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Robert the Celebrity Stalker · 10 Minute Murder | Bingeable True Crime Stories

• 0:08
  Dispersing in nineteen seventy. Robert John Bardo was born to an American father and
• 0:42
  a Korean mother, and as the youngest sibling of seven, his childhood was
• 0:47
  a bit chaotic. Robert's dad was in the US Air Force, causing that
• 0:51
  large family to move states several times before finally settling down in Arizona when Robert
• 0:57
  was in his early teens. The frequent moves weren't the only unstable aspect of
• 1:02
  Robert's childhood. One of his older siblings abused him and he became suicidal,
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  causing him to be removed from his family and put into foster care. Several
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  other members of Robert's family were diagnosed with mental illness, and eventually Robert was
• 1:18
  diagnosed with bipolar disorder when he was only fifteen years old. His emotional state
• 1:23
  was so bad that he was institutionalized. He attended high school up until the
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  ninth grade, when he decided to drop out. During this time, Robert's
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  life had been taken over by a deep obsession with a celebrity, Samantha Smith,
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  an activist in her early teens who had become famous after her anti war
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  letter to a Soviet ambassador received international attention. Robert's fascination with thirteen year old
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  Samantha quickly snowballed out of control, and before long he was actively stalking her.
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  He even traveled to Maine in the hopes of meeting her in person when
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  she she returned from a trip to the Soviet Union, but after a run
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  in with police, he lost his nerve and went back home regardless. Robert
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  planned on continuing to stalk Samantha, but then in nineteen eighty five, bar
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  Harbor Airlines Flight eighteen oh eight crashed with Samantha on board, killing her instantly.
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  With the object of his obsession suddenly dead, Robert was left reeling.
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  He tried to focus on a couple of female pop stars instead, but although
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  he became briefly obsessed, he never ended up stalking any of them. Finally,
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  in nineteen eighty six, he found somebody who made him feel the same
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  way that Samantha Smith had, Rebecca Schaeffer, an actress on the popular sitcom
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  My Sister Sam. At the age of sixteen, Robert watched an episode of
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  the series, and he was immediately infatuated with Rebecca. Quote, she came
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  into my life at the right moment. She was brilliant, pretty outrageous.
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  Her innocence impressed me. She turned into a goddess for me, an idol.
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  Since then I turned into an atheist. I only adored her. From
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  that moment onward, Robert started writing to Rebecca to express his admiration. Although
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  she didn't reply, he still felt like the two of them shared a close
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  bond. The next year, Rebecca actually wrote a reply to one of his
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  letters, sending a short note where she told Robert, your letter was one
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  of the nicest I ever got. Although it was the only time Rebecca ever
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  communicated with him, Robert believed that the note confirmed his feelings were mutual.
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  Desperate to communicate with her in some way, Robert ended up arriving at the
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  set where My Sister Sam was being filmed, and he tried to locate Rebecca.
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  He was holding an enormous teddy bear at a bunch of flowers, which
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  he hoped he would be able to give her as the next step in their
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  romantic relationship. Instead, he was apprehended by the security team, who refused
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  to allow him on the set. A Warner Brothers policy meant that all actors
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  and actresses needed to be informed if a member of the public was making uninvited
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  advances for their own safety. However, Rebecca was never told about Robert's arrival
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  on set. Because Robert had cooperated when he was told to leave, and
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  he didn't seem threatening or violent, the security team decided that it wasn't worth
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  worrying Rebecca. In the thick of his obsession with Rebecca, Robert's emotional state
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  was deteriorating. From nineteen eighty seven to early nineteen eighty eight. His neighbors
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  expressed that he made them feel unsafe in their own neighborhood, and he was
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  even arrested several times for disorderly conduct and domestic violence. He might have left
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  without a fuss when he was refused access to the My Sister Sam set,
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  but the incident didn't deter him from trying to meet Rebecca. Instead, he
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  hired a detective to find out the actress's home address, and using motor vehicle
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  records, they were able to find it. During this time, Robert wrote
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  a letter to his sister, telling her quote, I have an obsession with
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  the unattainable, and I have to eliminate what I cannot attain. He also
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  decided to buy a gun, and when he was denied due to his mental
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  illness, he got his brother to buy one for him instead. On the
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  eighteenth of July nineteen eighty nine, Robert arrived at Rebecca Schaeffer's home with his
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  gun. A few years ago, he might have met her and expressed his
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  love and admiration for her, but now he was no longer viewing her in
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  an affectionate light. He had been infuriated to see that she filmed an intimate
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  scene in one of her recent films, causing him to describe her as just
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  another Hollywood whore who had lost the sense of innocence that appealed to him.
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  In his eyes, she had betrayed him. Robert rang the doorbell of Rebecca's
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  apartment, told her his name, and showed her the note she written him
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  in response to one of his letters. Rebecca didn't seem alarmed by Robert's presence.
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  Instead, she was friendly, shaking his hand before telling him that she
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  had an appointment that she needed to get ready for. After visiting a nearby
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  diner and buying himself breakfast, Robert decided to visit Rebecca's apartment a second time
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  to give her a CD that he'd bought her. He rang the doorbell,
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  and once again Rebecca answered it herself. This time she wasn't as friendly,
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  telling Robert to hurry up. Ultimately, Rebecca had no time to react.
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  Robert pulled out a shotgun, fatally shooting her, and then fled the scene.
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  He had been carrying a copy of the book The Catcher and the Rye
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  with him throughout the entire ordeal, and for some reason he decided to throw
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  it onto the roof of a nearby building when he ran away from the apartment.
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  He was arrested for the murder after being found in a dazed state,
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  stumbling through busy streets and narrowly avoiding being hit by cars. At Robert's trial,
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  he said that the decision to murder Rebecca had been influenced by a song
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  Exit by the band U two, which had lyrics that were written to portray
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  the thoughts of a murderer. The song was played for the jury, and
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  Robert sat in the courtroom mouthing the words. Another media influence brought up at
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  the trial was the fact that Robert had been holding a paperback of The Catcher
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  and the Rye during the crime. The prosecution pointed out that this detail was
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  incredibly similar to another crime, when Mark David Chapman fatally shot John Lennon,
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  he had been carrying a copy of the same book. Despite the glaring similarity,
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  Robert insisted that the choice of the book was nothing but a coincidence.
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  Later on, Mark David Chapman claimed that Robert had actually written to him in
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  prison before killing Rebecca, asking him questions about what it was like to be
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  in prison. The defense attorneys agreed that Robert had killed Rebecca, but argued
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  that he should have a lighter sentence due to his mental illness. Psychiatrist and
• 8:03
  criminologist Parke Deets testified about his assessment of Robert, telling the jury that Robert
• 8:09
  was diagnosed with schizophrenia, which had caused him to commit the crime despite his
• 8:16
  significant history with mental illness. The jury found Robert guilty of murder in the
• 8:20
  first degree. He received a life sentence without parole. The crime caused intense
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  public scrutiny of the state Department of Motor Vehicles because many people were concerned that
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  Robert had been so easily able to obtain Rebecca's home address through her DMV records.
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  This resulted in the Driver's Privacy Protection Act being passed by Congress forbidding the
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  state departments from sharing home addresses. Rebecca's murder also resulted in the United States
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  first laws aimed at preventing stalking. In two thousand and seven, Robert was
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  walking from his cell to get breakfast when he was attacked by another inmate who
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  had been convicted of set second degree murder. He was stabbed a total of
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  eleven times with two different shives, but after a brief treatment at the UC
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  Davis Medical Center, he made a full recovery. Eventually, Robert was moved
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  from Mule Creek State Prisons maximum security units to a medium security unit at Avana
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  State Prison, where he will likely remain for the rest of his life.
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  That's ten minute murder for today, brief and binge able true crime. I'm
• 9:39
  Joe, that's my name. I'm the host, and thank you for taking
• 9:41
  the time to listen. And I know what you're thinking. Joe saw Baby
• 9:46
  Reindeer on Netflix, so of course he's going to do an episode about stalking.
• 9:50
  And that's partial that's partially true. I did not come up with this
• 9:52
  topic. Someone like one of you listening emailed me and said, hey,
• 9:56
  Joe, have you heard of this case? Would you like to cover in
• 10:00
  one of your episodes. I put it on the list to you to eventually
• 10:03
  get to and then I saw baby Reindeer, and I'm just like, oh,
• 10:07
  this reminds me a little bit of the Rebecca Schaeffer story. So I
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  went back and found that and then boom, here we are today. It's
• 10:16
  not exactly the same, obviously, because the outcomes are very different, but
• 10:20
  they are both about stalking, and they are both pretty terrifying. And by
• 10:22
  the way, if you've got a story that you would like for me to
• 10:24
  cover, or if you just want to send me an email and tell me
• 10:28
  anything under the sun that you want to tell me, a recipe for a
• 10:31
  cast role doesn't matter. Joe at ten minute Murder dot com is my email
• 10:35
  address, and I'm kind I'm half kidding about the cast role. I could
• 10:39
  use a new cast role recipe Joe at ten minute Murder dot com. But
• 10:43
  I could also use more cases to cover even more. You can send them
• 10:46
  both if you want, That's fine with me. That's my email address.
• 10:50
  Ten minute Murder dot com is the website and follow the podcast any place you
• 10:54
  have a social media account, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok all the places you
• 10:58
  can do that links from the show, or just go to one of those
• 11:01
  apps type in ten minute murder and that's gonna pop up. All right,
• 11:03
  that's gonna do it. That's your episode for today. Thank you so much
• 11:07
  for taking the time to listen. Bye.