Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
True Crime Conversations acknowledges the traditional owners of land and
waters that this podcast was recorded on. According to ABS
data and estimated, two point seven million Australians have experienced
being stalked. Drill down into those numbers a little deeper,
and it turns out one in five women and one
(00:26):
in fifteen men have been stalked, with women almost eight
times more likely to be stalked by a man, while
men were stalked similarly by both genders. The types of
women who are most likely to be stalked are young
who are students who rent their home, and those experiencing
financial stress. Over three quarters of those women who reported
(00:48):
having been stalked knew the man who was following them.
The most common perpetrator is an intimate partner, both current
and former. In fact, half of the women who were
stalked by a male intimate partner were assaulted or at
least threatened with assault. The majority receive unweas to contact
via the internet, phone or in the mail. Sixty percent
(01:10):
experienced their storkags turning up wherever they were, fifty two
percent were followed or tracked. Samantha Stites experienced all of
these things and then despite attempts to stop it, it
got much much worse. I'm Claire Murphy and this is
(01:34):
True Crime Conversations, a podcast exploring the world's most notorious
crimes by speaking to the people.
Speaker 2 (01:40):
Who know the most about them.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Samantha Stites fit all the criteria you just heard for
a woman most likely to be stalked. She was young,
a student at Grand Valley State University in Michigan. She
rented an apartment with one of her good friends, and
until she met Christopher Thomas, was planning a future of adventure,
of career goals, and exploring her faith. But a meeting
(02:03):
at a Christian group would change her life. For the
next thirteen years. While Samantha lived her life, Christopher watched
while she ate, slept, worked, celebrated, grieved. No matter what
life event she experienced, Christopher Thomas watched it his obsession
with the girl. He thought he'd one day Mary, persisting
(02:24):
even through a long term restraining order. Then one day
in twenty twenty two, Christopher took his obsession to a
whole new level, breaking into Sam's home and taking her prisoner.
What Samantha endured in the hours she spent locked in
a soundproof box in a storage facility not far from
her home is shocking, but her resilience an ability to
(02:47):
think straight in the face of horror would see her
not only be set free, but finally show the system
that had failed her that she would not allow Christopher
Thomas to beat her. Samantha joins us now. Samantha, thank
you so much for joining us today. We really appreciate
you taking the time to talk to us about your
experience and hopefully what we can learn from it as well.
Speaker 2 (03:10):
Thanks for joining us here in Australia.
Speaker 3 (03:13):
Yeah, pleasure, pleasure to be here. It's I know your
morning there, my evening here in the US, but happy
to be here. Thanks for the conversation.
Speaker 1 (03:22):
Well, first of all, we want to say thank you
for actually being here, being here because there was.
Speaker 2 (03:27):
A moment in your life where you didn't.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Know if you would be here speaking to me today
as you are. So thank you for surviving what you've
survived and living to tell the tale and using that
opportunity to help us understand the dangers of stalking a.
Speaker 2 (03:44):
Little bit better. We really do appreciate it. I guess we.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
Should start from the beginning. Can you take us back
to when you're in college and you join a Christian group, Like,
what was SAM like then, What were your hopes and
dreams for the future. What was your life looking like
before Christopher stepped into it.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
Yeah, I let's see college. I am thirty three now,
so this was I graduated high school in two thousand
and nine, so started college kind of right off the bat.
From there, I wasn't sure what I wanted to study.
I thought something kind of in the math and science realm.
I was always a big athlete, and in college I
(04:25):
chose to go to like a larger university and not
play sports and just focus on academics and you know,
do some intermural sports on the side. Things like that.
I had a really hard time kind of finding a
social group when I first started college. My freshman year
was really difficult, and then by my sophomore year, I
(04:45):
had found this Christian group on campus. I didn't identify
as a Christian, but the people I met were just
so genuine and caring that I kind of got swept
up into their group and learning, you know, about what
they believed. And I kind of joined this Christian group
when it sort of became a big corner zone of
(05:06):
my you know, education and experience in college, so a
lot different than a lot of university students that are
partying and drinking all the time. I was leading Bible studies,
you know, going to church. We were playing frisbee on
the weekends or like American football, things like that. And
I met Christopher my must have been my third year
(05:30):
when I met him in the fall. We had been
just playing frisbee at my off campus apartment in some
green space there and he had come out and joined
us to play. There were I don't know, maybe six
of us, and so we kind of introduced one another
and what's your name, what are you studying? Kind of
(05:52):
the basics, And I could tell he was significantly older
than me, Like he wasn't a traditional student. He was,
you know, six or eight years older than me, which
automatically you think somebody is going to have a harder time,
you know, fitting in. So we were all out trying
to make ourselves and our campus welcoming for new students
and you know, if they're interested in our group to
(06:15):
you know, promote that as well. And I could now
just notice he was a really awkward guy, would have
trouble making friends. I just kind of offered kindness to him.
And I don't really remember a lot about meeting him.
I just thought, this is some guy who live at
this apartment complex, and you know, it's possible I'll see
(06:35):
him again at the bus stop. But I didn't really think,
you know too much about it.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
Had you had many like high school relationships with boys
or like, what was your experience like before Christopher, what
was your understanding of like relationships between men and women
and negotiating that. Had you had any experience in that
area before?
Speaker 3 (06:58):
Yeah, I had been in a couple of relationships. I
guess the longest was like a year. You know, I
was really focused on academics. I wasn't super into dating,
and in college I was pretty focused. You know, he
wouldn't have been anyone I ever would have had interest in,
you know, based on his looks or his personality really
any of it. You know, I had zero romantic interest.
(07:22):
And it didn't take too long really before I found
out that he you know, either he thought that he
could be a friend to me, or we could be friends,
or maybe more than that. I could see that there
was interest on his end after a while, you know,
back in that day, in twenty eleven twenty twelve, especially
(07:43):
on a college campus, you'd add somebody on Facebook once
you met them, and you know, kind of build your
social connections that way. And I noticed after a few
days he had messaged me on that platform, which I
thought was kind of weird. But I'm like, I don't know,
people who weren't very social in person sometimes have an
easier time, you know, messaging behind a keyboard. And it
(08:05):
was just very like, how's your day going. I was
really nice meeting you the other day. Kind of really
basic things, but I didn't think too much of it.
I mean, he was kind of an awkward guy, so
you know, I gave him a pass, and maybe compared
to other people, I maybe would have been more dismissive,
but to him, I was like, he's just awkward, doesn't
(08:27):
really know social cues very well. I was trying to
be kind to him.
Speaker 1 (08:32):
Well, that's the reason I asked, because you were very
diplomatic in your dealings with Christopher at the beginning, because
he was very persistent and in the documentary you can
see how many messages he stand and how many times
he asked you to either go somewhere with him or
have a date with him, and you very kindly and
politely dismissed those advances, and it seems like it didn't
(08:55):
matter what you said. And at the beginning, it seemed
like you were kind of put him off rather than
completely cut him off, which I know that a lot
of women struggle with because you don't want to sometimes
outright say no to somebody because you don't know how
that will impact them or how they might respond to that.
Was there ever a feeling when you were trying to
kind of let him down easy that was it more
(09:15):
just like you were being kind to someone who was
socially awkward, or was there anything in the back of
your mind, any red flags that you can look back
on potentially now that made you think maybe I shouldn't
confront this person in that way.
Speaker 3 (09:27):
There really weren't any red flags to me, you know
at that time, you know, thinking I was twenty maybe
twenty years old. You know, this was before the Me
too movement. This was like in sort of a Christian
setting where I felt like I had to be kind
and welcoming to newcomers and be a nice, polite person,
(09:48):
which I was trying to do, you know, Regardless, I
didn't really. It didn't strike me as he was, you know,
that this would ever go down this path of stalking.
It was just somebody who doesn't really have friends, this
new on campus, doesn't really get social cues. So I'm
not going to you know, shut him down hard at
the beginning and have somebody, you know, I don't want
(10:10):
to be labeled, you know, a bitch or you know,
something like that. I want to you know, be kind
to people and give him respect. If I'm not interested.
He does ask me out, you know, do it in
as many ways to say, you know, I'm busy. He
must get the picture. I don't ever want to spend
time with him. I always have an excuse, you know.
(10:30):
And then I start saying, you know, I'm not interested
more clearly. And it takes some time, really before I
realize that it's not just that he's socially awkward and
doesn't get it, but that he's ignoring my wishes. And
that's kind of where things start to go a little sideways,
and really where I start to notice that it's more
(10:51):
irritating at the beginning for me, it's more irritating than frightening.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
I think, do you remember when that shift happened, like
what was he doing? There was a lot of messaging
on Facebook. In the documentary, you explain and experience where
he's kind of come to your workplace with flowers, even
though you'd made it very clear that you were not
interested in him in any way, shape or form, Like
where did it start to turn from you being kind
(11:16):
to someone who wasn't quite understanding to it being this
is not right.
Speaker 3 (11:23):
I would say it was that kind of altercation at
the bus stop we had. Rare showed up to my
workplace in college with flowers after my grandpa had died.
He had heard through the grape vine or potentially social
media or something that you know, my grandpa had passed away,
and at this point I had blocked him his phone number,
(11:45):
I had blocked him on email, and like multiple mediums,
I had told him very clearly in person and you know,
via text or messaging like I'm not interested, please leave
me alone. And then he shows up again in person
and I just think I've told you so many different
ways that I like, I'm speaking English, like you're understanding me.
(12:09):
This isn't somebody who's not getting it anymore. It's somebody
who doesn't care to listen to what I'm asking them,
and I had that wasn't really the first time I
had kind of experienced that where, you know, it's different
than like a sibling or a friend, like put your
dirty dishes in the dishwasher. It's like you're asking personal
(12:31):
space and for someone to leave you alone and they're
not doing that. And it's not that they're not understanding
the clues you're trying to put. It's that you're saying
it very clearly and they're still you know, so we
have this kind of I get angry with him at
this bus stop and other people are witnessing this and
me yelling at him, telling him, I've asked you to
leave me alone so many times. I don't know why
(12:53):
you'd show up to my work with flowers. I don't
know what makes you think you know I have any
interest in talking with you. I've blocked you. I've asked
you to leave me alone. You know, there's people like
looking at us, and I feel like I'm embarrass because
i feel like I'm making a scene. But I'm like,
maybe he'll listen to me if I yell like I don't,
I'm like, I don't really know what else. But to me,
(13:14):
that was really where things started shifting, and it was
he clearly knows what I'm saying and is defying it
and just keeps finding other ways to try to see
me or give me things or that was really the
first time it became something more than just oh, this
person doesn't really get it. And you know, I assumed
(13:37):
if I asked someone to leave me alone, that they will,
And so that was really the first time after strongly
asking him to leave me alone, like very bluntly, that
he came back and still found me somewhere.
Speaker 1 (13:49):
At this stage, what did you know about Christopher other
than what you'd sort of seen of him whilst you're
a college together, Like did you know anything about him
beyond that, like his past or his family life? Like
what did you know about him at that stage?
Speaker 3 (14:05):
I didn't know a lot. I mean, I knew he
was like an older student. He the one thing that
I knew about him that he told me kind of
once in confidence. He was really said he was really
struggling with anger at one point, and you know, confessed
he had been in some bar fight or something when
he was younger, and that he just got mad at
(14:26):
this person and tried to beat them up, and you know,
spent the night in jail or something, and so you know,
I'm thinking, Okay, this person also maybe has impulse and
anger issues, and that this is something I should also
be careful with him about because if he you know,
he's stronger than I am. For sure, he's bigger than me.
(14:47):
You know, if he were to get angry, there's you know,
aside from somebody else stepping in, he could potentially hurt me.
I never thought he would, but in the back of
my mind that was like the one piece of info
I kind of had about him was that, you know,
he had been in this bar fight at one point
and the police got involved, know anything about any prior
(15:08):
stocking or other issues. He had a couple friend like
long standing friends that seemed like pretty normal people, and
I was like, I don't, like, there's nothing that really
makes me think that this guy is really off until
you know, this interaction at the bus stop.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
It does escalate from here, even when you move away
from where you are going to college, like he seeks
you out and finds you like miles and miles away
from where you initially have contact with him. What was
that like to know that this man is now like
he's becoming a threat. He's actually following you and not
(15:47):
just following you down the street, but like to an
entirely new town.
Speaker 3 (15:51):
Yeah, and I mean, hindsight, it's always twenty twenty. But
you know, at the time, I thought, you know, this
isn't just a problem that I'm going to leave behind
when I graduate, I won't be on this campus anymore.
He has a like he's got a motorcycle, which where
we live you can only ride a few months a
year because of the snow. Like I'm going to be
(16:12):
moving to a different part of the state, like two
plus hours away by car. And then I had planned
to go halfway across the country for this like ministry internship.
Speaker 1 (16:22):
So I thought, so, you're like, I can just label
this behind, right, I.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
Can just leave this person behind despite what's happening. You know,
I don't necessarily have to get the law involved, because yeah,
probably what he's doing is wrong. But why would I
go through all of that if I'm just going to
be you know, moving I'm you know, I was a
very busy college student. I had an internship, I worked
all through college. I had a heavy course load, I volunteered,
(16:48):
Like it was just I didn't have spare time to
think about how can I, you know, go about this.
I just thought, you know, I'm going to leave this
person behind, and this is going to be history. I'm
never going to see what.
Speaker 1 (16:59):
Yeah, but also too at twenty, like I had a
fakely stalky incident with someone when I was also in
my early twenty and people always ask me every time
I tell the story, did you tell police? And I
was like, well, no, I didn't because I was twenty
something and just kind of getting on with my life
and it didn't really occur to me that I should.
Speaker 2 (17:16):
Have probably taken it further.
Speaker 1 (17:18):
Did you feel that way, Like, you know, when you're
twenty and you've got your life ahead of you and
things are happening, and like you did, the last thing
you want to do was like get involved in all
of that kind of stuff.
Speaker 2 (17:27):
Does that make sense to you too?
Speaker 3 (17:29):
Yeah? And I think I think maybe had I had
more time where I would have been on the same
campus or within the same city or something as him,
I probably would have. But knowing that I was moving
multiple hours away and he was, I knew he was
still going to be at that campus studying. I was like,
there's this big physical divide where it's not going to
(17:51):
be easy for him to come check up on me.
Like if I have him blocked on everything, there's essentially
no way he can get in touch with me. He's
not just going to be you know, driving places to
find me and then I'm going to be several states
away where it's like a fourteen hour Like, there's no
way I'm going to see this person again. You know,
he's not going to abandon his studies or something, and
(18:14):
you know it Just to me, it was like this
is an easier fix of like I'm just going to
move on with my life and distance and time is
going to solve it because he's not like, he's not crazy,
he's just another college student. And then that summer, it
was like two days before I was planning to move
halfway across the country for this ministry internship. He shows
(18:37):
up in my hometown and I'm shocked. I'm like, how
did he find me here? I mean my town was
like very small, but to just show up somewhere and
drive around until you find somebody is weird. It's wild
to me. And then he says, hey, I think I'm
going to go to the same internship as you. I
just got accepted. Can you give me a ride? And
(19:00):
I'm just like, there's no way we're both going halfway
across the country. I'm not I don't know, but what
can I do about this? This person isn't listening to me,
and now they're trying to ruin. The thing I've been
looking forward to is kind of this gap year, you know,
between finishing undergrad and going to grad school. That was
kind of my plan is to take this sort of
(19:20):
gap year. And do I not do that now or
do I try to get him kicked out? And it
becomes really obvious I need to kind of get the
legal system involved at this point. And you know, my
family friend is like, tell me more about this guy,
what's going on? And the more we like lay everything out,
I'm like, oh, We're like, yeah, he's stalking me. And
it's you know, clearly even distance isn't stopping him. Nothing
(19:45):
I've said has stopped him. And now this you know distance,
and now he's even trying to come even farther, you know,
potentially abandoning his studies and coming halfway across the country.
We're like, now so yeah, we file for a personal
protection order and right before I left, and it was
for set years, which was unheard of.
Speaker 1 (20:08):
Did that actually make you feel, Siphon, knowing that order
was in place?
Speaker 3 (20:12):
It did. I knew that I could petition in another
state for another one and it likely could be granted,
like because I was moving out of state. But I figured,
you know, having the law involved made me feel like
there was somebody else on my side and somebody else
telling this person that what you're doing isn't okay. And
essentially it sort of solved the issue. Like I got
(20:34):
him kicked out of that internship, we got this protection order,
and I ended up seeing him around the holidays. He
came out this ministry at a huge conference around the holidays,
and he found me there, Like he came around this corner.
There's like twenty thousand people at this big conference, like
needle in a haystack. So I liked tell security and
(20:58):
like have a male friend like escort me home every day,
like all of this stuff, and I never see him again.
Like seven years go by, and I think, you know,
it took that to finally shake him off and get
him to move on with life and then I finished
(21:18):
grad school and I moved back to sort of my
hometown more or less, you know that area, and I
buy a house. You know, I'm in my late twenties
now I'm starting my career. Yeah, I'm just like have
moved on with life. And I'm playing in this Rex
soccer league with other adults, and this was like, you know,
people are wearing masks because it's COVID and we're like
(21:41):
playing on small sided teams like trying to be safe
about you know, also getting fresh air and socializing and
things like that. And you know, I see him and
I just my heart drops, like what is he doing here?
What is he doing in this city? All these years later?
My first thing is, oh, my gosh, is he followed
me here? And I think that's crazy. It's been so
(22:01):
long since I've seen him. I haven't had a message
from him. I haven't heard from him. You know. It's
not like he's waving at me or trying to talk
to me either, So I just don't, you know, I
don't know what to think of it.
Speaker 1 (22:12):
You're listening to two crime conversations with me, Claire Murphy.
I'm speaking with Samantha Stites, who was kidnapped in twenty
twenty two by a man who was obsessed with her
and who stalked her for more than a decade. Up next,
Samantha describes the moment she saw her stalker again for
the first time in years.
Speaker 2 (22:29):
After having thought it was all over.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
It's so interesting because when you talk about that first
protection order that you have in place, you have so
much evidence that he's stalking you, so many interactions. You
have Facebook messages, You've got witnesses who've seen you tell
him no, You've got you know, people backing up your story.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
And it's almost like, because.
Speaker 1 (22:52):
You said, then he didn't interact with you, even though
he knows who you are and you know who he is.
He's come face to face with you on this soccer
team and doesn't say anything to you and doesn't really
even acknowledge that you know each other. It's almost like
he's learned from that first protection order not to give
evidence that he's stalking, because to a judge then that
(23:13):
just looks like, oh, he just happens to be in
the same place at the same time, doing the same
thing as you. If he doesn't even speak to you,
then obviously he's not stalking you. Do you feel like
he was clever enough to understand his behavior after that
protection order expired needed to be different.
Speaker 3 (23:30):
Yeah, I think so. And I don't know what that
was exactly like for him in terms of like if
that was a strategy, you know, to Essentially, I had
a really hard time proving that he was stalking me
because he wasn't doing the normal things where he was
sending me messages or leading me gifts or trying to
(23:53):
talk to me. You know, the only thing was I
was seeing him everywhere and he wasn't even acknowledging me.
So it just felt I kind of felt crazy, like
this feels wrong to me, Like I'm seeing him way
more than I should. Good, there's something off about this,
And I just kept thinking, well, if I were him
in this situation, and I really didn't think anything of it,
(24:13):
what I at least acknowledged and waved the person, what
I you know, say hey in passing what I you know,
what would I do if I were him? You know?
I didn't know he was, Like I just I couldn't
get it to add up. But something felt very wrong
to me, and I felt like I essentially had to
stalk him to prove that he was stalking me. You know,
(24:35):
in my gut, I was like, I don't have enough
evidence for a new protection order because he isn't, you know,
unless you can tie in all these previous things he's done.
You know, I couldn't really start from scratch and say
this person stalking me, which you know essentially was kind
of what I had to do. I don't think they
even reviewed the first PPO. When I applied again the
(24:58):
summer before he kidnapped me in July twenty twenty two,
I had the help of an assistant prosecutor and I'm
a master's degree social worker, and I still got my
like PPO denied after all of this history, and it
just was so discouraging, and that to me, I just thought,
you know, what is the downside to having a PPO,
(25:22):
Like if he's truly not stalking me, then it shouldn't
make a difference, and if he is, then there's something,
you know, to charge him with. So it was it
was incredibly you know, discouraging going through that second PPO
process and just feeling like there's something wrong here and
I don't know what to do about it. And at
the same time, what can I I'm not going to
(25:44):
stop living my life. I'm not going to sell my
house and up and move, you know, I'm not going
to stop playing in this soccer league that I you know,
my friends were like, you know, stop playing there, change gyms,
like these places you're seeing him go do some stop
going there. And I'm like, I shouldn't have to change
my whole life because this person is doing something wrong.
(26:06):
And is that going to solve it? I don't think So.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
That's something that I think is quite telling. When I
did watch the documentaries that you did refuse to let
him make your life smaller, because that seemed to be
almost what he was trying to do by being everywhere.
And we'll discuss how he knew where you were at
all times in a minute, but it seems like his
(26:31):
motive for doing that was to kind of get you
to make your life as small as possible so that
he was the everything part of your life, that he
would be the focus of your every single waking moment,
whereas you kind of refuse to do that, and we're
just like, I am, I'm not going to allow that
to happen. How do you find the fortitude in yourself
to make that decision? Because it would be so easy
(26:52):
to shrink away and try and hide from all of that.
Speaker 3 (26:55):
And ultimately that's a lot of what Stocking's about, I mean, stalking,
domestic violence, whether so you're being stalked by someone you're
in a really or were in a relationship with, or
someone you don't know, a lot of it is about
control and that person having me upper hand. And I'm
kind of like thinking about my own coping skills and
(27:17):
styles and things that make me feel calm and myself
are like I like to be able to go to
the gym. I like to be able to, you know,
go running in my safe neighborhood. I like to play
on a soccer team, and those are all things that
help center me and connect me with other people. And
by like forcing me out of that, it's, you know,
(27:39):
kind of trying to shake me up. And I'm like,
I don't I don't know. I think I'm just such
a stubborn independent person that i was like angry with
my friends at suggesting this because I'm like, this is
driving me crazy and I don't want to stop doing
the things that I'm doing. Like it's not like I'm
walking around a dangerous city at night with headphones on,
(28:00):
like waiting for somebody to kidnap me. Like I'm I'm
burying up my routines, I'm like locking all my door,
like I'm doing all these logical, safe things. But at
the end of the day, I'm like, there's things that
are important to me and I shouldn't have to. It's
like him winning. I'm not going to stop playing soccer.
It's something I enjoy I have. I'm making friends here.
(28:22):
I you know, I'm safe about how I do it.
You don't park in the same place. I sometimes get
somebody to drive me. You know, all these things that
I was trying to be thoughtful of, and eventually, when
someone's persistent and off, it just isn't enough. And not
that a protection order would have prevented him from doing
(28:43):
any of this, I think that's clear that it probably
wouldn't have mattered. But kind of going back to your question,
I think he was very specific in particular about what
he did and didn't do kind of the second time
around in terms of speaking with me or you know,
interacting with me in any way.
Speaker 2 (29:04):
When did he speak to you again?
Speaker 1 (29:07):
Like all this time he's kind of around you, and
he's interacting with the environment around you, but he doesn't
interact with you personally, and your friends do eventually interact
with him, But does he ever speak to you again, Like,
does he ever give you any idea of what it
is he wants from you?
Speaker 3 (29:25):
Honestly, no, I never I don't speak with him. He
never approaches me even asked to speak with me. There's
no We have one interaction on the soccer field where
I am like late to come into this game and
he's asked to like be a substitute on our team,
and a couple of people from my team weren't aware
(29:47):
of who he was. I told a bunch of them
who he was. So I come and it's like co
ed groups, so you need to have like a certain
number of women. We're always short on women playing. So
it was like I showed up. I had to be
on the field otherwise we're a shorter player. And so
I'm like, I'll play this is my team, but I'm
not playing with And that was the only real interaction
(30:08):
I had, was like not even speaking to him, but
telling my team, I'm I'm here to play on this
team with you, but I will not play with this man.
And this is why, Like I told them, you know why,
and he just like looked at me like he had
no idea what I was talking about. That was the
closest we came to interacting. And I was like, you're
like following me, like I'm not. I You're not get
(30:31):
out of here, like you're not playing with us. And no,
I had never spoken with him until he broke into
my house on October seventh, twenty twenty two, while I
was asleep, and broke into my bedroom and kidnapped me.
Speaker 1 (30:48):
Forcibly, what did he say to you in that moment?
Because he did break in, and you wake when we
call it your spidy sense, when you know that something
isn't right or someone's there, and so you wake up
before he actually enters your room. Yeah, and then he
forces his way in so quickly that even though you'd
(31:10):
taken measures, you'd put a weapon underneathil mattress, ready to
defend yourself, but even that wasn't accessible enough in the
speed in which he came and grabbed you, was it.
Speaker 3 (31:23):
Yeah? I mean he was prepared obviously, and I had
been sleeping, so like, I'm not fully there. I'm thinking,
if this person's prepared and if they don't have a weapon,
now I'm introducing one, Like this person is clearly here
for me, who's on the other side of my bedroom
door right now. If they were robbing me, they would
have been robbing me and they would have been that
(31:45):
they wouldn't be standing outside my door. So yeah, I
mean he told me basically, he like put his hands
around my neck and was like strangling me to get
me to stop screaming, and he's like, I just want
to talk, and I'm like, no sane person says they
just want to talk in this situation, like you've seen
me every week for however many weeks, because as you
(32:06):
show up to the same soccer group I'm a part
of and you've never approached me once to talk, and
now you're breaking into my house and I'm in my
underwear in bed, Like this is not what you do
when you want to talk to somebody, and so, you know,
I immediately thought, like he's going to kill me. There's
no way people get out of this, Like I don't
(32:26):
know what weapons he has or you know, and he
binds me, he puts a gager on my mouth and
tape all around my head and carries me out I'm
shackled up my hands and feet. I'm like, he's going
to murder me. He's gonna rape and murder me, you know,
is what I was positive was going to happen. You know.
He took me out of my house and I thought,
this last time ever, I'm ever going to see this
(32:48):
last time. I'm not going to see daylight again. The
sun wasn't even up yet wherever he was taking me,
and he brought me to this, like it was really
close to my house too. He brought me to this
like storage unit he had rented out. He had rented
two side by side and taken the ball out and
built this impressive construction, I must say, but built this
(33:11):
like soundproof bunker within this storage unit that had multiple
doors and locks, and there were sandbags to the ceiling
with like a bed and like shackles on the wall basically,
and I'm like, oh, yeah, this is where I'm going
to die. But you just keep saying, you know, I
just want to talk, you know, I want to He
(33:32):
reveals like we're going to be here for two weeks together,
Like I took two weeks off work and we're going
to spend it in this soundproof bunker together, and I
just think you've lost it, Like, yes, he was all
the things I thought, and worse, and I found out
he had been tracking my car, you know, which we
had suspected because how was he showing up all these places?
(33:53):
We couldn't find a tracker anywhere on my vehicle.
Speaker 2 (33:56):
But he wasn't just tracking your car, was he?
Speaker 3 (33:58):
Nope? Nope, my car. I had like a kind of
beat up truck I used from time to time, my
roommate's car, my friend car, anyone I spent enough time with.
Really you wanted to know who I was with, what
I was doing.
Speaker 2 (34:11):
Have you watched back the documentary yet?
Speaker 3 (34:14):
I have just once?
Speaker 2 (34:15):
What's it like to look at that setup?
Speaker 1 (34:18):
Because like the police body cam takes you in there
and shows you around and you can see all the
work that he's put into that.
Speaker 2 (34:24):
What's it like to see that?
Speaker 3 (34:25):
Yeah, it's it's weird. I mean it looks to me,
it looks less intimidating than what it did when I
was there, because it was like really dark and you know,
arranged in a slightly different way. It was. It was
definitely strange, but also like, oh, this is like something
(34:46):
that someone would create in a horror movie, like you know,
seeing those rings on the wall, and yeah, it was
I mean, it was a lot. But at the same time,
I feel like I've I don't know, I've so thankful
to be alive and have made it through everything. I know.
There's so many folks that are stocked, or abducted or
(35:08):
raped or any combination of those and don't survive that
I feel like I'm very thankful to be able to
tell my story and I want to somehow honor the
people that didn't have that opportunity, you know, because of
no reason of their own, just how things went.
Speaker 2 (35:29):
You know.
Speaker 3 (35:29):
I don't feel like there's anything unique about me that
I survived and others didn't. But yeah, watching it back
is heavy in that way because I think, you know,
that's not a situation you think people are probably going
to survive.
Speaker 1 (35:44):
We said that a few times that in your mind,
in that moment, you're like, this is it. This is
where I'm going to die. He's going to kill me.
Do you ever actually really accept that and understand that
because that is so far from our normal day to
day reality, Like, how do you in that moment come
to terms with the fact that this could be the
end of my life. At the same time, I'm imagining
(36:05):
in your brain, like how do I survive this? How
do I get away from him? How do I how
do I beat this man who is so much bigger
than me and so much stronger than me, and who
has literally got me shackled and tied to a wall
in a soundproof bunker. Like it feels like every single
thing that could potentially be against you it's against you
in that moment. How do you first of all reconcile
(36:26):
the fact that you're in a position that you might
not make it through, and then also find the fight
to get out of it.
Speaker 3 (36:31):
I don't know. I mean, there definitely was that moment,
specifically as we were leaving my house and we were
in the car, you know, going to this bunker, and
once we got there and I saw what it was
and what was you know, what his plan was? You know,
I was like, okay, like I don't I don't know's
(36:51):
It was like a weird sort of peace in some
way of like perhaps this is it, and I hope
I'm satisfied with what I've done. But at the same time,
I'm not just going to give up because of what
I seeing like there's got to be some way, and
I'm going to try. You know, I value my life
(37:12):
enough that I'm going to try and get out of this,
you know. And obviously I was striking out. I can't
fight my way out, I can't screen my way out.
I can't you know, all these common things. I essentially
the only thing I had to do was kind of
outsmart him or convince him to let me go. It
was really the only kind of tool I had at
(37:33):
my disposal.
Speaker 1 (37:34):
He also kind of took hope away from you too,
didn't he Because I think the thing that we would
all think if someone was to kidnap us is that
someone will be looking for us, Like someone will come
to find us and they will start telling police, and
like people will be mobilized to look for me.
Speaker 2 (37:49):
But he had a plan for that already.
Speaker 3 (37:51):
Yeah, he had planned obviously with time. He wasn't a
complete idiot. He was like, you know, people will start
probably looking for her if she's missing. He had already
loaded my inflation paddle board into my car when he
took me, so he was planning to drive leave my
(38:13):
car and an inflatable paddle board out on the Great
lakes and you know, which is like a massive, a
massive lake in October. It's cold at this point where
we live, and it looked like you can't see the
other side of the lake. It's strigantic. It looks like
the ocean. So, you know, he had planned to kind
of fake my death and just sort of keep the
(38:36):
cops busy. I don't I don't know, and so, and
then he was going to have to walk twenty thirty
miles back to where we were. So I'm like, okay,
I was going to be alone, potentially shackled to a
ball a whole day while he played my death out
like I don't know. That was kind of wild too,
and he had like planned for that to happen, because
I saw the paddle board in the car and I
(38:57):
was like, oh my gosh. He wasn't just blowing steam.
This was his real plan. And I did feel like
time was also not on my side, because once people
start thinking I'm missing and the police get involved, He's
going to get more panic because the first, you know,
anybody close to me is going to say, look at him,
(39:19):
find this guy, and you're gonna find her. And so
I kind of thought, well, geez, if he gets agitated,
he's relatively calm. Now, you know he spooked, he knows, like,
oh man, I just like did something really bad, Like
he admitted, like I can't believe I did that, And
I'm like, yeah, me too, like so what are we
(39:40):
here for? But I mean all humor aside, though, yeah
it was. I did feel like time was like kind
of not on my side too, because as time went farther,
like I was like, I have to get out of
this by today because by tomorrow people are going to
know there's something wrong. Like I'm not just going to
disappear and tell nobody where I am and not have
(40:01):
my location on my phone or anything and not show
up to work, Like all these things just didn't you know,
wouldn't make sense. So I was kind of like, once
he gets agitated, who knows, Like if he didn't want
to kill me now, he probably would want to then
if he's you know, back against it all.
Speaker 1 (40:19):
Next, Samantha talks about the impossible situation she faced in
order to get her kidnapper to set her free. So
this is the first time you've had a conversation with
him since that protective order has expired, and you know,
that he's following you again. So what does he finally
(40:42):
tell you? What does he want from you? Why has
he kidnapped you in the very early hours of the
morning and chucked you in a box? Essentially, like, what
does he want?
Speaker 3 (40:50):
Uh, he's in love with me. He wants to get married.
He acknowledges that I would have no interest in that
and that that wouldn't be practical, you know, which is good,
I think, But he essentially is just like, you know,
I've never been able to get over you. I never
felt like you gave me closure. You know you wouldn't.
(41:12):
I was like, it's not like we ever dated what
you know, I'm thinking, what kind of closure was there?
You just stalked me. Like the only closure I need
is for you to leave me alone. And so I
kind of, you know, appease him. I'm like, you know,
I'm sorry, that was really unfair of me to do
all those years ago, and you know, kind of catered
to him and listen to him like I had trained
as a therapist. It was like I get how to
(41:34):
like listen to people and try to get to like
what the heart of their issue and concern is. And
that was kind of what I did, and I discovered,
you know, he was still in love with me, and
he feared I thought he was nuts. I was like,
clearly you are.
Speaker 1 (41:48):
But also wait that he's aware of that, Like he's
aware of what he's doing people who think he's crazy,
Like he's aware of that if he's saying that to you.
Speaker 3 (41:57):
Yeah, And I almost had to convince him otherwise, like
we can kind of forget about all of this. We've
had this misunderstanding, Like you know, I'm trying to think
what can I do to get out of this of
like how will he let me go? Well, he's afraid
of going to prison, you know, as soon as anybody
thinks I'm missing and go to find him, Like we
need to pretend this never happened, maybe so that he
(42:19):
doesn't go to prison, and that maybe we could just
be friends. Like I don't think he would believe that
I actually have a romantic interest in him. That would
be too unbelievable, But could we have some sort of
friendship something. So I spend this whole day, you know,
trying to answer his questions I learn, you know, I
(42:39):
ask him things, try to find out more about his
motivations and his life and he's just this like sad,
lonely person and just has not been able to get
over me in all these years, and it blows me away,
Like it was sad to me, but it was also
terrifying that somebody, you know, could feel that way about
(43:02):
someone for so long and knowingly commit this many crimes
to be able to see and talk to them. Like,
it's just wild to me. And clearly I thought the
whole time, you know, he's going to try to rape
me one way or another, whatever that looked like. And
essentially that's kind of what it comes down to. Like
we're waiting into the night at this point, and I
(43:25):
you know, try to convince him like if you let
me go tonight, nobody needs to know that this happened,
and he's like, well, how am I supposed to trust you?
My life's in your hands. I'm like, well, my life
has been in your hands all day. And he essentially
is like, I'm not going to let you go unless
we have sex, and I'm just like, there's no world
(43:46):
that makes me want to do that, and I'm very
clear like I have no interest in that, and this
is going to be really bad for us that like
if this if We're at this stalemate and we don't
you know, we run out of time. People know I'm missing.
It's going to escalate the whole situation. So I end
up like making it very clear to him I don't
(44:06):
want to sleep with you. I'm not, but like, if
this is what the terms of this agreement are, like,
I want you to look me in the eyes and
shake my hand that if we have sex you'll let
me go. And knowing like to me, I'm like, there's
no way anybody can actually give consent in this situation.
It doesn't really dawn on me that he doesn't quite
understand that, you know, until later on in the legal process.
(44:30):
He thinks, well, she agreed, you know, well I'm locked
in a box and you might kill me otherwise, so
or you could just tie me to this wall and
rape me anyway, you know, what's the safest thing for
me in this situation. So I made that really awful decision.
And then he eventually followed through with his end of
(44:53):
the promise and let me go, which was wild, you know.
So it's like, oh my gosh, I'm I did this,
Like I thought. I thought all day I was going
to die, and now I'm just you just let me
go into my car and what like what just happened?
(45:13):
So yeah, I mean I had spent the whole day
like trying to gather as much information about him and
the setting as I could because I knew. I was like,
if I can get out of this and go to police,
he's done so many crimes that he'll be put away.
Speaker 1 (45:27):
What I thought was incredible to after everything you've just
gone through and having to make that god awful decision
to save your own life, you have the presence of
mind to know that you can't jump in your car
and drive to a police station because you know that
that man is tracking your car now. So you're like,
how do I strategize to get myself to safety in
(45:50):
a way that he won't be able to follow me?
So you really think this out, and you find someone
that you think a neighbor whose car probably isn't being tracked,
and get their help in order to get you to
the hospital, because you know you need to go to
hospital first before for law enforcement gets involved. Even so, like,
is your mind just spinning at a thousand miles an
(46:12):
hour trying to come up with plans at this stage?
Or are you now at a point where you've been
stuck for thirteen years? Is that how your brain works now?
Is that how your brain subconsciously goes. I understand what
it means to avoid this man now, and I now
have taken it next level seriously.
Speaker 3 (46:27):
It had That's an interesting question. I feel like it
had in those last couple of years. I felt like
had been sort of a training ground for that whole day,
because I did feel like I always had to be
on edge. You know, where am I going? Is this
something that's safe? You know, if something were to happen,
(46:47):
would there be witnesses? Like I was always thinking about
those kinds of things, like I was somebody who liked
to go hiking with my dog. You know, I was
on edge and very cautious about what I was doing,
where I was going, you know, those kinds of things,
always like what kind of car is following me? Have
I seen this person before? Sort of thing? So I
(47:09):
feel like I don't know. Also, our minds are a
brilliant thing, like when that's all you have to survive,
like I don't know. You hear about mothers being able
to lift vehicles off their children like this, You know,
survival instinct, and I feel like because my mind was
the only thing that was going to get me out
of that, I just could do everything. In that day.
(47:31):
I was really on point. I made like one mistake
probably through that one or maybe two very small mistakes
through that whole day where I was like, I have
done everything I can to get myself out of this
situation and to stay safe, even from the moment he
let me go and like going home because he was
tracking my car. You know, if he saw that I
wasn't going home like I said I was going to,
(47:54):
would he have tailgated me or ended up like running
me off the road or something, or would he have
shown up at the hospital or police station with me
and had some other story of his own, like you know,
how can I do this in the safest way possible
and you know get him in trouble. So yeah, I
knew from being a social worker, I knew I needed
(48:17):
a sane exam. I knew that DNA evidence was important.
I needed to get to the hospital for that. I
was like, also, this is a wild thing that's happened.
I'm not just going to go call the cops and
be like this is what happened. Because they would have
been like, yeah, okay, we'll send somebody. You know, I
just didn't if I heard that story, I would have
been skeptical too. If I heard something like that over
(48:39):
the phone. I'm like, if I'm in a safe place
in the hospital, you know, I think it'll be a
different setting. There's going to be potentially DNA evidence now.
Speaker 1 (48:47):
And what was it like seeing yourself in hospital after
that day?
Speaker 2 (48:52):
Because the police had.
Speaker 1 (48:53):
His body cam on when he came to interview you, Like,
what's it like to see you in that hospital bed
in the aftermath of everything you'd been through that day?
I imagine that would be so difficult to see it was.
Speaker 3 (49:05):
I don't know that it was necessarily difficult. It was
interesting seeing me, like seeing that back in that setting
and like how I felt like my jaw hurts so bad,
like I had ice PAGs on my jaw, and that
you know, some of that film, and I just remember,
you know, being on the other side watching the detective
and like trying to answer his questions and thinking like
(49:29):
is he believing me? And you know, seeing it from
his perspective of this person. I don't know that it
was necessarily difficult. I think you know, watching back, you know,
hearing about how I had to tell my friends that
this happened, and you know, the court process and all
of that was you know, difficult. I think watching my
(49:49):
friends and family go through this was like probably harder
than I feel like me going through it. You know,
I can't imagine this happening to a loved one and like,
you know, yeah, I'd want to reach across the table
and ring his neck probably if this happened to or
someone I cared about.
Speaker 1 (50:07):
One of your friends is like, I wish I'd killed
him that day that he confronted him and he turned
up at a place where you were.
Speaker 2 (50:13):
He's like, I wish I'd done more. I wish i'd
killed him.
Speaker 3 (50:15):
I think probably there's a lot of people in my
life that feel that way or have said similar things,
just because you you know, how do you reconcile that?
And I'm I don't know. For some reason, it feels
different being myself and like not that I've necessarily forgiven him,
but I don't feel a lot of anger toward him. Surprisingly,
(50:36):
I'm very thankful that he's in prison. I wouldn't believe
a thing that comes out of his mouth.
Speaker 1 (50:41):
Well, can you talk us through that court process, because
there was a couple of things that happened there. One
he came up with a story to explain why and
how you ended up in a soundproof box inside a
storage unit in the middle of the night. Talk us
through the story that he gave police and then kind
of tried to give in court about how you ended
(51:02):
up in that soundproof box.
Speaker 3 (51:04):
Yeah, so I had asked to through a lot of
my therapy process. I had asked to come to the
courthouse and like meet the prosecutor and go through some
of the evidence, just for like exposure therapy, you know,
especially off the bat right after this happened, Like I
wasn't sleeping. I was having you know, difficulties with open
(51:26):
doors and small places and things like bananas and like
weird anyway, So when we went there, she had prefaced
you know, we have this video of his you know, interrogation,
but I want to warn you what his you know,
I want to preface this is kind of what he says,
(51:46):
and they you know, they asked me about it as well,
like he claims this, can you tell me more about
you know, have you had sexual relations with him? His
defense initially when he speaks with the detectives after being arrested,
was that we had a long standing role play sexual
(52:09):
thing going on where I had asked him to surprise
me this day and time at my house on a
Friday at seven am on a workday, and he took
things a little too far, was kind of his defense,
and that I was upset about it, you know, and
there was no you know, well, how would you plan
(52:30):
these sort of meetups? Like your number is blocked on
her phone, like there's no evidence of any communication between you.
How are you meeting in person and like talking this through?
Like well no, Like, well she's somewhere and I'll show up,
so like okay, so you're following her like no, like
(52:52):
just none of it makes sense and bless him. One
of the detectives said, well, when my wife says she
wants to be surprised, I'll come home with chocolates and flowers,
I don't come and you know, choke her and bind
her and take her somewhere, Like that's not a that's
(53:14):
not necessarily a surprise. And so it was just this
kind of crazy idea that was kind of his initial defense.
You know. Later he obviously they could tease out that
any of that was not accurate. That was his story,
and he had pled. Ultimately, he pled guilty by advice
(53:35):
of his legal counsel. But his attorney had a really
hard time working with him. I think they had tried
many cognitive evaluations to see if he could be deemed incompetent,
essentially get mental health treatment instead of standing trial or
being sentenced. But he just kept passing the cognitive tests,
(53:55):
so that drew everything out by like a year. So
he's just sitting in jail, and I'm sitting at my house,
you know, not sure. I end up having to sell
my house and like, you can't live here anymore. My
roommate moves out. She's like I don't want to live here,
and like I get it, but now now I'm here alone,
(54:16):
and it was just, yeah, it was a rough time.
And then you know, it was February twenty twenty four
before you was sentenced.
Speaker 1 (54:28):
What's wild, too, is that the judge ends up being
the same one who denied your protection order.
Speaker 3 (54:34):
Right, Yeah, that's what I was just going to say.
It was the same judge that when I found that out,
I was like, oh no, Like this was the same
judge that had denied my protective order, and to be clear,
the court had said, you know, we would like you
both to appear in person to figure out to get
to the bottom of this, to determine if we can
(54:54):
order that second PPO.
Speaker 1 (54:56):
This is before he kidnapped you, Yes, before.
Speaker 3 (54:58):
He kidnapped me. But I'm like, no, I'm not like
poking this bear in case they don't give it. So
that was kind of the court defense. But at the
same time, I was like, the court never even looked
into my previous PPO. They just kind of dismissed my request.
And now this happened, and this awful thing has happened,
and now we're right in front of the same judge again,
(55:19):
and so I think, well, this is either maybe going
to help me or hurt me. I don't really know,
you know, I don't know this person. I don't know.
I would hope that they're fair. They're a judge. You know,
there's plenty of evidence there.
Speaker 1 (55:32):
That's the thing with a lot of women who do
take things this, you know, down a legal avenue, is
that there's a fear that even if they all believed
that the legal system might not back them up at
the end of the day, and that's the thing for you,
is like if he doesn't plead guilty, if he doesn't
go to jail, like where does that leave you?
Speaker 3 (55:51):
Yeah, then essentially I was warned very clearly, like if
he doesn't take a plea deal or if we don't
offer him that for whatever reason, and this goes to trial,
everything about you will be scrutinized. And I'm like, why
should I. I'm not the one who's on trial. I'm
the victim in this situation, or theoretically the victim if
(56:12):
you believe maybe this didn't happen, But it just was
kind of wild to me, and I was like, there's
so much evidence, but even then, like my sexual history
probably would have been dragged through court or just anything
about me, which seems so intrusive and unfair when it's
(56:33):
something that happened to me and not you know. But
he did end up taking a plea deal, and he
wouldn't plead guilty to any of the sexual assault charges,
which is something that really I struggled with for a while,
just because I'm like, you rate me, I want you
to be labeled as a rapist.
Speaker 1 (56:54):
Is that because he fully believed that what had happened
between you was consensual.
Speaker 3 (56:58):
Yes. His legal counsel even said, this would be in
your interest to plead to at least one of them,
and demon's straight that you have remorse, et cetera. And
he said, no, I you know, she consented. This was
this was not an inappropriate act. Like However, many times
it sounded like his attorney tried to explain it to
(57:19):
him or other people tried to explain consent and what
needs to be in place for that. Being locked in
a room under duress, you know, that doesn't allow someone
to give consent. So yeah, that that part I kind
of struggled with because I was like, I want him
to be fully responsible for all of the charges, but
(57:43):
the judge can consider the full case when sentencing, even
if formal you know, charges are dismissed, and I don't.
It didn't really make the documentary, but the judge did
have a pretty lengthy statement toward me about just was
very complimentary, Like before I'm reading my impact statement and
(58:04):
so I'm just like, you know, tear, He's like Christopher's
there fifteen feet from me. I'm standing in front of
this judge and he's you know, I think, well, that's
a good sign. He's like, you know, you saved your
own life and you know, all of this kind of thing,
and he really ripped into Christopher, like, you know, he
took that into consideration. You know, his life expectancy based
(58:28):
on his age, et cetera. He essentially got sentenced forty
to sixty years, which at about forty years of age,
he's going to be at least eighty by the time
he gets out, more or less a life sentence. So
I was thankful for that, and essentially, you know, the
judge was like, if you've been doing this to this
person for this long, I don't see there being any
(58:50):
chance of rehabilitation for you, which is sad because I
don't think it was probably always like that. You know,
had he had a therapist or some other intervention way
back in college or something, you know, could things have
been different. You know, his life is ruined because of it.
Not to say I feel bad about that necessarily, but
(59:10):
in terms of mental health and impact, you know, it's
not just about as women, how do we protect ourselves. Well, yeah,
maybe I don't become somebody who's a victim, but somebody
else will because that person's going to go ahead and
stalk someone else or sexually assault someone else and statistically
that's the case.
Speaker 2 (59:31):
Well you found that out eventually, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (59:34):
They found even with Christopher, he had stalked another woman
prior to me that nobody knew, Like it was on
like file, it was legally there, but you know I
didn't know about it. Yeah, he had been in trouble
for this before. So for me, I'm like, how can
we help make laws that can make things easier for
(59:55):
victims to get help, to get protection orders, to get resources,
et cetera. And how do we also prevent people from
aging this behavior to begin with? You know, I know
the pandemic wasn't kind to a lot of folks in
terms of mental health, and maybe this was you know,
something that went into all of it for him. But
(01:00:17):
you know, people don't become like this overnight usually, you know,
this is something that's a process. And you know the
fact that people that were close to him, like friends,
saw that what he had gotten in trouble for and
immediately thought of me makes me think you knew something
was wrong and you you know, what do you do
(01:00:38):
about it? Though? You know, are there more resources where
you can try to get somebody help more easily, or
it's not a burden financial burden to the person, or
doesn't you know, get them in legal trouble. But how
do they get help or how do they even realize
that there's something wrong? You know, I'm not confident that
Chris knew that there was something off, you know, with.
Speaker 1 (01:01:00):
Him, even the conversations he had with his mom on
the phone from prison, where she was saying to him, like,
I could have helped maybe had I known and had
I got your help when you were younger. And also
he kind of said to her that it probably wouldn't
have made a difference anyway, We'll never know.
Speaker 3 (01:01:17):
I mean, I like to think that early intervention would
be helpful, that you can change the course of somebody's life.
I mean, in every case, probably not, but for some
people definitely. You know, if you had gotten more help
or resources or other things to help socialize or to
process your feelings more, you know, particularly for men, that's
(01:01:38):
not Men don't like talking about their feelings. They don't
know where to go. It comes out in anger. You know,
you have all these other you know, issues that happen
because of it. You know, how do we get people
the kind of help they need to kind of help them,
you know, get on their goals and find him an
appropriate partner or love interest or something that's.
Speaker 2 (01:02:00):
A healthy relationship.
Speaker 3 (01:02:01):
Yeah, no is no, and it's not a okay, Well
let me try, and later it's no. This person says no,
and so I'm gonna look elsewhere.
Speaker 1 (01:02:13):
Just finally, Samantha, I want to know, like, it's been
three years since that happened to you, and I mean,
all up, if we want to look at it, it was
thirteen years of stalking and then being abducted, So it
was a long term thing for you to deal with.
I imagine that change is a person, not just the
incident itself in twenty twenty two, But that's thirteen years
(01:02:34):
where you had to watch your back.
Speaker 2 (01:02:36):
How do you.
Speaker 1 (01:02:37):
Think that's changed you as a person now? And do
you still have to take that experience into consideration as
you step out into the world every day, Like is
it is it getting further in your mind or is
it still fresh for you? Like how do you recover?
Speaker 3 (01:02:52):
I think in some ways things are kind of getting
better with time, Like, no matter what, if there was
somebody in the house with me, that was first few
months and then we're making a noise. I just would
feel very tense, like, oh, there's somebody in the house,
like this is my roommate or my friend or something.
But like noises would set me off, or like a
(01:03:15):
stranger coming to my door to sell something, or like
a repair man or something would really freak me out.
That like first year or two and now I'm like,
you know, it's a thing that happens. People's solicit for
different reasons from time to time. Or you know, there's
a mailman that needs a signature for something. You know,
those more common things. I don't so much get the
(01:03:37):
heart racing like I used to. I'm still definitely somebody
looks over my shoulders a lot. You know, I'm never
I never have headphones in. I'm not wandering around by
myself at night, you know, the common common things. I
haven't lived in a safe area, but yeah, and some
of the like startle responses. I feel like have gotten
better with time, but there's things that always like I'm
(01:03:59):
very leery about men after all of this, and I
don't know how much that's going to change people. I
have established relationships with great but like meeting new people
in terms of friends or colleagues, Like I just am
very suspicious to start from, which I know isn't always fair.
But those things, like all of that has shaped, you know,
(01:04:22):
how I interact with people, or if like somebody cat
calls me on the street or a man tries to
hit on me at a bar, just the way I
respond to those things is like I don't take any
of that. Like my reaction is a lot more stern
than it used to be. And it's not so much
(01:04:42):
like a brush it off. It's like that's not okay,
like you need to like step away kind of thing.
Speaker 1 (01:04:48):
So there's no more playing it nice to help anyone's feelings.
Speaker 2 (01:04:52):
It's literally just protect yourself. Now.
Speaker 3 (01:04:54):
Yeah, it's not so much you know, being nice to
people hasn't really gotten me anywhere. I'm still nice, I say,
for the most part, but especially with men that seem
like they have any interest, I just not. You know,
you don't get the time of day. So some of
those types of things have changed, for sure. I'm getting
(01:05:16):
a bit better about doing things like on my own.
I was somebody who's like very independent. I'd hike alone,
I'd go camping alone, like sometimes and those are like
things I just can't I don't feel safe doing anymore.
Speaker 1 (01:05:30):
Samith, I'd love to end with I don't know what
advice you could give to someone who might have a
stalker in their life right now, Like if someone is
dealing with what you dealt with and is like really
not knowing how to handle it, Like, what do you
tell people who say that they're having a similar experience
to you.
Speaker 3 (01:05:48):
I think i'd say, like, take it seriously. Like it's
easier to brush off and think of it like, oh,
it's not a big deal, but you don't know that
it isn't a big deal yet, And trying to get
help sooner than later is always good, even if it's
just a matter of you having like a stalking log
(01:06:08):
where you're documenting the times this person is contacting you,
what your response is, or you know where you're seeing
them in the event you do need that, and to
file a police report sooner than later. If the police
roll their eyes at you, they rolled their eyes at
you like there's nothing, you have to do something about it,
(01:06:28):
and it's discouraging to be met with resistance or skepticism,
but you know, taking it seriously and reporting it to
I think can help the person kind of go away sooner,
depending you know what their what their response or what
they're thinking. You know, communicate clearly, don't you know, Oh sorry,
(01:06:54):
I'm busy, be very stern, be very clear. Let friends
and family know about it, not so that they can
be scared, but so that they are aware, you know,
if something does happen to you, if they can be
on the lookout if they see this person. I think
jumping to the conclusion of stalking, you know, for me,
was tough. I think you just like to think of, oh,
(01:07:15):
this person's annoying. You're like, they just don't leave me alone,
like they're probably stalking you. Like it maybe isn't to
the you know extreme that mine was, but I never
would have guessed that this was something that could happen
to me.
Speaker 1 (01:07:30):
Stalking Samantha is now streaming on Disney Plus. Here in
Australia Hulu. If you're listening somewhere not here. If you
need support in fear you're being stalked, report it to
the police. Additionally, if you need to talk about what's
happening to you, you can reach out to one eight
hundred Respect on their one eight hundred seven three seven
seven three to two helpline. True Crime Conversations is a
(01:07:50):
podcast hosted by me Claire Murphy and produced by Alaria
Brophy and Tarlie Blackman, with audio designed by Jacob Brown.
Thanks so much for listening. I'll be back next week
with another True Crime Conversation