Forty-three-year-old repeat stalker Anthony Carpenter lasted just a day in the free world after his recent release from jail before he was arrested for showing up at his victim’s house.
During the spring of 2024, Carpenter began appearing uninvited at the Murrysville, Pennsylvania home of a female singer who happens to be a member of the popular rock band Flyleaf. The obsessed superfan’s first arrest came in April after he was seen lurking on the property despite the obvious presence of “No Trespassing” signs. Police found Carpenter sleeping at a local park a short while later and arrested him on a defiant trespass charge.
Carpenter’s Second Arrest
Authorities told Carpenter to stay away from the property, but he continued to go there despite living a four-hour drive away in Rutland, Ohio. He also sent the woman hundreds of letters and emails professing his love for her, with some of the correspondence containing threatening overtones.
At 7:30 AM one morning in May, Carpenter rang the woman’s doorbell and was seen walking around the house. After he left, a member of the victim’s household gave police a collection of his creepy letters and emails.
Shortly thereafter, officers arrested Carpenter at a nearby restaurant on suspicion of stalking, defiant trespass, and harassment. He spent more than six months in jail before pleading guilty to two misdemeanor stalking charges and one count of defiant trespassing. The judge sentenced him to time served plus a year of probation, and he was released from custody in early December.
Carpenter’s Third Arrest
As a condition of his freedom, Carpenter was ordered to return to Ohio and banned from contacting the victim or anyone associated with her. Just hours after leaving jail, however, he showed up at the woman’s home. According to the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, the repeat stalker arrived in a flat-bed truck shortly before 10 at night with a McDonald’s bag in his hand. A household member told him to leave and called the police.
Officers quickly located the truck and pulled the vehicle over. Carpenter was riding as a passenger, and it’s unclear who was driving. Police arrested him on charges of stalking, harassment, and defiant trespass and booked him into custody at the Westmoreland County Prison, where he remains held without bail amid his ongoing case.
The judge did the right thing by tossing Carpenter back in jail. I wish more judges would take a no-nonsense approach to stalking cases.
It seems like common sense that a judge would detain a stalker who either can’t or won’t stop reoffending on their own. But this doesn’t always happen. My stalker was arrested and turned loose so many times that I lost count.
Just six weeks after his release from federal prison, he emailed a business associate of the victim he had just served time for stalking. The authorities charged him with violating probation, and the judge ordered him to undergo additional outpatient mental health counseling – which, at that point, was like placing a Band-Aid over a nicked artery. Completely fucking pointless.
A multitude of additional violation charges followed. And while my stalker would spend a few weeks or a month in jail here and there, he was never meaningfully disciplined. To add insult to injury, he knew he was getting away with his continued crimes, and he relished in it. Rubbed it in his victims’ faces every chance he got while the FBI monitored his social media and let it happen.
“The feds don’t mess around.” You sure about that?
I was especially surprised by the leniency my stalker received due to the fact that he was on federal probation. People always say that the feds don’t mess around, but in my experience, they babied the defendant to the point of letting him run them over. It actually reached a point where I thought to myself, ‘the people involved in this case ought to be embarrassed and ashamed. He’s running the show, and everyone sees it.’
The court eventually began imposing harsher consequences on my stalker, but it took a really long fucking time. I still don’t know what will happen with his case, and I’m confident that the judge and prosecutor are finally treating the matter with the seriousness it deserves. But I hope to see a day when more judges and prosecutors treat stalking as a serious crime by default, not only after the situation has devolved into ten times the mess it needs to be.