Woman Gets Probation for Threatening Actor

A Westlake Village shipping clerk who in a year’s time sent nearly 6,000 threatening letters to actor Michael J. Fox was sentenced to three years’ probation Friday after she pleaded guilty to three counts of making terrorist threats.

Tina Marie Ledbetter, 27, was also ordered to receive psychiatric therapy and to stay away from Fox, his wife, actress Tracy Pollan, and the couple’s young child. Deputy Dist. Atty. Susan Gruber said Ledbetter could face a maximum jail term of four years and four months if she violates the terms of the plea bargain.

Ledbetter told investigators that she hated Pollan and was furious when Fox married her. The expletive-filled letters began arriving in February, 1988, at a rate averaging 15 a day. When she was arrested a year later, investigators found more than thousand threatening letters ready to be sent.