A New York man by the name of Joshua R. Stetar was arrested Friday for stalking two young girls, a 15-year-old and her sister, he met while playing an unspecified title in the Halo franchise. Stetar, 20 years old, had discovered the girl's address by searching online and had been sending flowers and other packages -- which her parents returned -- to her home since they first met online in 2006. Stetar had apparently driven 40 hours straight from his home in Saratoga Springs, New York to the girl's home in Spokane, Washington, where he drove by her house and sent her threatening text messages. According to the Associated Press, the girl's parents were outside the home at the time and saw Stetar driving past. They wrote down Stetar's license plate number and called the police, who later tracked down Stetar at a hotel and arrested him. He has since posted the $10,000 bond and was released on Saturday.
A disturbing story to be sure. Let this be a reminder to the parents out there to utilize the 360's parental controls and keep an eye on what their kids are playing.
[Via Gaming Today. Thanks YGZ Kentucky and Foolio]
Read - Detailed report from KHQ
Read - AP report via KOMO
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 2)
1-02-2008 @ 5:46PM
DaMan09 said...
Did they have recon armor?
1-02-2008 @ 5:47PM
Ndray13 said...
Killswitch: Explain to me what a psycho is supposed to look like? Are psycho's supposed to a have a tatoo on thier forehead?
Yeah there are two sides of the story and we are only hearing the one side. The guy is 20, and the girls are underage. That is all we need to hear!!!!
The guy should be in jail where he can passed around like currency and maybe get stalked by America's finest criminals.
1-02-2008 @ 5:56PM
Larry *not allowed to say cheevo* said...
What this story doesn't tell you is that the threats he was making were to "Rape you and your sister". Now, maybe that was just in Halo... since youngsters seem to used that phrase without actually knowing it's meaning.
Maybe he was going to rape them in halo... Takes the teabagging to a whole new level.
1-02-2008 @ 6:36PM
john paul said...
Children shouldn't even be playing this game in the first place...but whos stopping them: NOONE
(actually though i did start playing halo CE when i was 14)
1-02-2008 @ 6:53PM
Dean Tripp said...
Wow, When I first read this story I figured the guy was from Washington, but after reading I realized he's from Saratoga Springs, that's like 15 miles away... He made a really long drive to Washington but you have to blame the parents as well, their kids gave away their phone number, a quick google search gives you an address, name, everything you need for stalking, I mean 15 year olds should be intelligent enough not to give such information away.
1-02-2008 @ 8:28PM
wickedpheonix said...
FFS why would you give your phone number or address or something like that over XBL?! Cue the "she deserved it" arguments... and yes parental controls exist for a reason.
1-02-2008 @ 9:37PM
Anticrawl said...
I hope someone beats that kid, clearly she didn't learn not to talk to strangers or respect her parents enough to listen when they said that. Either way it's bad parenting involved here. Watch and beat your kids people! Be parents, get involved in what they are doing or atleast monitor them. For gods sake you could atleast ask what they've been up to.
Hmm, though you guys should worry about that stalker. As soon as he gets back in the slammer they will beat the fuck out of the guy. Pedophiles don't last long in jail.
1-02-2008 @ 9:39PM
Anticrawl said...
You shouldn't* worry about the stalker I meant. Yeah the other criminals will take care of him.
1-03-2008 @ 2:47AM
Zeus the God said...
Maybe she should get raped... That will teach her a lesson. As long as shes not a fatty or extremely ugly, I'm up to the task...
Jokes, jokes...
1-03-2008 @ 5:10AM
mattclarkie said...
I think you could probably be arrested for such comments. Now days there is no such thing as a joke, no matter how obvious it is that you are kidding. Everyone is a pervert.
Hey you, what are you doing in the kiddies department.
I have to walk through it to get to the Mensware.
Pervert, arrest that man.
1-03-2008 @ 9:46AM
DjDATZ said...
Beat your kids! Anticrawl FTW!
And yea...he won't last long in jail...even people in jail know not to go after minors.
1-03-2008 @ 4:43AM
mattclarkie said...
If this started in 2006, then it is so obviously Halo 2. Why are you using the Halo 3 logo? What a bunch of n00bs, I'm gonna stalk you like a l33t, and pwn you so bad.
lol, even stalking can be made funny with that ridiculous online speak.
1-03-2008 @ 8:18AM
JakubK666 said...
n0 y(_)o teh n()()b , giv m3 ur 4dr3ss s0 i c4n s74lk u.
Imo considering what a promiscuous bitches nowdays teens are I wouldn't be surprised if it was her to seduce him.
I'm not defending a pedophile/stalker as he deserves to go to jail, but think outside the box.
PS: I'm not saying all girls are like that.
Just the majority.
PS2: Interesting opinions, from somebody who's a teen himself :)