High-tech stale of stalking in the 21st century
By Naush Boghossian, Staff Writer
Los Angeles Daily News, CA
Sept 4 2004
GLENDALE — A Glendale businessman faces stalking charges that allege
that he attached a cell phone with Global Positioning System technology
to his ex-girlfriend’s car so he could track her every move and show
up unexpectedly wherever she was.
In what authorities said was the first stalking case of its kind
in Los Angeles County, Ara Gabrielyan, 32, was charged Tuesday with
stalking and threatening over a six-month period to kill his former
girlfriend and himself.
Gabrielyan — who ran an Armenian CD and video specialty shop — is
suspected of using GPS technology to pinpoint her location so he could
arrange apparent chance encounters at the bookstore, at the airport,
even at her brother’s grave site.
“This is what I would consider stalking of the 21st century — the
utilization of technology to track a victim,” said Lt. Jon Perkins
of the Glendale Police Department.
After the unidentified 35-year-old woman broke off their nearly
two-year relationship, Gabrielyan would follow her by car, show up
at her doorstep and call her 30 to 100 times a day, she told police.
But it wasn’t until he started to bump into her at odd places that she
became suspicious. Gabrielyan would pop up when she was having coffee
at Barnes & Noble, picking up a friend at Los Angeles International
Airport and even visiting the cemetery. In all, police said, he bumped
into her at dozens of locations.
“It was an obsession, an obsession to the point where 24 hours a day
he had to know where she was, what she did, who she met and how she
carried out her daily routine,” Glendale police Sgt. Tom Lorenz said.
“She, like other stalking victims, feels violated and extremely
vulnerable — like they no longer have that sense of security in
their own home.”
Gabrielyan’s luck ran out, according to authorities, when his
ex-girlfriend spotted him under her car — apparently trying to change
the cellular-phone battery, which lasts about five days. He said he was
trying to fix some wires, but she called police, who found the phone.
Gabrielyan was arrested Sunday and is being held on $500,000 bail.
The technology, which in recent years has been used to keep track of
children, the elderly and even pets, would give Gabrielyan real-time
updates on her location every minute.
“The technology was designed with every good intention in the world,
but it was utilized for bad in this case,” Detective Mike Stilton said.
The situation is such a rarity that the District Attorney’s Office
has assigned a prosecutor who specializes in complex stalking and
threatening cases — including actress Catherine Zeta-Jones’ recent
stalking case.
The Police Department has 57 pages of documents outlining the woman’s
movements since Aug. 16 — which is when police believe Gabrielyan
placed the device on her car — including where she was and how long
she spent at a particular place.
Gabrielyan had purchased a Nextel phone device that has a motion switch
on it that turns itself on when it moves. As long as the device is
on, it transmits a signal every minute to the GPS satellite, which
in turn sends the location information to a computer.
Gabrielyan, who paid for a service to send him the information, would
then log on to a Web site to monitor her locations, police said.
Police are investigating where Gabrielyan purchased the device and
the tracking service.
He’s scheduled to be arraigned Wednesday on one count of stalking
and three counts of making criminal threats. If convicted, he could
be sentenced to a maximum of six years in state prison.
Given the fact that the prosecutor is from a special team, Gabrielyan,
who has been arrested once in a credit card fraud case but has not
yet been tried, will be assigned a special public defender.
Capt. Al Michelena of the Los Angeles Police Department said stalking
somebody using GPS technology is not something his department has
encountered.
“I think that would be a rare instance where a stalking suspect would
use that kind of technology, and now that this incident has happened
it’s certainly something to be aware of,” Michelena said.
GPS technology can be used for tracking purposes in California only
by law enforcement agencies, and in cars if the owner chooses to sign
up for a service such as OnStar. Owners of cars equipped with the
OnStar service, for example, are one button away from being located.
Erin McGee of the Cellular Telecommunications and Internet Association
said GPS is wonderful technology to maintain safety and security.
“I guess it’s use of the technology gone wrong,” she said. The
organization lobbies on behalf of the wireless industry.
Technologically sophisticated methods of stalking are on the rise,
said Tracy Bahm, director of the Stalking Resource Center at the
National Center for Victims of Crime, and they expect these types of
stalking cases to become commonplace in coming years.
“The concerns from our perspective is GPS is becoming more common,
smaller and smaller, cheaper and cheaper, and all these things make
it easier for a stalker to use it,” Bahm said. “We know of a handful
of cases throughout the nation and that tells me there’s a lot more
of it going on, but people who encounter it may not be reporting it.”
The group is also working to make sure each state’s laws cover stalking
by GPS.
If Gabrielyan had not been charged with felony stalking and
threatening, simply placing the GPS device under the car would have
been considered a misdemeanor, Lorenz said.
“This is sort of old technology coupled with new applications and the
law is trying to catch up to it,” said prosecutor Debra Archuleta,
the head of the stalking and threat assessment team.
The public needs to be aware of the reach of this technology and how
it can intrude on lives, law enforcement officials said.
“This particular case alerts the community and it alerts the public
to the extremes some people could go to to prey upon an innocent and
unsuspecting victim,” Perkins said. “What started out as a device to
help keep track of children has transitioned into a covert type of
device that’s used for wrongful purposes.”