Stalking Samantha: 13 Years of Terror

"Very good?" "Very good." "That's a lot."

"Cool, what did you say?"

“"The one who was in the test computer field, focus management, finance, and so on."”

"Mega, but that's not what you're saying." "Eil, just a picture of the low-stoe building, and 40." "Very good." "Very good." "Hold your money with the same style."

"I'm here in the car to the wall." "This torture chamber." "There's no windows."

"It feels eerily silent."

"This is like a horror film." "Am I going to die?" "Chain to this wall?" "There's no where to run." "There's no where to hide."

"I'm just stuck." "I did not picture myself surviving."

“"I want other women, whether they've been stalked."”

"Or not believed to see my story and think things can change." "I was 21. It was my last year of school. I was working a job. I had an internship." "I was so busy." "I feel like I had no time." "I show up at my job on campus and work my shift and I hear the door open."

"And I look and Christopher's there with flowers in his hands." "I just freeze and my eyes get big." "And on the inside I'm flaming mad as the angriest I've been." "Because I thought we were past all of this." "He said, you know, I'm really sorry I heard a ramp up past away."

"I say, like, I told you Christopher, I don't want to see you. I don't want to talk to you." "I don't want the flowers, like, just leave me alone."

“"I think he was surprised that I wasn't plattered."”

"I'm, like, waiting outside in the cold at this bus stop and he approaches me again." "And he's, like, I just don't understand and I cut him off." "And I said, I don't know what there's is to not understand about this situation." "He's, like, well, I just feel like there needs to be some closure. I want to figure this out with you." "Christopher, I've told you multiple times. By text, I've blocked you. I don't want to see you. I don't want to talk to you. Don't talk to me. Don't text me. Don't show up where I am. Leave me alone."

"He thought that was his chance. He's a little Romeo, not at all. He was creepy." "It's the first real experience where I feel like somebody knows what my wishes are very clearly and doesn't care." "Christopher, to me, he was, like, a sad, lonely guy." "I wouldn't say my first impression was very memorable. I mean, he was certainly older by six, eight years, maybe." "He seemed very socially awkward."

"She was a little bit nice to him, and he took that and he spun it into something it wasn't and ran away with it." "One day, I caught him at Frisbee practice, like sitting in the stands by himself, watching us." "It was a women's Frisbee team." "And then every week at practice, I would see him either up walking on the track, or sitting in the stands."

"But he never approached me, never talked to me."

"But at that point, I was, like, I just want to graduate. I just want to get through and do the things I'm going to do next." "I felt like it was just something I could deal with on my own." "Sam initially seems hesitant to accept the situation for what it is." "It seems like she's in danger, and it's frustrating to watch her downplay that."

"I'm very excited to graduate."

“"My mom and my grandma were there, so that was special."”

"And I wanted to take a little time off before I did graduate school." "So I returned back to Elk Rapids in northern Michigan." "The Christopher chapter is behind me." "It's kind of nice to just catch up with Pat and Robin and some of our other friends." "I met Samantha on the soccer team. She was a senior when I was a freshman in high school.

It doesn't matter your age or your lifestyle will give everybody a chance." "We lived in this apartment right downtown across from the local pub above the Chinese restaurant."

"Our door was always unlocked, and it was fun, it was cute."

"Pryster for a message me a few times like wanting to come up to Elk Rapids or meet with me." "And when I show Karissa, we just kind of laugh, and just kind of brushed the messages off."

“"He became a running joke, just being this guy who doesn't get it, and, you know, get a life."”

"It wasn't room for a villain. I didn't fit in the plot of this story I had written about our situation in paradise." "I wanted to take a year or so off, and kind of explore my faith a bit more." "There was a ministry internship that really caught my eye, and I applied and was accepted." "It was located in Kansas City." "That was very excited."

"I've known Sam about 25 years. My youngest daughter is her same age, so they were in school together."

"You know, Sam doesn't have an active dad in her life, and so I did a lot of the dad stuff." "You know, provided rides, tried to be as supportive as I could." "Two days before I left, to go to Kansas City, Craig and I are running errands together." "We had noticed there was a red motorcycle allowing us."

“"My heart just sank. I knew it was him."”

"How did he find us?" "I'm not even in my own car. How did he know where we were?" "So I pulled into the high school parking lot. He gets off his motorcycle." "I'm going to go in front of him." "Sam says, "No, I'll do it."

"I get out of the car and I say, Christopher, what are you doing here?" "Why are you in my town?" "He's like, well, I applied for the same internship you did, and I was accepted." "Do you think you could give me a ride out there?" "I am just stunned and deflated."

"Like the thing I had been looking so forward to for so long." "It feels like it's ruined." "I tell Craig what Christopher says." "Creg says this is a problem." "I'm a solver."

"So it's like, all right, we're going to stop this." "Sam's over at our house." "We're sitting out at the table." "Talking about what happened during the day." "Creg's son comes home and says, "Sam, there was somebody looking for you."

"And I said, "Who was it?" "He's like, "I didn't recognize him." "Was he like bald and short and redheaded?" "Sam shows my son, Josh, a picture of Christopher, "and Josh realizes he's seen him coming out of Sam's apartment."

"And that's really when it starts to get even more serious." "I realized the gravity of how terrifying that was "that he was literally coming out of our apartment." "I felt like actually scared and threatened "that he would drive two hours and find where I lived."

"This man is not just like obsessed with you." "He's dangerous." "Creg says, "I think we need to consider our restraining order."

"I was like, "Oh my gosh."

"Like a PPO." "It was for any order." "Christopher?" "It just felt so surreal." "So we urge her, sit down right now and write down all the things he's done

"and all the places he's showed up." "It's now not just a school issue. "It's a all-year-round issue." "I thought through the past two or three years "and wrote down the list of interactions with Christopher."

"I'm at Christopher in 2011. "He had joined the same Christian group. "I want to be welcoming and kind, "so I saw him at different events the group was doing." "He printed me on Facebook one day."

“"At first I think he's just lonely for some reason”

"finds me an approachable person to talk to." "And then at some point it kind of changes." "He's asking me out on a date if I'm free between classes." "Have some time for lunch." "And so I'm just kind of saying no and letting him down easy

"and thinking he must get the message." "But he doesn't get it." [Music] "Before my birthday he approaches me." "He says, "Hey, I know your birthday is coming up.

"I was wondering, would you want to go see a red wing scheme? "I got his tickets." [Music] "I am just kind of speechless in a bad way. "I tell him I'm not interested in going to a red wing scheme with you."

"That's not like there's anything wrong with you, Christopher. "I just don't have any romantic interest in you." [Music] "That's a few red roses under my windshield wiper." "More flowers like at my doorstep with a weird love note."

“"I said, I think you need to kind of back off and to leave me alone."”

"But he won't stop." "He was following me to my work, following me to my internship." "There at Frisbee practice." [Music] "It was the first time I had really laid out each interaction with him in such a way that once they're put all together,

"I'm like, this guy's stalking me." [Music] "I received Samantha's petition requesting a personal protection against Christopher. "I have 24 hours in which to review it and decide whether it should be granted or deny it." [Music]

"I've never seen a stalking case as severe as this."

"He was obsessed if you looked up stalker in the dictionary, there'd be a picture of Christopher." [Music]

“"So I granted the personal protection order for six years."”

"At the time, this was the longest personal protection order I had ever issued." "I get a hold of the director of the prayer ministry in Kansas City." "And explain to him, hey, there's a restraining order on Christopher. "Can you take care of it?" "He calls him and says, we're revoking this.

"You can't come out here." "It was a really few as over. "And I could just pack my car and drive off into the sunset." [Music]

"After the PPO is granted, life goes back to normal and it's like he never existed."

[Music] "I went to graduate school and I trained as a private practice therapist." [Music] "I had friends that were like interested in what I was doing." "So I write this blog and there's a woman named Sarah Mont, that comments."

"And she just said, well, I just stumbled across your blog." "I was like, oh, this is kind of cool." [Music]

"I moved back to Michigan because I really missed."

"I missed home. "A lot had changed. "My mom and my grandma passed away." [Music] "It was really tough for me.

“"I think it shook a lot of kind of my identity."”

[Music] "I buy a house and I dug into painting and house projects." [Music] "I joined this like adult recreational soccer league."

"This league is a true social gathering."

"Sams good. She's a skilled player. She's very confident with the ball." "And that was what she's doing." [Music] "I'm arriving to one of my soccer games." "And I see Christopher."

[Music] "I just stopped at my tracks."

“"It looks like he's lost a lot of weight."”

"What is he even doing here?" "I was kind of shaken up with the whole game." "Just seeing him again, he didn't acknowledge me or speak to me." [Music] "Like what?"

"Am I in danger?" [Music] "I went back through my files and found the PPO inside. I had to expire." [Music] "There's something wrong with this guy."

"He's here to play soccer. He's here to watch Sam." "And when did he start doing that?" "He started as soon as his Australian order lapsed." [Music] "I do worry that he maybe is coming after me in a vengeful way,"

"wanting to hurt me for denying him all those years ago." [Music]

"When Sam first met Christopher."

"He was just kind of just soft." "Chubby, seemingly harmless, awkward guy." "It seemed to me when I saw him ten years later." "He had been training for something." "That's how it felt."

[Music] Christopher didn't scream soccer player. He was kind of awkward with his body. Didn't really know how to play. Didn't know how to move his legs and feet correctly. [Music]

"I approached this league's organizers and tell them about my fear that Christopher's following me again." "And the league organizer says..." "I'm sorry, like I spoke with an attorney and there's nothing I can do to really kick him out." "Technically, Christopher's not doing anything wrong." "Then one day I am grocery shopping and I see him."

[Music]

“"I remember her telling me that she would go to the gym and she would see him there."”

"He was everywhere." [Music] "I'm playing soccer one day and he's playing against me and somebody passes the ball." [Music] "He's faster than me and he beats me to the ball."

Christopher was overly aggressive with Sam just running into her. Almost to like just put a body on her instead of go for the ball. "It was not normal behavior." "He turns around and looks at me and sticks out his tongue." "He's like, "Ah."

"And I just am infuriated."

"And I just kind of broke down like I subbed out of the game."

“"I feared that I would never be free of him."”

[Music] "Carissa comes into ill-crapeds and she stays at the same apartment. We use to live in and college." [Music] "We go up on the roof for drinking wine. We're chatting.

Neither of us told each other but we were both scanning the premises." "And I happened to glance over next to this alleyway, next to my apartment, and I see..." "Guess who?" Christopher looked around when he was walking down the street a lot, like he was looking for me. At that point in me, like a switch flipped.

And I got up, I ran downstairs, and I just screamed. I said, "Christopher, what are you doing? What are you doing in ill-crapeds?" He said, "Well, I can't go home because I'm drunk."

“"I'm like, you're not even drunk. Why are you following Sam?"”

And he said, "I haven't talked to Sam." "I've had a word to Sam in eight years." I said, "Why are you following her?" And he said, "I'm not following you." I said, "Well, you're everywhere."

And it's weird. So stop. And if I see you again, I'm going to call the police. I was terrified. I called my family. I called all of Sam's friends.

I said, "I'm really concerned about this." The more Sam sees Chris out in public, the more she gets concerned. She is a little more on edge. She's more irritable.

People were concerned for Sam at this point.

“You have to get another PPO. We will all write reports.”

There's no way that they can deny this evidence. It's frustrating for me. I had the gut feeling that I did not have enough evidence. We all thought that Christopher was a psychopath. Robin had suggested, "Do you have any protection in your home?

Do you have a firearm? What's to prevent him from potentially trying to break in your home?" And I said, "Well, all my windows and doors are locked. My friend had gotten me a ring camera. I kept like a really sharp hatchet. Like it was like sharp to the touch like a knife.

Right under my mattress. I feel better having a weapon. It's an easy access thing. If something goes bumping the night. [Music]

Pat and a friend had come up to stay with me and hang out for the long holiday weekend. [Music] We went to a bar.

The first conversation we had was with Sam telling us how Chris followed her the other night.

And her the other night in Chris, a classic Chris. She goes off on this guy. Thirty seconds later, who walks in. Chris walks in. [Music] We all sink our heads. Holy hell, this guy's this guy's track in here.

A sea Christopher sitting by himself with his phone out. Really behind me, there's just no way how is he here also in. I'm scared. And I say, "Hey, can we leave?" I got to make this stop.

As soon as I got next to him, you could almost like see him tense up. I remember saying his name. I said, "Chris, I know you're following Sam. I know what you're doing. I know you're stalking her.

[Music] Once we got back from the bar, we knew who he was tracking her.

That was the first time we really kind of brainstormed,

like how could Christopher possibly keep showing up at the same places. Like, is he driving by her house? [Music] I cleaned out the inside of my car.

Like I'm not, I'm not a mechanic. I don't know what is the track or even look like. We kept digging until our flashlights died until our shirts were dirty. Unfortunately, I didn't find it. I decided I needed to try to get a PPO,

and I needed to try to get proof because I didn't think I had enough evidence to really get another restraining order. She felt confident that she didn't have enough evidence for a PPO when we felt certain that she did. We were all scared and feeling very urgent. Like, Sam, we need you to do this.

Something has to be done. Guys, a weirdo. I got in touch with Dev and who is an assistant prosecutor. And said, "Can you help me with a PPO?" Christopher had smartened up.

He never tried to even talk to me or get in touch with me.

So I feel like it's going to be tough to prove.

“And she's like, "I don't know, I think we should try."”

[Music] I would be scared if I was Sam. I didn't want to freak her out, but I wanted her to start taking steps to protect herself. I filled out the paperwork.

I actually met Dev in at the courthouse and formally filed it. We also attached her previous personal protection order. I wanted it to be shown that there was a six-year personal protection order,

which to me is unheard of for a first time.

When I was at the office, I specifically asked the clerk, I said, "If Christopher were to come in and inquire if there was any petitions filed against him, would you be able to answer that?" And she said, "No, that's information is confidential."

[Music] I felt hopeful. There's an assistant prosecutor helping me file this. She must think I've got enough. What's the harm in granting it?

[Music] On Friday, I checked the mailbox. And I opened the letter and it says the petition was denied. [Music] Because it appeared myself and Christopher had a complicated relationship.

[Music] I was very upset.

“I remember just cranking music and my car and driving out to where I was meeting my friend.”

[Music] I felt so defeated and it felt like a slap on the face. [Music] And then what does he do? He goes to my yard, he starts building his bunker.

[Music] That's when he took action. I was shocked and worried for Sam and the PPO was denied. What you're essentially telling is you don't believe her. The people that are supposed to protect her have failed her.

If Sam is going to get stalked and not get protected, then who will? I think it's definitely a comment on society about how hard women have to fight to be believed. How easy it is to just look the other way. He knew where she lived. I don't know what his intent is.

“If you want to hurt me, it's just this ticking time bomb that I couldn't do anything about.”

When asked a comment, the court said Samantha had not alleged sufficient specific facts to show that immediate and irreparable injury would occur prior to a hearing.

And that her ex-part A PPO lacked a copy of the first order of protection.

Samantha was offered a hearing by the court, but did not pursue it as she feared that Christopher would become angry when notified to attend. This really becomes kind of a fight for my life. This show is sponsored by Bombas.

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“I heard a noise. I heard like the squeak of a floorboard.”

I sounded like it was just outside my bedroom door. I could see some sort of shadow that wasn't normally there. And my heart starts racing. My mind shoots to the hatchet. I kept under my mattress.

In that second, someone storms into my room and jumps on me while I'm in bed.

I might begin screaming and hoping that someone would hear me. And I feel his hands around my throat. And he begins to choke me. And I get tougher to breathe. And I just think he's going to kill me.

I recognize immediately. That's Christopher. He picks me up. We approach my car. He puts me in the back seat. I'm being kidnapped in my own vehicle.

Once we leave my house, the likelihood of me surviving this experience goes down drastically. This really becomes kind of a fight for my life. He stops the car and asks me to lean forward and he ties a bandana around my eyes. So I can't see anymore. But I know the neighborhood and I begin counting the turns.

So I see like a garage door. Christopher gets out of the car. He picks me up again. And we kind of take a couple steps and then we crouch.

Then I can hear that I'm like in a more enclosed space.

“And then we go through another threshold.”

And then he sets me down on this soft surface and takes off my bandana. I look around and I'm in this tiny seven by seven little room. I see like these soundproof patches on the wall. So no one's going to hear me scream. And I glance over and I see metal rings on the walls.

And I just think, oh my god. This is like a horror film.

And I say, you want to talk? Let's talk.

He says, well, I didn't just bring you here to talk for the day. You're actually going to be here for two weeks. He says, I've taken vacation and we're going to spend some time together. And I try to hold back tears.

“And I say, okay, what are we going to do for two weeks, Christopher?”

He says, well, I have a deck of cards. And I say, well, people are going to know I'm missing. And he says, well, I think I'll keep them occupied.

I've planned to take your paddle board and leave it out at Lake Michigan

and let people think maybe you drowned. And that will keep them busy. I maybe have the day before people start to raise eyebrows about where I am. Is he going to panic?

Are things going to get tense? Is he going to kill me? I say to him, let's talk. I'm a social worker. I can talk. He asks me specific things. Who is I with when we went camping on this date?

What was I doing in Glen Lake two Thursdays ago? I answer him truthfully.

“I think he's testing me because he already seems to know the answer.”

He reveals with some pride that he has a tracker on my car. He showed me the app on his phone that he used. And anytime you leave your little neighborhood, it alerts me. And I see where you're going. And he revealed he also had trackers on my roommate's car and my friend's car.

I asked him how long he'd been doing that. He said, maybe a year. Christopher is a psycho-path. He is someone that I can't use normal logic with. I decided to ask him more about this space that he has me.

Did you build this? And he says yes. He built it himself. And he kind of takes pride in building this structure. He tells me, "I kind of got this idea for this bunker from watching that show, the TV show, you."

The show, you, is about a good-looking young man who becomes obsessed with a woman. And he essentially kidnaps her and keeps her in this glass room, which Christopher says wasn't logistically possible. He had looked into it. This main character is this psychopath. He ends up murdering the woman and you've related to this person.

I need to try to convince him that we can be friends. Afternoon, he pulled a piece of clothing out of this tub and he says, "There's something I really wanted to give you. And maybe it's kind of silly, but I've kept it all this time."

And on the back it has my last name on it. He says, "I actually got this for you when I bought those Red Wing tickets all that time ago." Christopher initially bought those tickets and college from my birthday.

And I told him I never wanted to go to a Red Wing's hockey game with him.

And I said to him, "Maybe after all of this, maybe we can go see a Red Wing's game sometime." "Maybe we can be friends."

“I think, "Okay, I have this foot in the door."”

He says, "I'm really sorry. I did that to you this morning." I just had to talk to you and I thought you would never talk to me, unless I did something like this. He has this moment where he says that he's scared of prison. He says, "I would never survive in prison."

I think I could get in a lot of trouble for what I did today.

He's panicked. He realizes what he's done. Christopher, if you, will let me go tonight. I promise I will not go to the police. And he says, "I don't, I don't believe you." And he says, "I think what would really convince me that you want to be my friend and that you're willing to keep that thing."

"You're willing to keep that secret." "Is if you sleep with me." And I just think there's, there's no way. There's no way. And I just say, Christopher, you know I don't like you like that.

Like, I'm seeing somebody. I don't, I don't want to sleep with you." He says, "I see."

“Well, I think that's the only way I can really trust you with this.”

You know, if I say, "No, is he going to rape me anyway?" If he said, "Oh, not what's to stop him." He could time me up. That sounds, a lot worse to me. I said, "You promised me Christopher that if I sleep with you, you will let me out two night." He said, "I will."

And I said, "Shake me on it." And he looked me in the eyes and shook my hand. And I knew enough about Christopher to know that his integrity is important to him. And I was banking on that.

“He leaned in and kissed me, and I just felt myself go dead inside.”

And I just ripped down on my cried, and I shook. And he asked me, "You's like, "Are you okay?" I didn't want him to know that I was reacting to the experience, and that I was disgusted by him and terrified. When everything was finished, he said, "That's all I've wanted for so long.

You cannot imagine how long I've thought of that moment." You're the person I'm supposed to marry. My stomach turns even just thinking about that. I said, "Okay, Christopher, I've held up my end of the bargain. You need to let me go."

And he said, "Okay, I'll take you back to your car. Let's go." He opened up the doors, and I realized we're like at the back of this storage unit complex. Like, there's woods next to us. It's dark and cold, there's stars.

And part of me thinks, "I thought I would maybe never see the world again."

And I was just so thankful.

“I survived. I did not picture myself surviving through that day.”

I need to get to the hospital, but because Christopher's tracking my car, I turned around and drove back home. Someone needs to drive me to the hospital, and Melissa comes to my mind. She's my neighbor, so she's close. She's someone I trust. Sam called me, and her voice was not her usual confident self, I would say.

It was kind of emotional, shaken up. She said, "We have to hurry. We have to get out of here right now." And then I was like, "What the hell is going on?" The driver to the hospital was only 15 minutes, and I go up to the counter. And I said, "I need a rape kit."

To this whole process, my back is to the door, and so I'm glancing over my shoulder, thinking, "He's going to burst through the door any minute." This episode is supported by the podcast, Dr. Death. There are people you're told to trust, lawyers, teachers, especially doctors.

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I've been working as a police officer for 19 years, and I've seen a lot of things, and sometimes it's not always as it seems, but sometimes it is.

When I specialized in sex crimes, and when I first walked in the room and met sam, before she even said a word when I looked at her, I could just see the look in her eye. I knew this happened. My first thought is my own daughter. I have a 25-year-old daughter, close in age to Sam, and I have to do everything I can, and it has to be done right. Is it an actual storage unit? It's a storage unit that he spent five grand at Menard's building. It's got some proof-square, you know, those rigid, some proof-square things on the walls, on two of the sides.

And he said it was the units where V is an vector. It's at the back of V6 and V7, I'm pretty sure they're next to each other. Sam was probably the easiest interview I've had. I was just an off her, the way she told her story.

“The details that she gave me were so important.”

He says he doesn't want to go to jail and you've read it really shoot him, so... Because he has weapons to this time. Can I? It's rifle than a frostbout. I don't make it cool.

We called in detectives to get information about this guy, because we didn't know much.

We didn't know if he was hiding in the bunker.

“We didn't know if there were booby traps or anything like that.”

Christopher, if you're inside, let us know. We're gonna have my dog come find you and he will bite you. Call out to us now if you're inside. Dude. There's like an entrance little thing here, and then another room here. There's this box.

It's exactly how Sam described it to us, and I'm like, "Holy ****. This thing's actually here. I couldn't believe my eyes." When we realized Christopher wasn't there, that's when the evidence collection started. Sandbags. Find all the way to the ceiling there.

Sandbags not completely. It's a little bit of love.

“I'm going to the inside. This is the interior.”

I can see the soundproof panels that she had described all over the walls. I'm going to give you another view of the inside. He packed insulation in the roof, insulation on all the sides. He really wanted to make sure that nobody knew that they were in there, and that nobody could hear Sam if she was screaming.

There are three hooks in the wall. So it's two by six construction.

And we're shutting the second door, which was the exterior.

So as soon as I saw the bunker, I just want to find him. I want to find him, and I want to get him into custody as soon as possible. I knew that Sam was in fear for him being out there, and the longer that he was out there, the more fear she was going to be in for not knowing where he was at. I don't know that my friends or family are safe, or that they would be used to try to get to me,

“or that he would hurt someone. He's out there, and he's capable of murdering, I think.”

I think if you kidnapped somebody and chained them to a wall, you have no boundaries. Even if you think somebody is creepy or crazy, you can't actually fathom that they would build a bunker for somebody in a storage unit. I was convinced if you had gone through all that trouble, that there was going to be no end unless he was behind bars.

My specialty is cellular analysis. It's not pinpoint to the location, but I can get pretty close to where the cellular device was at. I was able to determine the area where I thought had the highest probability of being able to find Christopher's cell phone. We broke up into separate groups, and we began driving. I was driving down Road Street.

It was the first road that I had driven down, and out of luck's chance, I looked out in alle,

and I see the front of a car. Sam had told Detective Matuchi that Christopher drove a black Cadillac CTS. I thought to myself, there's no way that this is going to be this easy. And surveillance detective then called out that the suspect was out of his house and was approaching his car. He was giving us updates. He's now inside of his car.

The car is now driving away down the alley. Everybody knew what was that stake. We don't want to put our guys in harm's way, but we also have to protect a community.

I can't hear him. No, I can't hear him. Hands up. I'm not your door.

Don't touch all the phone. Just get out of the car.

You're good. I can find it. The detective's let us know that he's been found and arrested, and it was safe if I wanted to return to my home. I felt this weight lifted off of me. Like, okay, he's not going to hurt my friends and family and me.

And I don't know what's going to come next, but they caught it. Like I, I did the thing, like I, they arrested him. I was very excited that we had him in custody, but also now I had a job to do because I wanted to verify everything that Sam had told me. Chris, Chris, Chris for a month, Mike. What are you doing?

He's just staring at me, not much expression, not much emotion at all. Do you mind switching chairs with me?

I was there for not only as a secondary interviewer, but also to keep an eye in Christopher.

“Do you know why you're here? Do you know why you're under arrest?”

I just tell me why you're under arrest. Well, it has to do with Sam. Do you know Sam? Sam, that's Sam. He was kind of playing dumb with me wondering why he was there. So yeah, we're here to talk to you about Sam.

What happened Friday? What had been between 7 a.m. about 9 a.m. Were you working that day? What was it? I get out when we were working. What were you doing? But I'm a product and modifications.

Chris, we know you're on a thing. You're not the whole day, but what were you doing to 7 a.m. It was in the wood. We weren't in the woods that's out. We have video surveillance from your storage units.

No dumb man's road. He was mad and I think he was mad at Sam. He believed her that they were going to have this friendship, this relationship. Well, we did do a search warrant at the storage unit. We know it's in there.

“It looks bad, Chris. That's what we're saying.”

Tell us the reason behind it so that there's an explanation behind it. He started to lie to us. It's weird because it's personal. Tell us what was going through your mind. If you weren't going to harm him, what was it for?

It was a role playing the going to wait for her. He claimed this was a planned event where he was supposed to surprise her, but he overdid it and she didn't like the surprise. Took it further than she wanted to. We wanted him to talk.

And the more he said, the more he verified the better. You're doing her watch that next flick serious you. Possibly having. If you think you want to do it, what'd be in your Netflix history? I don't have any Netflix credit.

“You know, I don't even know what you mean.”

The way that he snapped us had looked at me when I asked him, "I knew that he'd seen it." He's kind of surprised during the starting role playing. Yeah. It's what I took it to for. Like, when I was supposed to surprise me,

I take care of the dinner and give it flowers. I mean, there's role playing. And then there's breaking into someone's house, kidnapping them, binding and gagging them, putting them in a car, driving them to a storage unit

that you have staged for the song proof room, looking them to a metal bracket on the wall, making the **** in the bucket, and then breaking them. It didn't break, Sam.

But if she was not okay with this, as you said in the beginning, that's right. Knowing the things that he did to her, I have looked at the cross-the-table item, and I am thinking that he is pure evil.

I've never seen daylight again.

Why did you see that? Because you've already built a case against me. And you're taking everything that she says is truth. He's trying to give us a story to paint,

and that she was complicit in everything.

“I have a lot of experience doing these types of cases,”

and what I've come to understand over the years, especially with juries, is they expect somebody to act a certain way. If they're being sexually assaulted, they should fight. They should run.

And if they don't do that, they're not believed. So I'm going to do a bucket swab on the right side. The bucket swab on the left side. There was a lot more information out there that we had to try to find.

That the hospital Sam mentioned that he removed all the hair from his body, so he could avoid detection, DNA-wise. He didn't want to leave hair behind, so he tried to chemically remove a bunch of this hair and had a bad skin reaction.

And when he took his pants and a shirt off, you could see chemical burns on his body. I want to put a case together that makes him go to jail for the longest time possible.

One of my first phone calls was the Noelle Morganberg.

She's the head prosecuting attorney in Grand Traverse County. I got a call from Detective Matucci, and we've worked together for a long time, and I'm like, "Okay, what's really up?"

“That's a good one, but what's going on, what do you need?”

And no, no, I'm serious. And in my mind, at that point, I'm formulating, "Okay, what is this going to look like when we go to court?" I had just hoped that a jury would believe Sam. And she was extremely believable

and had this long history of telling him no. This is a prepaid call from Christopher Thomas. I don't know how much did they not took her. I know you as a loving, serene, kind person. Yes, I am.

And I don't know what's inside you. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Everything that happened on that day was loving, trying to carry. I think I'm hurt to anybody.

We had been in touch with a prosecutor's office in Christopher was set to be arraigned and so rob it and I streamed the arraignment. There on my TV screen and my living room seeing him in that orange jumpsuit

and hearing my name and hearing the actual crime scene was charged with. You know, there were very heavy words. I charged Christopher Thomas with kidnapping,

home invasion first, torture, aggravated stocking,

and four counts of criminal sexual conduct first degree. He stopped a victim in this case for over a decade. Christopher, please not guilty to all of the charges. And I'm not surprised. The judge agreed there'd be no safety for Sam.

If Chris was released. And so she did not bail. I didn't have to find another plan to hide or escape or live in fear that he could just come to my home.

He was locked up and it felt like another win. All right, hold on one second. All right, so it's 1024.

“Every piece of information that we got was important.”

We did our best to locate the trackers. Initially he had outright denied heavy trackers on any vehicles. You don't know where you put it up. She put it up.

She did not put trackers on her own car. She didn't. He didn't want to admit to a misdemeanor of tracking somebody. And meanwhile, he's looking at several life offenses for what he had just done.

No where could I find them. He even told Sam that I can't believe that I'm being beaten by this guy and these placement of these trackers. One of the cars we put it up on a rack where we could get underneath it.

He put them up underneath the bumpers. These particular trackers, you only get a couple of weeks with a battery life on them. So he had to travel with all these different locations to constantly check the batteries,

charge the batteries and place the trackers back

It seemed like when he was not at work or sleeping,

he was tracking her. But when we looked at his phone, I can't even count how many videos and pictures of Sam. It's been 10 years, 10 plus years.

And this guy is not stopped.

“After 2014, after the restraining order,”

my life moved on, but his didn't. But that whole time I just had the feeling like I was being watched. While I lived in Kansas City, there was a woman named Sarah Mont,

that comments on my blog. So Sarah and I had some email sort of exchanges. I later found out that Christopher had posed as Sarah Mont. He made some fake account,

and he was following me.

That Christopher's health.

There were receipts from stores around town, which led us to look at their video surveillance and actually catch them on camera by all these things. I filed a PPO in July,

and it's denied. August and September, he's building this bunker to kidnap me and hold me in. He spent thousands of dollars

on creating this box, so he could spend time with Sam and do god only knows what. To see someone like that, who was able to hold a regular job,

who was able to appear as a normal, productive member of society,

who's then got this other side of him

going on in the background, was really scary. There were no receipts before. Yeah. We're doing it over the year.

It was a four. A very nice mixed up. A perfect morning star. Sonne. Park.

picnic. Shoppapoteca said, "Chusology and halo filling." Here, if you're all at the bottom, the allergy time comes.

As a new customer, spend 10% off 30 € per day. With the code, 910. You've got a recipe,

a shoppapoteca, and you're right. Good bye. Good bye. Disney celebrates America 250.

“24 hours nonstop live all across the country,”

and David Nure is right there. 250 years of America more than 24 hours on the air. This is going to be one extraordinary event. And you can watch it live on ABC, Disney Plus,

Kulu, ESPN, Natchio, FX, and Freeform, an epic and historic celebration.

Tell 'em Steven A. It's America's 250th birthday party. No one throws a party like Disney. ♪ We got a text message,

and it was the detective from Grand Traverse, and he said, "Can you call me?" So I called him, and he said, "Do you remember a guy named Christopher Thomas?"

And I think I said,

“"I will never forget a guy named Christopher Thomas."”

♪ In 2009, I was in college full-time, and working at a residential treatment center, and that's where I met Christopher. One day, he asked if I wanted to go to dinner.

And I didn't really think too much of it, but apparently he did. So next, he wanted to know if I wanted to go ice skating. I did not want to go ice skating with him, but that's when I was younger and still trying to be nice.

And so I told him that I had studying to do, instead of just flat out saying, "No, I don't want to go." When I set those boundaries, and he didn't like it, things kind of escalated after that.

The spring semester, I was sitting in class, and I would see him drive through the parking lot on campus. ♪ Not long after that, my friend was at the house.

And I looked out the window, and I was like, "He's outside, but he was on foot." And my friend got up and ran out of the house and chased him.

and the judge signed it, "Expartate," which means there was no court hearing. This was serious enough that it was necessitated. After that, you know, it's just a matter of every time you see him, you have to document it.

♪ All summer, he'd drive by,

“and I'd be like, "Wow, am I calling the police today?”

Or am I not calling the police today?" And then we got a new prosecutor, and she called me. And she said, "You know, all this is going on,

like, do you want to press charges?" And I said, "Yeah, absolutely. I'm tired of this." ♪ He got 24 months of probation,

and he was in jail for a few days, and he got credit for time served. He's punished for what he does. He was held accountable for that in 2010, and instead of changing his behavior,

he found a new victim.

I'd always knew that there would be somebody else.

And at that point, you know, I didn't know who I didn't know where I didn't know when. And when I talked to the detective, there was like this guilty, like he did do it to somebody else.

I was right. I knew this was going to happen. How could this have gone down so long with me if he's done something like this before? The system's not set up to really protect

and defend women. A victim of rape or sexual assault doesn't necessarily see justice most of the time, so what's going to be different about me?

I found out that the defense wanted to have Christopher evaluated for criminal responsibility, which means was he at the time

“of the defense able to understand right from wrong?”

The risk always is if someone comes back

and the reports says that they are insane, then what happens is their hospitalized, and then after a certain time, they're released. It was several competency evaluations, and each time he was ruled responsible for his actions.

You know, I want to get some closure for myself, and it just drags on. His attorney wanted to get an independent competency exam to compare to the state exam, but they came up with the same conclusion.

He said that there's crazy and insane and you're not neither. You were just an isolated, lonely, depressed person. You know? I'll tell you something.

I'll catch it. And then bury it. Don't. And try not to cry today. And I've been crying that's about for three days.

There were a few conversations that he had with his mother when she would get upset. And it was one phone call in particular, really. It kind of scared me a little bit.

But I was so sorry that you were so lonely. I'm sorry. I made you get your old clay. And she is a blaze dayer. You know, I wouldn't say one of them at it.

I think it would have been. I don't think you even had her on your mind at that point. I mean, you know, every day of her class, 12 years.

I never heard you mention your name one.

But we could have got you an old boy. Conflator, something. We could have worked through all of us. We could have got a whole different path of this path. Right?

Yeah, we could have talked to the one person. Yeah, the person didn't want anywhere near her. He's so far gone, so far obsessed with her that.

“I believe if he had the opportunity, he would do something again.”

We do have to always be prepared for trial. But we knew that there was a potential for a plea bargain in this case. So we get a call from Jesse. Christopher's attorney. And we started talking about what those please would look like.

And Jesse came back a few days later and said he's not ever going to admit that he raped her. He says it was consensual. Despite his attorneys' attempts to explain the concept of consent, Christopher will not plead guilty to the criminal sexual assault charges. But if she was not okay with this, as you said in the beginning, that's right.

He thinks that she's consenting to having sex with them in this box.

“And she's in a situation where her life was at stake.”

And she's trying to survive. I had conflicting feelings. I thought a plea deal seemed like a cheap way out for him. I should get a pass at some of the charges just because he didn't agree. Or doesn't understand consent.

No well really said yes, this case is a slam dunk case. But if this does go to trial, you're going to be dragged through the mud. You couldn't have the best case in the world together. We don't like to leave it the hands of a jury. Sometimes juries get it wrong.

Dropping the criminal sexual conduct charges didn't feel like full justice to me in some ways. I wanted everyone to be able to point at Christopher and say this person is a rapist. But in the end, I decided to trust no else in stinks and say yes. Let's go for a plea deal and let's try to make him look as awful as we can. When I asked no well who the judge assigned to the case is,

she tells me it's Judge Ells and Hymer. That was the same guy who denied my PPO. How could this judge be assigned to this case? Today I'm like either that's going to be a good thing because he's going to feel awful or potentially it could be bad. A Traverse City Man accused of kidnapping a woman and holding her hostage in a soundproof bunker to complete deal today.

“Is your belief that you acted in such a way as to create a severe mental pain on her part?”

Yeah. It's almost blood guilty to kidnapping torture and aggravated stalking all other charges will be dropped when he sends.

Christopher does choose to accept the plea deal and finally I get a date for sentencing.

It's going to happen February 5th, 2024. The day of the sentencing, we go into the courtroom. We have Robin, me, Sam. We have Christopher's family right there. Christopher's not there yet, but the stage has been set and we're all holding our breaths. Christopher enters in his orange jumpsuit with his hands bound and he's there in the flesh in front of me. All right, people have any argument in the middle of the sentence.

I wanted to make sure that the judge heard all the details of what exactly she went through that day. She agreed to have sex with him so that hoping that he would feel his end of this is our bargain and let her go. Noelle hoped that this would persuade the judge to sentence outside of the guidelines. He then penetrated her with his penis to the point that she was crying and shaking. It just felt like such a private thing that would just be out in the open, but I understood why she needed to do it.

I would ask the court to again, to think about the duration. Look at both the aggravated stalking and the kidnapping about the meticulous preparation that the defendant took. And I felt like this was the first time after enduring that whole day with him that I felt free to really tell him some of my true thoughts. I don't want to address Christopher as he has not honored my requests nor shown he values my thoughts or feelings in over a decade. I wondered if I would see daylight again.

I shook and sobbed after he raped me. I wasn't sure he would stop.

“If I tried to push him away, would he hold me down again?”

I never want to worry about him hurting me or another woman ever again.

I asked that the court protected myself and other women from being stalked and raped by this sin and disrupted them. And by considering the longest victims, pertinent by law. Thank you, man. I guess when you see someone as strong as Sam is and as unshakable as Sam is. And then you see them break down a little bit.

It just it really spoke to the depths of what this person had done to her.

I just remember thinking, "Oh God, I don't want to hear whatever you have to say."

“I wish I could take it all back. I can't.”

I'm going to can't. I obviously could. I had a lot. I wanted to say it. He talked to his three pages of speech away and just apologized to the people he hurt. And then stood there and waited for his sentence. So you do have that one prior misdemeanor. You don't have a juvenile record. You have a master's degree.

You're very well educated. You had a good job. This court itself has let me down before. What if they only give 20, 25 years?

And then I need to move and go into hiding and change my name so that I feel safe.

Please, God, don't let it be just 20 years because 20 years is nothing. But this stalking behavior and obsessive behavior already happened in big rapids back in 2010.

“You knew what the result of this kind of behavior would be.”

And you continued to engage with a different person. The judge said that he felt Christopher was not able to be rehabilitated. Even after you were sitting in jail, you told your mother that nothing would have mattered. That nothing would have stopped you from doing what you were going to do. That's an extraordinary statement. All of those things in concerts lead me to believe

that a sense would have been a guideline in ranges inappropriate. The judge started talking about a reasonable life expectancy for someone Christopher Thomas's age. And that's when we got really excited. With regard to count one, kidnapping, you will serve 40 to 60 years in the Michigan Department of Corrections. At the time of sentenced in Christopher Thomas was 39 years old.

And Judge Ells and Hammer gave him 40 to 60 years. So he's going to be almost 80 before he even has a chance of getting out of prison. If somehow you are released at some point in your future, then it is a requirement that you will have a lifetime GPS, so that you will know where you are all the time for the rest of your days. The judge is nice, little piece of, and if you get out, you got to wear an ankle monitor to rest of your life.

It's like, okay, you know, thank you. You know, Christopher isn't a place where the worst of the worst people are, and he needs to be there. To do something like that to another human being, I just don't understand it.

“It is a little difficult to watch, but I just remember being really proud of her for doing that.”

I'm very proud of her. I don't know, sorry. Justice is a funny thing. It doesn't necessarily come in the form of prison years. I can't ever go back to before I was kidnapped.

And that's something I had to grieve. Are you ready? Yeah.

But knowing that I'm finally turning the page of this.

And that I should feel safe with him off the street and that I'm protected. Mentil, I felt free. When asked a comment, Christopher Thomas said, "I am tremendously sorry and immensely grief for those impacted by my actions." And that is our program for tonight. Thanks so much for watching.

I'm David Nure. And I'm Deborah Roberts from all of us here at 2020 and ABC News. Good night. Mr. Sugar, we've run out of places to hide our money. We can do really bad things together.

Crime is on the rise in Philly. Say hi to you, wife. I'm like who's hilarious comedy? Who in the middle of a crisis here? Delhi boys is back with it all you see is it?

You can't more about the business than you do your own brother. No money, no problems.