New Ideas to Foil Celebrity Stalkers

The anonymous note had been hand-delivered to the production office, though no one knew when or by whom. It read: “Shoot Butch and knock off the swearing or she’ll end up in the unemployment line I guarantee.”

The threat was directed at Sharon Gless, who was then starring in the TV series “Cagney & Lacey.” The actress had for years received unwelcome attention from disturbed fans, including a young woman who in 1990 barricaded herself inside Gless’ home with a rifle and 500 rounds of ammunition.

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Threatening letters as a typical form of stalking, according to Brooke Plantenga, Gless’ former personal assistant and now a private security consultant. But as Plantenga told a group of celebrity personal assistants last week, Hollywood stars are adopting more sophisticated means of tracking and foiling would-be stalkers and even paparazzi. Personal assistants, who have control over a star’s correspondence and scheduling, have in many cases become the first line of defense.

Plantenga said that besides closely monitoring fan mail, which experts have long advised, celebrities and their aides are devising living trusts and taking other steps to keep addresses and personal information out of public records. She even counsels clients to avoid a fashionable type of journalism that consists of interviews in stars’ homes.

This get-tough strategy “is almost like a witness protection [program], except you don’t have to change your name,” Plantenga told about 30 listeners at a meeting of the Assn. of Celebrity Personal Assistants, a 4-year-old group whose membership includes former aides to Ronald Reagan, Mel Gibson and other celebrities.

Such an approach is perhaps the inevitable result of a number of highly publicized star-stalking cases, the most recent involving Robert Dewey Hoskins, a 38-year-old homeless man convicted in January of threatening to kill Madonna, her bodyguard and personal assistant. But the public never learns of many cases.

“There are probably very few celebrities and public figures who aren’t subject to this kind of behavior,” said Lt. John Lane, who heads up the Threat Management Unit of the Los Angeles Police Department. The unit’s seven detectives investigate about 200 stalking cases a year, a third or so involving celebrities.

Lane characterized the typical celebrity stalker as a “socially maladjusted” male suffering from schizophrenia or other serious mental disorders. Such stalkers seldom have jobs or stable relationships. “These are very long-term cases,” he said. “The duration of the obsession can last well over 10 years.”

Joni Leigh Penn, the Garden Grove woman who pled no contest to burglary charges in the Gless case, admitted to stalking the actress for two years. She sent Gless more than 100 letters, some of which included a chilling series of photographs that showed Penn in male drag or holding a gun to her own head, Plantenga said.

California’s anti-stalking law, enacted in 1990, has empowered police to investigate and sometimes make arrests in connection with “different bizarre behaviors people have found threatening,” Lane said. But Plantenga argued that personal assistants should develop strategies to disarm and prevent threatening behavior before it escalates into a confrontation.

She advised personal assistants to avoid signing letters from stars to fans with such seemingly innocuous closing lines as “fondly” or “always.” Such words might reinforce a stalker’s delusional tie to the celebrity. Fan mail sent to a star’s home should never be answered, she said, because a reply would only verify the address.

Living trusts--legal documents that place a person’s real estate and other assets under a fictitious name--can foil stalkers (and journalists) who use the public record to get information about a celebrity, Plantenga said. Some stars have even asked courts to strike their real names from divorce proceedings and lawsuits.

Plantenga even advised personal assistants to nix interviews with such publications as Time Warner’s In Style magazine, which often publishes photographs and stories showing stars relaxing at home. “These unprecedented insights into the celebrity’s personal life only feed the ‘privacy invader’s’ quest for a personal relationship,” she said.

Martha Nelson, managing editor of In Style, said that the magazine had taken pains to ensure its subjects’ privacy and had experienced no problems. But she agreed that the topic is a sensitive one: “We all know security is a growing concern for everyone in the culture, not just celebrities.” After consulting with its own security experts, she said, the magazine is careful not to photograph home exteriors or mention specific streets or neighborhoods.

Plantenga admitted that her approach may virtually isolate the star from fans and the press. But arguing that it may be the only way to guarantee privacy, she quotes Justice Louis Brandeis: “The right to be left alone is the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by civilized man.”