst nightmare come to life. Were you scared that this person was going to actually show up or reach out and hurt you? So at one point, they then stopped with the emails and I don't know how, but they got my phone number and they began to text me and I would just proceed to block every single number and then they would just go and make a new one. So I think that they were using, just like the Google Voice phone number generator. So this would just go on and on. And there was like one evening where he texted me from like 10 different numbers. I kept blocking, blocking, blocking and telling him to stop, and he kept making new phone numbers and kept persisting and saying that, you know, he's he's the one to make me happy. Why don't I give him a chance? He even tried to solicit me as a prostitute. He asked me if I could come to this hotel and he'd pay me like five hundred dollars. Like it was so strange. It was so very strange. And the one particular night that he made all these Google Voice numbers insisting on being with me. Eventually, he got really angry and threatened to come to my address, and he was like, you know, he stated my address and the text message, and he was like, I know where you live, like, I'll come down. Like, Do you want like, do you want to see what'll happen if I come down? And that was the first night that I actually called the police because I was afraid. I lived in an apartment and I have two dogs and I walk them alone at night, and there are parts of that street that are kind of dark and scary. And so, you know, there were nights where I would walk my dogs and I would be looking over my shoulder constantly because I was so scared that he was watching me that he was just going to show up. And so I called the police that night and they pretty much told me they couldn't do anything because I didn't have a name. All I knew was that this was somebody that lived in the area, and I showed them the messages. And, you know, city cops, they have other more important things to be doing. And I think that they didn't really take it very seriously. So they gave me a case number and they said, If you get any more updates, let us know. We'll update the file. But as far as what you're dealing with, we can't help you. They didn't basically give you any direction on how to deal with your stalker. No, because he was using all these like fake Google Voice numbers, so it's not like you can even track him down. I even tried to do some of my own investigative work, and I would, you know, try to look up his IP address from the emails he sent me. That didn't work because he was clearly using a VPN. So, you know, this guy was clever and definitely no stranger to this sort of stuff online. I don't think I was the only girl he was doing this to. I don't think I was the first or I'll be the last. Do you feel this could have been somebody within the YouTube community, maybe a competitor? No. And you know, I also thought maybe it's like an X or something, but I really I really didn't think so. But, you know, he sent me, for example, this one message should I just pop up at your address? Stephanie is a good old soul. Yes, she is a pig's a*****e. Steph, honestly, I'm frustrated because I really feel I would keep you so happy and so full of life. And have you see life differently? You would forget about your condition. Oh well. And like, I don't know anybody who writes like this. I this is clearly somebody who is maybe not the brightest person. I don't know. But there was one night where I was getting so fed up like he would message me like weekly from these weird a*s numbers. And every time I saw a weird number with the weird area code, I knew it was him. And then I would read a few lines. And of course, you could just tell by the grammar that you saw how he writes. It's like he uses strange terminology that doesn't really make sense. And there was one night where I tried to kind of buddy buddy up with him, maybe try to get some information. And so I did manage to find out after him letting his guard down that he was that he worked at a flooring company. And I also got his first name, so I knew that he lived in my area and I knew his first name and I knew his type of work. So I did a lot of Googling and I just googled his name, my area and flooring company, and a Facebook profile popped up and I clicked on the Facebook profile and I saw a man who, you know, was writing statuses that really lined up with the same type of sentence structure in these text messages. So I was fairly certain that this was the person that was sending me these messages. And they have a last name that kind of works as a pun as well. So as a joke, I wrote a pun as a text message using their last name and I thought, OK, well, if it's him, it's going to be. He's going to freak out because you've got to see that. I know his last name, but it's not. He's just going to be like, Oh, that's a pun, it's a joke, whatever. So I wrote the sentence using his last name as a pun. And that's when he realized I had found out. I figured out who he was. And that's kind of when he backed off. He actually apologized to me. He said, Hey, I'm sorry. You know that I've been making you feel this way. And he's like, Yeah, you're much smarter than you look. And you know, I joke with him and I said, Haha, yeah, like, just please don't do that again. Like, you've really made my life a living hell the past few months that I've been living here just don't do that again. And I kind of left it off, you know? We're good, we're cool, but just like stop and leave me alone, but I think he kind of maybe still thought that he could message me because sometimes he would still text me like these just friendly text messages, nothing threatening or anything. But I wouldn't respond because I was like, Dude, you're an idiot. Like, I'm not going to talk to you. So, yeah, that's kind of how it left off with that for a while. How did you feel when you first found out who he was? I was just confused. I mean, it was just some random person that literally just found my YouTube channel. It was just bad luck. I guess just the wrong person stumbles upon my channel watches, my videos, and I talk about a lot of personal things on my channel. So I guess it becomes easy for people to watch me and maybe feel like they're good friends with me or that they know me, or that they might want to date me. But you know, the person that's online is a fraction of who I really am as a person. So, you know, it's just it just sucks that this person had to find my channel and take things so far. I. You know, and the worst case scenario is that the person lives nearby, and of course they do, they live like 20 30 minutes away from my new apartment. And at that time, I was looking to start fresh. I was looking to start a new life. I had just gone through a really bad breakup. And I thought this was like, You know, we're going to be my second chance, like finding love and being back within like the New York City area. I was feeling really positive and then this happened. And kind of. Clouded that entire time. This was before 90 day, but it also continued to happen after. And when I got back from Australia, it proceeded again. It kept happening more and more, and eventually it escalated and it escalated when I bought my new house and I moved away from New York. I moved back to near where my parents live. And, you know, I thought I was done with it. I thought it was over. He had kind of stopped messaging me for the most part. Even the friendly messages had stopped, like he had just kind of backed off and I was like, Oh, thank God, it's over. He's you've moved on and he's either stopped or maybe found another victim, God forbid, but who knows? But then one night I was here at my new house, my new address, and I got a text message and in the text message was my address, my new address. And it was like two sentences, and it was very, very cryptic. I mean, the sentences didn't even make sense. It was like a riddle, and I just had chills down my spine because I don't even know how he could have found this address. Like, there must have been way more digging involved this time. The other address, I kind of understand, you know, it's New York. It's more easy to pinpoint where you are based on like your pictures and stuff. But you know this, I was like, How the hell did this guy find my address? And so at that point, I knew his name and I knew that he knew my new address. So that's when I called the police here in my town and they have been able to help me. What was that like when you called the police for the second time, calling the police the second time? I was a little apprehensive because I knew the first time they didn't really do anything. So a part of me was like, I'm just maybe wasting my time. Like, they're just going to basically shrug it off and tell me to get a better security system or, I don't know, get a gun or something. But I was so, so surprised. The police officers came in that night. They sat down with me and we looked at the messages and they seemed to take it very, very seriously. The police officer was actually frightened for me after looking at the messages that I was sent. And he said, You're not staying alone here tonight. You need to call your parents and we're going to stay at the edge of your driveway until we see your parents pull in. And I was like, Wow, like, are you sure you guys want to do that? And they were like, Yeah, we insist. And I was like, Oh, shoot. And this police officer that works at my town, he used to work in the private sector. So I guess he's dealt with some things with stalking. And so he said that like, he's experienced these things, you know how bad it can be and that this doesn't seem like some sort of joke or something to be taken lightly. So I think that was also the first time that I started to see it as something really serious because this cop seemed scared. But I was also very grateful that they were taking it seriously. They said that they were going to come back a few days later and that we were going to make a statement and that they were going to open a criminal investigation against this person. But obviously, there's so many steps involved. How did you build your case against this stalker? I had to go back and basically compile an entire folder of every single message, comment everything he's ever left me, which, you know, showing that to the police and then and then reading it out loud and making a statement. It's just gross and just disturbing. And you could tell the cops were just so creeped out by it. They were just like, What the hell? Who is this guy? And they were like, How long has this been going on? And I told them, you know, almost three years at this point, and they couldn't believe it. I gave them the name of the guy. They were able to find his employer. They were able to do a background check on him. And there is a violent past with this individual, and it's it's a process, the criminal investigation, because you have to go through all of the legal steps. You can't just like, show up at someone's house as a cop and just arrest them. You have to be like, you know, have a search warrant and not just a search warrant for him, but for all of the different phone numbers. So to prove that it was really him, they have to take everything. Fake phone number he's ever made and do a search warrant on every single number, so the court has to approve every single number. So like this has been like weeks and weeks on end. I'm just trying to pinpoint the guy that makes sure it's the right to make sure it's the right guy. But basically, it's almost a certainty that it is. And even once these search warrants are are approved and they can put out an arrest warrant, it's not in their jurisdiction. This is back in New York, so it's another loophole. So, you know, it's not like, Hey, I'm being stalked. This guy is harassing me and telling me he knows where I live and how he's going to come by and go arrest him. No, it's like all this legal stuff that you have to do. So it can be discouraging, actually. What are some of the things you found out about his previous record? I can't really say what I found on his previous record, and I don't think even the police want to tell me in detail what it is. But I can say that it is violent and it has reinstated some of that fear that I've had in this whole situation because I always spent the past three years wondering, where will this guy stop? Like, is what is this guy capable of? You know, at first I said, OK, he's only capable of just sending me some YouTube comments, but then I moved to email. Then it moved to text message. And, you know, it's like, where does it stop? And why is he doing this? Is it so he can feel powerful knowing that he's scared a girl? Or is it because of some like sexual fetish that he has? Or is he really looking to track me down? So I've actually shied away from talking about it anywhere on social media for a long time because I felt that by showing my fear and frustration, it would be giving him what he wants. Was he still contacting you while you were working with the police and gathering this evidence after the police were involved? He messaged me one more time. But then, as the investigation got further and further and the police began to reach out to the former employer and do some more background history work, I think he got I think he got a little bit frightened because he hasn't messaged me since then. I hope that there was some sort of wake up call for him that like people were on to him and that, you know, people were closing in on him. So, you know, I'm always like holding my breath and waiting for the next time he might reach out to me. And I have gone as far as to buy bear repellent spray that I keep by my bed at night because I haven't thought about really getting a gun. I got the bear repellent and I also got an entire home security system. And the police officers in this town are really wonderful and have agreed to basically patrol my street every day. So every single evening I see the police car drive by and they like wave to me and they're like, Is everything OK? And they kind of check on me too. So like, if they see that my garage door is open, like they'll text me and they'll be like, Stephanie, make sure your garage door. It's like it's it's very nice. I almost feel like I have twenty four hour onsite security, to your knowledge. Have you ever seen him in person? No. I mean, now I know how he looked. So if I ever saw him, I would know it's him. But thankfully I haven't. When he was sending you messages about knowing what you were doing, was that really what you were doing? Do you think he was actually watching? So there was one message that he sent me. I'm watching you my sexy slut arena. That's a slut and a ballerina. We live in the same building on your second floor. I'm on third. I have a telescope pointed in your corner unit. My baby girl. I love seeing you. Especially a couple of weeks back when you had company, you looked a little tipsy. I enjoy seeing you and your dogs go when your Porsche. God, damn, you're fine. And then he wrote my address and I was like, I mean, it's past. I mean, it's possible he could have seen that because, yeah, I did have a few drinks. I have a few drinks every week. I mean, it felt very like general. It felt like he could have just guessed he could have watched one of my YouTube videos and seen that last week I did have family. Over and that there was maybe wine on the counter. I think he is one of those really perceptive people who can pick a pick out, pick out things and make it seem like he's really watching me. I, you know, I want to not I want to believe that he would, that he wasn't watching me, but anything's possible. Did you report any of his initial comments to YouTube? I just basically reported him on YouTube, but then I guess YouTube does whatever they want. There's so many millions of people commenting on YouTube saying awful things that I don't think YouTube really takes that stuff very seriously because you are well known and you have, you know, some fame. Do you think that this is just something that goes along with that? I think that having some kind of notoriety online definitely attracts both good and bad attention. I think everybody kind of deals with it who has a following. I've gotten messages from people. I've gotten mail from people. That's been super weird. I actually recently got a letter from a prison inmate who wanted me to put money in his in his commissary account. So I just get though I just get the weirdest messages, the weirdest attention and a part of me, like blames myself. I'll make all. I bring this upon myself, but it's not good to believe that it's not good to think that like, I did this to myself, like, no, I didn't make this guy do this, you know, I'm just putting myself out there online. If anything, it just teaches me maybe to keep more things private and be a little bit more cautious and to not, you know, ignore it for so long because for so long, I just put it off and said, Oh, maybe I'm just overreacting, or maybe I'm just being a drama queen because everybody says I'm a drama queen. So I'm like, Yeah, I must be a drama queen. But now I think this is a really serious situation, and I'm glad that finally, I'm handling it how I should have been the first place, which is weekly. How many times did you file restraining orders against him? So I'm currently in the process of getting a protective order, but that relies on the search warrant, you know, going through and basically identifying that it's definitely him. So it's it's like a process, basically. I can't really get a restraining order just yet. How close do you think you are to proving that he's your stalker? I think probably within the next few weeks, what are the next steps for you in the legal process? I think the next steps would just be to get these search warrants done and then, you know, get an arrest warrant. Unfortunately, with all these messages, even though there's years of them and they are explicit and terrible, you can't really be charged with anything beyond a misdemeanor crime. So he's not going to go to prison, but he will probably face a fine and he will be arrested and brought to jail. And you know, and that's the extent right now. But hopefully that's enough to scare this person and. Stop him from doing this to me, but maybe just doing it to somebody else, too, because odds are he probably is doing this to other women online. It's not just me. And yeah, I mean, we'll see. Hopefully it doesn't escalate any more. Hopefully, we can just scare him straight and send him the message that I'm not putting up with this anymore. What point did you talk about this with your friends and family and what was their reaction? I hid this from my mom for about two years because my mom and I are really close and she's so paranoid about everything, regardless of the situation. She's a total helicopter parent, so she'll call me multiple times a day to check in on me, and she's already terrified of me getting kidnapped or murdered. So I was like, OK, this is the last thing I need to tell her because I feel like by telling her it's not going to make it any better, or she's just going to make me more scared, or she's just going to keep on calling me every minute of the day to check in on me. So I chose not to tell her when I found out his identity and when I thought I had the situation under control. That's when I chose to tell her, and she was pretty mad at me that I hid it from her and she was really disturbed at what I've been dealing with. I think a lot of things made sense for her then, because there were some nights you're like, What's wrong with you? Like, you seem scared and agitated and stressed out, and I didn't tell her because I I couldn't really. I couldn't bring myself to tell her. So yeah, I'm glad that I finally was able to talk to her about it. And now that she's in the loop and knows what's happening, I feel safer because I know that if anything were to happen, I could call her and I could be like, Can you come here right now? Can you call the cops or something? Have you any other followers or fans online that you've suspected of potentially being stalkers? There have been some followers and fans online that have definitely overstepped boundaries, and I've just block them. I don't deal with that anymore. I refuse to forget anything disturbing, weird, creepy in my comments, in my filtered messages. Block block. Like, don't even entertain it because half the time, most of the time, a lot of these people, they just want you to know that they got to you. They want that attention from you. So I just stopped completely engaging. And the police even said with this guy, if he ever texts me again, don't engage. Don't message back. Just call us. Let us know. We'll add it to the file. That's it. Where there's certain things that made him escalate, like every time you posted a YouTube video or when 90 Day Fiance came out on national television, were there things like that that kind of escalated for him? Yeah, absolutely. Any time I post a video, it would almost happen right after he would send me a text message and he would have something to say about my video, ranging from what I was wearing to maybe something I had said about a relationship or about my love life. He would always make commentary on it. And then once the show came out, he seemed pretty upset by the fact that I guess I was, you know, I was dating a girl, and he was seemingly angry about that. I'm so fascinated by the whole cyber part of this and everything because, you know, people can kind of hide in anonymity for only so long. But you've gotten a lot further with this than a lot of people have in these cases. So I really want to understand, you know, where you're coming from and going down that path. So if someone were to come to you and say, I want to be YouTuber, what advice would you give them if someone came to me and said they wanted to be a YouTuber or an influencer? I would say, be true to yourself and be who you are, but also make sure you keep some things private. You know, having a private life is important. Be as careful about posting your surroundings as you can. But also the problem is that if somebody really, really, really wants to find you, they're going to find you. It's so easy to nowadays. They can look up so many different things. They can look up tax records, they can look up an MLS listing to see, you know, where you bought a house. I mean, like literally everything. And I've tried to cover my tracks. My mom's a realtor, so she didn't list these things online when I was in the process of purchasing a home in order to help protect me. But there's still ways that people can find out in this day and age with the technology out there. If somebody wants to mess with you, they have so many different ways of doing it. You know they can go. They can use an app to make 100 different phone numbers. They can use a voice changing monitor thing they can use up. You know, they could change their face using an app like there's so many just simple things people can do. So I guess be careful when you start doing anything online. There is there's risk and there is a reward. Just like with anything in life, the reward is you get to work for yourself, you work from home and there is like endless earning potential. But the risk is that, you know, your s**t's out there and people are nasty and rude and sometimes people cross the line. How do you think stalking can be taken more serious within the YouTube community? Unfortunately, I think the only time that stalking really gets taken seriously is when somebody ends up hurt or dead or kidnapped. And it should never even have to get that far. I think people need to take it seriously right at the source when it starts to happen. How would you like to see your followers or your fans interact with you? I just I wish that people could interact with me. As if I were a friend, but not as if they really know me. Be nice, be kind online, but realize that I am a stranger and you are a stranger and we don't really know each other. So, you know, I just I wish people knew boundaries. It's it's so hard to like, put put boundaries up because you want to be friendly. You want people to like you. You want to be open. And you want to accept people who are your followers and who are generally kind. But then sometimes when you do, you let in the wrong people. And have you ever met a fan or follower that you did eventually become friends with? I've actually met a handful of people that started off as followers. I mean, my ex girlfriend was at one point a follower. There's just something a lot less intimidating about a female follower, though I will say that there's been a lot of female fans and followers who I've given out my number two and who I've talked to frequently. But sometimes men can scare me and it's nothing against them. You know, like, I don't want to sound like an a*****e, and they, like all men, suck. But you know, there is something kind of scary and intimidating about a man aggressively pursuing you on the internet. So I hope that guys can kind of see that and realize that that's not OK and back off and know that it's not anything personal, but like, I'm just I'm a single woman. I live by myself. You know, I have to take precautions based on online harassment. How do men and women differ in their levels of harassment? Women will just be petty and mean and will leave you comments calling you ugly or fat or whatever. But guys. When they take it to that next level, it can be scary because it's coming from a guy, I'm sure women can be vindictive as well, but you know, with men, oftentimes it can have a sexual undertone, which is really uncomfortable and scary. I have had, you know, I've had I've been sexually assaulted in my life. So it's like hearing that like these text messages, it like it kind of triggers me because I've had I've had very scary experiences in my life. And this is this is reminding me a lot of that. I have issues with intimacy and it's something that I'm currently in therapy for. I have been sexually assaulted in my past. I many, many years ago before I was ever diagnosed with my illness. I had briefly worked as a dancer in Los Angeles, and I had one evening where I was sexually assaulted by somebody. And, you know, it's kind of something that stayed with me. And I. I do not move quickly when it comes to intimacy. People that try to be intimate with me very early on will seem my knee jerk reactions like someone can put their hand on me and I'll just like jerk away. And I think that's that's something that my partner noticed quickly, too. It's like, Oh my gosh, like every time, like I put my hand near you, you flinch and I'm like, Yeah, I'm sorry. Like, it's just, I'm just like a little screwed up. And it's not something that I really talk to people about, but. It's a it's a problem, and for me, intimacy takes a lot of time and trust to be built. And I need to feel completely comfortable and not pressured at all. And unfortunately, when you're on a show that's like, Are you guys in love? Are you guys f**king, are you guys like, you know, it's like, you feel like you're under pressure a lot, even though that's not your partner's intention at all. They're not pressuring you, but you feel the pressure from, you know, we're on a TV show about falling in love. People want us to, you know, do the deed and fall in love and whatever. So I think that the show being on the show kind of like amplified my anxiety as far as intimacy goes, and it really psyched me out. So, yeah, and it's and I I struggle a lot with that even now today. And it sucks because I know that people see me online and they view me as a sexual person based off of the the photos I post and the videos I post. And so I get worried and nervous meeting people for the first time because I think that that's what they will expect for me and that they might forcefully try to get that from me. So I'm like, I think that's part of the reason why I'm a hermit, and I kind of shy away from meeting people nowadays. I have a YouTube channel where I talk about sex, and yes, I wear sexy outfits on my Instagram posts and I have an only fans, but that does not dictate what you can do with me. And it does not give you any permission over my body. This, you know, it's not giving you consent. I'm actually celibate. I have been celibate for almost two years now, so I'm like, I'm now very assertive. But unfortunately, that and assertiveness scares people away sometimes. So what kind of precautions do you take now? How has your life changed from this? I have strongly considered getting a firearm, but I'm still on the fence because I don't know if I want that in my home. I do have that bear spray that I got from Amazon. Somebody recommended it to me. They're like, You should get bear spray. It can take down a 300 pound man. And I was like, OK, so I got some bear spray. I have a security system. I have cameras set up outside of my house with sensors. So if anybody is walking by or if an animal walks by, then it's like I get a notification right away. So I'm like, very alert, aware of my surroundings almost too much. You know, it's it's like, I don't need to see all that. I don't need to see the squirrel in my front yard three times a day walking back and forth. But you know, it makes me feel safe and. You know, I actually I recommend that every every person should have something like that, especially if you're a woman living alone. And do you know where your stalker is now? He could still be in the general area, but there's also a chance that he could be somewhere else in the United States. The police are trying to track him down as well. So. I'm going to get an update soon. I actually did get a message from one of the officers recently, and he says, I have to update you, but he wants to see me in person and tell me what where the investigation is now. What do you want to see happen to him? I don't want anyone to suffer and go to prison or to have to pay thousands of dollars or anything like that. I just want this person to stop. You know, I want to feel safe in my home again. I want to not worry every time I hear something outside. I just want peace of mind. That's all I want, and I don't get peace of mind knowing that somebody is in prison because, you know, eventually they get out. And then what? You know what kind of an emotional toll has all of this taken on you? I think, you know, I have nightmares a lot about it. There was actually two nights ago that I had a dream. And in the dream, he was standing in this little area of my front yard where there is an opening in the woods and he was just standing there. And in this nightmare, he was taking these notes and he would be putting them around the woods in my house for me to find. And I woke up like sweating, freaked out, like terrified. And, you know, it was like six a.m. that I woke up. It was still a little bit dim outside and my dogs wanted to go out and pee. And I kind of like, hesitated to is really scared. So I checked my cameras before going outside. And it's just things like that. Little little changes in my behavior that really make me see how much this guy has kind of screwed with my head. I guess I sleep with my bedroom door locked every single night. And that might be weird or not. I don't know, but I yeah, I do get scared. What's life like for you now? Well, knowing that the cops are helping me out right now, it's actually it's good. I feel very lucky to be living in the town that I live because I know that police departments vary greatly based on where you're living. And I think because I live in a relatively small, tight knit community that, you know, police are much more involved in my case than if I was living in a big city. So I think so far, life is life is good, like nothing's ever perfect, right? Like, everybody's got that thing that they got to deal with. So this is that thing like I got I'm blessed in other areas of my life. I have two great dogs. I have a beautiful home and I love what I do for a living. So, you know, life has to tip the scales a little bit. It's like, Oh, everything's good, OK, we're going to give you a really s**tty stalker just to even that playing field out. What have you learned about stalking from this experience? I've learned that, OK, this is going to come as come off as kind of ironic because I'm on a podcast talking about my stalker. But you know, a lot of YouTubers, a lot of social media influencers will talk about their stalkers for entertainment value. And after actually experiencing stalking firsthand, I know that it's not something that's that's supposed to be like a fun story. It's something that's scary and that really changes you and changes your life, and it's something that should be taken seriously. It's not like a fun little anecdote to post on a YouTube channel. It's something really serious. And thankfully for me, it hasn't escalated to a point where I've been hurt by this person, but so many people have been hurt by their stalkers. So. I think, yeah, it's never to be taken lightly, and when somebody is going through a stalking experience, they should be taken seriously by people around them and law enforcement. Do you think there's anything that law enforcement could have done better for you the first time you went in? I think they could have put me in touch with maybe a private investigator. They could have maybe referred me to somebody who could do some kind of cyber work and find out if they could track this person down. I think that they could have maybe tried to make me feel a little bit safer by. Suggesting more things that I can do and giving me just making me feel like I have options, you know, like when the first time the cops left, I was like, OK, like, what do I do? You know, I just I didn't even know who to call. Like, do I just call 9-1-1 every time? So I think that first initial time meeting the cops, it really left me not feeling safe at all. But the second time with the new police department in my in the town that I'm currently in, I feel so much safer. I kind of feel like I feel like more attention is being paid to it. Stephanie, thank you so much for joining us today. We really appreciate your time and coming forward, and I know it's always a difficult thing to kind of get into all this. But you know, it's exciting that you're actually very close on your case to be a hundred percent honest with you. It's it's like very few people, especially online stalking, get nearly as far as you have. And also joining us is David Myman, an associate professor at the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology at Georgia State University. He researches cyber enabled and cyber dependent crimes and also co-authored cybercrime prevention theory and applications. Today, he's here to share his thoughts pertaining to Stephanie's case. Thank you for joining us. Thank you so much for having me. How did you become interested in studying cyber crimes? Well, it actually happened late night by chance when I graduated. I really like my studies in sociology. I didn't want to pursue an academic career as a criminologist or sociologist actually wanted to just leave it all and go to Australia and pursue another Ph.D. marine biology. But then my wife told me this. If I did that, she would leave me. So, you know, I had to find, you know, another way to support my family as well as do something that I'm really interested and interested in, and that will allow me to expose new things. And so I decided to dive into the cybercrime field. Can you elaborate on some of the cybercrimes that you research AI Group studies? Many different types of cybercrime, cybercrime. Again, this is a very broad concept that encompasses many different types of crimes, including hacking, but also cyber bullying and DDoS attacks and writing malicious software and cyber stalking, of course. Our group focused on studying many of those offenders as well as victims. So we studied hackers. We study online fraudsters. We study online extremist online drug dealers. Of course, we studied darknet vendors, darknet customers. There is some research indicating that cybercriminals tend to be more obsessive. They tend to have a low level of self-control. Some research that they have high level of self-control. Some research that suggests that many online criminals tend to be narcissists. How would someone like Stephanie, who's you know in the public eye identify a follower who could potentially be a stalker? Is that even possible? It's I don't think it's impossible doing this the first time that someone is following you on Twitter or Instagram or YouTube. You know, I think it's it would be ridiculous for me to say that it isn't possible. I mean, it's it's very problematic to predict someone's behaviors based on. One interaction that you had with him and the interaction is actually happening online and it's a link, it's like, I'm sorry or or a you know, it either a nice post or even a nasty post. I mean, it's very difficult to predict that that individual will end up to be a stalker. I think that you definitely need to engage with individuals over time in order to be able to hopefully come up with a set of predictors that will allow you to understand that that individual will become a stalker or not. But that requires a lot of time and a lot of investment in communicating with those individuals. So what do you think that her stalkers ideal goal was? Do you think it was to make her fear him, to get her attention, to make her life miserable, to cause her harm? I mean, do you think they're seeking validation or maybe a combination of all when you talk to these guys online, you understand that there's no there's really no one motivation behind their behavior. It's a slow it's an array of things that push them to behave in a specific way. Again, without talking to the guy, it's very difficult for me to say what was his motivation. I think it's a combination of everything you just mentioned the attention, the fact that maybe the guy was, you know, getting thrill by the fact that Stephanie was intimidated and petrified by the emails he sent in. Who knows, unless unless we talk to them, we'll never know. What do you think the first thing Stephanie Pratt and differently would have been right off the bat? Take her phone for an expert. Try to figure out whether she has a malicious software on it. If it's, you know, if it had a malicious software in it, if it were, if the expert would have said that there was a malicious software in it, clean it. If not, I would have recommend potentially getting a new phone with a new number because to me, it seems like someone hacked her. You know, it could be that the individual simply was able to lure her to click on a link, on an email, on a fishing link that in turn downloaded a malicious software to her smartphone or a computer, or every technology she was using. And then? You know, once once the malicious software embedded itself, the spyware embedded itself on the on the device, the individual could have gotten all the information she mentioned doing the podcast, like the dinner she was having with family or, you know, her driving in her car, right? I mean, if that if that individual was essentially on the smartphone, all he had to do was just just click on a button and then simply record everything she was doing. Is it really that easy for a hacker to just you? Click a link and there in all your stuff? Yeah, it is. So this is one of the I mean, we engage a lot with hackers, we conduct a lot of hacking and hackers research, and you'd be amazed when the hackers first took over the device, they turn on the camera and then they turned on the mic right now to really try to figure out who owns the computer and whether they can get some really cool information right about the individuals they are targeting. So I think that speaks volume to. And these are not really sophisticated hackers. I mean, in this experiment, the hackers were not the state level hackers that we're talking. We're talking like script kiddies, people with, you know, very low level of experience. They just had the malicious software with a lot of access to someone computer. Yeah. Just pure stalking in my book. So those those scary movies that we see where someone's on the other side of the computer and they're, you know, watching you walk around your house and stuff, that's real. That's real. How do you know if someone has put this software on your phone or your computer? That's the million dollar question. I mean, you know, you have the best minds working on answering this question constantly, right? But it's very difficult, right? I mean, you have to understand how malicious software work in the sense and how antivirus sort of works. So the the technology that will allow you to identify the spyware or the malicious software is the antivirus and the way antivirus work is like. It's like identifying signatures on the on the malicious software. So imagine someone break into your house. The police will come. They will dust for fingerprints to make you feel better, but then they will take the fingerprints or whatever they they were able to excavate from your apartment and they will run it in their database to try to figure out that there's a match or not. Antivirus were very similar. Right, I mean, different malicious software that we are aware of, they have different signatures. And so once we are aware of a signature and the antivirus has the signature in the database, it will flag the existence of a virus. But what happens if there's no signature, then you will never know that you have someone on a computer that you have malicious software on your computer. But then you have a gallstone on your system. So, you know, unfortunately, I can't really that that is the answer to that to the question. And it's not really it's not a really happy one. You know, it's difficult to identify when you have someone in the system. Do you feel that social media platforms could do a better job combating cyber stalking? And, you know, if they could, how would they go about doing it? You know, I think that at the end of the day, it's not only on the social media platform. I think, you know, social media platform is just one place where actors can get all the information that they can use. But, you know, so think about that. The government released a lot of information on you as well. I mean, if you buy a house, then your address, your name, your mortgage. All the sensitive information that you don't want anyone to know about is out there and everybody can get it. And so people will be I mean, if they will look for your name, they will be able to know, you know, where you live, who you're married to, how much money you owe to the bank. And all this information is not on social media. So, you know, maybe social media can do better. But is this the solution for cyber stalking? I'm not sure. You know, I think, you know, the better solution is if you want to take social media into consideration, the better solution is for us to be more careful about what is it that we put out there that people can use the information you put on social media to know whether you're in your home or not. And then. Get to your house physically and still stuff, right, and we know that cases like that essentially happen. So in my mind, the better solution is not necessarily the social media platform who may or may not can do better. But you know, we need to be more careful about the content that we post on social media platforms. How equipped do you feel that most police departments are dealing with cyber stalking? Well, they're really not. If you if you think about it, unfortunately, at the local level, I don't think that law enforcement has the skills, the tools, the know how to deal with cyber stalking. And I think, you know the the response that Stephanie got the first time she went to the police is the most common response cyber stalking victims experience when they call the police and tell them, Hey, you know, someone is stalking me unless you have evidence, unless you have concrete name, write about a potential suspect, someone who you know for sure is stalking you. There's really nothing the police can do to help you. That's unfortunate, but that's the case. How can we change that with how the police deal with stalkers and cyber stalking? We need to allocate more resources to local police. We need to train them again. I mean, we're talking about cyber stalking and online fraud, but you know, I can tell you that the local police is experiencing difficulties being on the darknet, where people are selling or shipping guns and drugs and all this, you know, illegal commodities that are committed to communities and they don't know what to do with it. So, you know, I think that at the end of the day, there's got to be this realization among law enforcement that, you know, online crime is here to stay for a long period of time or need to allocate more resources in order for us to really understand, you know, the criminals, understand the victims, understand how we gather intelligence, you know, to help. Prevent these types of crime, as well as how we get our evidence in order to get as close as we can to offender and then prosecute them. David, thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you so much for having me. If anyone out there is in need of help or the victim of stalking, please reach out. You can find a list of resources on our Instagram at Strictly Stalking Pod. You can watch your episodes at YouTube.com Slash Strictly Stalking and now we're on Patria and we can sign up for exclusive bonus episodes. Live chat sessions and check out some merchandise. Just go to patron.com/ strictly stalking. I'm Jake Deptula and I'm Jamie b.V Thank you for joining us and today's episode of Strictly Stalking.
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