DARK SIDE OF FAME
The frightening world of celebrity stalkers
Having thousands of admirers might seem like one of the perks of celebrity status, but there’s a fine line between super fan and stalker. From the Beatles’ John Lennon being shot outside his New York home by a crazed follower to Latin singer Selena Quintanilla-Pérez being murdered by the president of her own fan club, Hollywood’s history books have been filled with stalker stories gone wrong. Here, WHO looks at some of Hollywood’s stalker run-ins …
BEYONCÉ
Beyoncé’s stalker, Bassey
Essien, was convinced that the singer, 38, was actually an imposter who had killed and replaced the real Queen
Bey. Essien sent her a series of twisted and threatening letters and gave her a book of “religious ramblings” that he’d written himself when she appeared at a London event in 2009. She eventually won an anti-harassment order against him in 2011, but always has her security beefed up when she visits his native London.
MADONNA
Robert Dewey Hoskins was a serial stalker and his actions had serious consequences when he was finally convicted of stalking the Queen of Pop for many years. In 1995,
Madonna’s bodyguards were forced to shoot Hoskins when he jumped the fence at her Los Angeles home and attempted to get in. “He was there to take me away,” the singer, 61, later testified in court. “[He said] that I was supposed to be his wife, that if he couldn’t have me, he was going to slice my throat from ear to ear.” Hoskins was sentenced to 10 years in prison and then committed to a mental institution, which he escaped from in 2012. Thankfully, the “mentally disturbed offender”, who cops say still has “very violent tendencies”, was caught and put back behind bars.
SANDRA BULLOCK
After scoping out her residence for days,
Joshua James Corbett broke into the actress’ home in 2014. After she discovered him,
Bullock, now 56, ran and locked herself in a closet and called the police – with a recording of her phone call later used in court. “I’m in my closet. I have a safe door,” she shakingly told the 911 operator. “I’m locked in the closet right now.” Corbett, who police say had plans to sexually assault the star, was found with four pictures of the actress and a handwritten love letter. “You could of (sic) had me today however you choose other people over me … I love you,” the letter read in part. While Corbett was only sentenced to probation and continued mental health treatment, his infatuation with Bullock continued and in 2018 he sadly took his own life after a five-hour standoff with police at his home.
TAYLOR SWIFT
Taylor Swift’s stalkers need to calm down because she has them by the bucketload!
In 2013, a man was arrested for trespassing after he swam to Swift’s
Rhode Island beach house in the middle of the night. Years later in 2016, Frank Andrew Hoover was arrested after violating an order of protection that the singer had taken out against him. She and her family
had suffered through years of threatening letters and emails sent by Hoover before he was slapped with the restraining order. With several more stalkers bringing weapons to Swift’s homes – and three reported attempted break-ins in a single year – the singer, 30, is understandably cautious and prepared for anything. “I carry [a] QuikClot army grade bandage dressing, which is for gunshot or stab wounds,” she wrote in an essay for US Elle last year. “You get enough stalkers trying to break into your house and you kind of start prepping for bad things.”
KEIRA KNIGHTLEY
For years the English actress and her family lived in fear, after being terrorised by a man named Mark Revill who tweeted out threats, stalked Knightley and her husband James
Righton and delivered handwritten letters to the family’s home. On one occasion, Revill disturbingly showed up at the actress’ home and meowed through the letterbox, causing her husband to chase him down the street. While Revill claimed to be in love with her, his disturbing antics had Knightley, 35, feeling scared every time she left her house. In 2017, a court ordered Revill, who has been diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia, to be held in a psychiatric hospital indefinitely.
JUSTIN BIEBER
Back in 2012, Mark
Staake and Tanner
Ruane, were hired by Dana Martin to murder and castrate the singer with garden shears. Martin, who is serving two consecutive life sentences for crimes he previously committed, was obsessed with Bieber, 26, but then became upset with the singer. “He changed, and that made me angry,” Martin, who has tattoos dedicated to the star, later shared. So he hired Staake, who he met in prison, and his nephew to do the deed – promising them $50,000 and a Ferrari, as well $2500 for each on the singer’s testicles. Thankfully, they were caught, charged with first-degree conspiracy to commit murder and were never able to accomplish their deadly plan.