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Chapter 22 Supplement Special Topics
Section 2, Stalking
Statistical Overview
Data from the National Violence Against Women Survey, a nationally representative telephone survey of 8,000 men and 8,000 women ages eighteen and older, indicate that 2.2% of males and 8.1% of females report being stalked during their lifetime. The survey defines stalking as a course of conduct directed at a specific person that involves repeated (two or more occasions) visual or physical proximity; nonconsensual communication; verbal, written, or implied threats; or a combination thereof, that would cause a reasonable person fear (BJS 1999).
Four out of five stalking victims are women. By comparison, 94% of the stalkers identified by female victims and 60% of the stalkers identified by male victims were male (Violence Against Women Grants Office July 1998, 10).
With respect to stranger and acquaintance stalking, 1.8% of all U.S. women, compared with 0.8% of all U.S. men, have been stalked by strangers; and 1.6% of all U.S. women, compared with 0.8% of all U.S. men have been stalked by acquaintances (Ibid., 12).
Based on comparisons between estimated numbers of stalkers per total U.S. population, and numbers of cyberstalkers per online population, it is estimated that there are 63,000 Internet stalkers cruising the information superhighway, stalking an estimated 474,000 targets (Cyberangels 2000).
The Los Angeles District Attorney's Office estimates that e-mail and other electronic communications were factors in approximately 20 percent of the roughly 600 cases handled by its Stalking Threat Assessment Unit (Reno 1999).
Cyberstalking
Stalking has now taken a turn into cyberspace on the information superhighway. Although there is no universally accepted definition of cyberstalking, the term is generally used to refer to the use of the Internet, e-mail, or other telecommunication technologies to harass or stalk another person. Essentially, cyberstalking is an extension of the physical form of stalking. Most state and federal stalking laws require that the stalker make a direct threat of violence against the victim, while some require only that the alleged stalker's course of conduct constitute an implied threat. Although some cyberstalking conduct involving annoying or menacing behavior might fall short of illegal stalking under current laws, such behavior may be a prelude to real-life stalking and violence and should be treated seriously. Cyberstalking has the potential to move from a URL address to an IRL (in real life) address--from virtual to actual (Gregorie 2000).
In Cyberstalking: A New Challenge for Law Enforcement and Industry--A Report from the U.S. Attorney General to the Vice President (1999), cyberstalking is identified as a growing problem. According to the report, there are currently more than 80 million adults and 10 million children with access to the Internet in the United States. Assuming the proportion of cyberstalking victims is even a fraction of the proportion of persons who have been the victims of offline stalking within the preceding twelve months, the report estimates there may be potentially tens or even hundreds of thousands of cyberstalking victims in the United States (Gregorie 2000).
TECHNIQUES
Cyberstalkers use a variety of techniques. They may initially use the Internet to identify and track their victims. They may then send unsolicited e-mail, including hate, obscene, or threatening mail. Live chat harassment abuses the victim directly or through electronic sabotage (for example, flooding the Internet chat channel to disrupt the victim's conversation). With newsgroups, the cyberstalker can create postings about the victim or start rumors which spread through the bulletin board system. Cyberstalkers may also set up a Web page(s) on the victim with personal or fictitious information or solicitations to readers. Another technique is to assume the victim's persona online, such as in chat rooms, for the purpose of sullying the victim's reputation, posting details about the victim, or soliciting unwanted contacts from others. More complex forms of harassment include mailbombs (mass messages that virtually shutdown the victim's e-mail system by clogging it), sending the victim computer viruses, or sending electronic junk mail (spamming). There is a clear difference between the annoyance of unsolicited e-mail and online harassment.
However, cyberstalking is a course of conduct that takes place over a period of time and involves repeated deliberate attempts to cause distress to the victim (Ibid.).
RECOMMENDED ACTIONS
States should review their laws to determine whether they address cyberstalking and if not, promptly expand laws to include same.
Federal law should be amended to prohibit the transmission of any communication in interstate or foreign commerce with intent to threaten or harass another person where such communication places that person in reasonable fear of death or bodily injury.
Law enforcement agencies need training on the extent of cyberstalking and appropriate investigative techniques.
The Internet industry should create an industry-supported Web site containing information about cyberstalking and what to do if confronted with the problem.
Significant Legislation
As of April 1, 2000, twenty-three states had included electronic forms of communication within their harassment or stalking laws.
For example, Section 646.9 of the California Penal Code, Paragraph (g) determines the circumstances under which a person is liable for the tort of stalking: "Credible threat" is "a verbal or written threat including that performed by an electronic communication device, or a threat implied by a pattern of conduct or a combination of verbal, written, or electronically communicated statements and conduct, made with the intent and the apparent ability to carry out the threat so as to cause the person who is the target of the threat to reasonably fear for his or her safety, or the safety of his or her family." Paragraph (g) defines "electronic communication" devices as "including but not limited to telephones, cellular telephones, computers, video recorders, fax machines, or pagers." (CA Penal Code Sec. 646.9 (g) & (h), California Cyber Stalking Law of 1998).
In the first case tried under the California cyberstalking law, a security guard was found guilty and incarcerated for using Internet bulletin boards and chat rooms to solicit the rape of a woman who had rejected his romantic advances.
Promising Practices
Dover, NH Police Anti-Stalking Unit. The Dover Police Department, with assistance from a USDOJ Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) grant, has created an Anti-Stalking Unit that is charged to investigate all harassing, threatening, and stalking behaviors. It is a crime in New Hampshire if someone repeatedly follows a person, appears at their home, or engages in threatening contact. The unit staff are on hand to assist all stalking victims in assessing risks and developing safety plans. Their ten-minute video called "Stalked? What to Do" provides basic information about how to deal with stalking and is available for free by telephone or e-mail (staff e-mail addresses appear on the Web site). Dover Police Department, Dover, NH (603-742-4646) <www.ci.dover.nh.us> (then select City Departments, Police Department, Anti-Stalking Unit).
San Diego County Stalking Strike Force. The District Attorney's Office in San Diego County, CA developed a Stalking Strike Force to increase awareness of problems in defending victims from stalkers, to better assess risks to their safety, and to improve the tracking of stalkers and the collection of viable evidence to effectively prosecute them. The unit is comprised of two attorneys, a victim/witness professional, and an investigator. The unit comes in contact with victims of stalkers in two ways--through law enforcement referral or through the stalking victim hotline in its office. Employing a proactive approach from the first moment of contact, they assign an investigator to the case to determine risk to the victim's safety and the possible need for a restraining order.
Victims meet with the victim/witness professional to learn preventive measures to widen their safety net and limit their contact with the stalker. The unit has developed response plans that include set-ups for taping stalker phone calls and voicemail to screen telephone calls.
- When victims have been physically threatened by their stalker, they are advised to relocate. An emergency fund is in place to assist victims in rapid relocations.
- The stalking unit helps victims obtain restraining orders when necessary.
- The stalking unit's investigator continues to monitor and collect evidence on the stalker once the victim has relocated.
Stalking Strike Force, Office of the District Attorney, 330 West Broadway, San Diego, CA 92101 (619-531-4040).
Web Sites for Victims of Cyberstalking
The Stalking site at the "An Abuse, Rape & Domestic Violence Aid & Resource Collection" Web site at AOL.com is designed to: support stalking victims; explain the parameters of the crime; and address such issues as what constitutes stalking, who are the victims, what to do if one is stalked, and exercising one's legal rights. The site also provides links to the stalking laws in all fifty states.
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