Stalker of ‘CSI: Miami’ actress Eva LaRue arrested by FBI after 12 decades

The threatening letters started in March 2007.

They arrived in the mail to Eva LaRue’s Southern California property — from time to time handwritten, sometimes typed — from an mysterious sender who named himself “Freddie Krueger” and vowed to rape and get rid of her and her young daughter.

The letters — much more than 3 dozen of them — saved on coming for more than 12 a long time, a relentless psychological assault that designed the “CSI: Miami” actress and her relatives scared to action outdoors their household.

Early on, some letters talked about LaRue’s daughter, then 5. But in 2015, letters started arriving dealt with to the baby. The stalker also began contacting LaRue’s daughter’s faculty, declaring that he was her father and was outside the house to select her up.

But with the support of genetic genealogy, a science that was utilized for the to start with time in California to seize the Golden State Killer, the FBI in 2019 was ready to consider DNA from the envelopes and run it as a result of a database, yielding a checklist of the suspect’s family members. This sooner or later led them to a modest city in Ohio, where they arrested a 58-calendar year-aged gentleman immediately after pulling his DNA from a discarded Arby’s straw.

James David Rogers was sentenced Thursday to 40 months in federal prison. The Heath, Ohio, person pleaded responsible in April to two counts of mailing threatening communications, a person count of threats by interstate communications, and two counts of stalking.

“I forgive you, but I are not able to fail to remember,” LaRue explained to him at the sentencing in a Los Angeles County courtroom. “The dread is with me permanently.”

12 many years of terror

LaRue is a former natural beauty queen and longtime actress who appeared for quite a few yrs as a medical doctor on the soap opera “All My Small children.” She’s likely greatest regarded for her 7 seasons on the criminal offense drama “CSI: Miami,” ending in 2012.

Her character was a DNA analyst for the Miami-Dade Law enforcement Department, which turned a bitter irony when authorities uncovered DNA on envelopes made up of the threatening letters but could not pinpoint a suspect.

LaRue was midway by means of her 2nd total year on “CSI: Miami” when the to start with letter showed up at her dwelling. Other folks before long followed.

“I am heading to f**king stalk you till the day you die,” said just one, in accordance to a 2019 federal indictment of Rogers.

“There will be no location on this earth that I … (can not) find you. I am likely to rape you,” stated a further letter, in which the stalker also threatened to rape and impregnate LaRue’s daughter.

The letters were being signed “Freddie Krueger,” the fictional killer from the horror movie collection “A Nightmare on Elm Road.” Lots of were being postmarked from Youngstown, Ohio.

LaRue told VFAB she was so terrified that she ultimately bought her residence and moved with her loved ones to Italy, the place they lived for various months with a mate. She then returned to California and purchased a new home less than an LLC — a enterprise entity that supplies restricted liability protection — to defend her identity, but the letters commenced exhibiting up at that tackle as perfectly, she reported.

LaRue and her daughter “drove circuitous routes house, slept with weapons nearby and had conversations about how to look for assistance immediately if [Rogers] uncovered them and experimented with to damage them,” federal prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memorandum.

“They experimented with to anonymize their addresses as considerably as feasible by averting receiving mail and deals at their actual handle,” prosecutors stated. “To no avail. Each time they moved, [the] letters — and the victims’ terror — would constantly adhere to.”

In 2015, the relatives begun receiving letters resolved to LaRue’s daughter. At the time, she was about 13.

“I am the man who has been stalking for (the) final 7 several years. Now I have set my eye on you also,” the 1st a single read, in accordance to the indictment. An additional a person go through, “You seem so beautiful in your photographs on google. Are you prepared to be the mother of my kid.”

How the FBI caught the stalker

The FBI gathered DNA from a lot of of the envelopes but did not know whose it was until 2019, when they turned to the emerging field of genetic genealogy — the very same approach that experienced fingered the Golden Condition Killer the previous yr.

Thanks in aspect to companies these types of as 23andMe, Ancestry and GEDmatch, genetic genealogy has turn into a precious tool for legislation enforcement officers seeking to address outdated crimes. Authorities add a DNA facts file to a public database to recognize any family members of the person who may well have submitted their DNA for tests. They then create out household trees and slender down feasible suspects via outdated-fashioned detective do the job till a direct suspect emerges.

Even so, investigators nonetheless ought to obtain a sample of the suspect’s DNA and make a match in advance of they can make an arrest.

Once the proof pointed to Rogers, FBI agents started surveilling him. FBI agents traveled to Ohio in the fall of 2019, previous FBI exclusive agent Stephen Busch and former FBI lawyer Steve Kramer advised VFAB.

When Rogers remaining his career as a nurse’s assistant at an assisted living facility and went to an Arby’s on his way property, the FBI followed and viewed him consume his meal and discard the bag in a Dumpster, Busch and Kramer said.

Brokers raided the Dumpster and extracted Rogers’ DNA from a soda straw in the bag, Busch and Kramer claimed. It matched the DNA from the envelopes despatched to LaRue and her daughter, they stated.

The FBI arrested Rogers at his house early a single early morning in November 2019.

Rogers’ conviction marks the very first time genetic genealogy has solved a case on the federal degree, Busch and Kramer told VFAB.

Their worry even now lingers

At his sentencing Thursday, Rogers told the choose via a video clip backlink from Ohio that he grew up in an abusive dwelling and was bullied in faculty. He stated he is obtaining psychological well being therapy.

“I sincerely apologize for what I did for the previous 12 many years, placing you and your household by means of hellish behavior,” he explained to LaRue. “I acknowledge total responsibility. I hope you can set this driving you and at some issue never ever assume about me yet again.”

LaRue then addressed Rogers in her victim impact statement, thanking him for his apology but telling the judge, “I am so anxious what will materialize when he gets out out.”

She grew psychological as she explained to the courtroom how the repeated threats took a toll on her and her household and deprived them of primary freedoms.