Prison often awaits celebrity stalkers in recent years

A timeline of selected celebrity stalking cases:

June 1, 1989: Margaret Ray pleads guilty to breaking and entering talk show host David Letterman’s house. Diagnosed with schizophrenia; serves 10 months in prison and 14 months in a mental institution. In 1998, commits suicide by kneeling in front of a train.

July 18, 1989: Robert John Bardo shoots and kills actress Rebecca Schaeffer after she answers her door. Serving a life sentence with no possibility of parole.

July 18, 1990: Joni Leigh Penn arrested after breaking into actress Sharon Gless’ house with a rifle and 500 rounds of ammunition and threatening to shoot herself in front of her. Sentenced to six years in prison.

May 19, 1995: Gary Benson sentenced to five years of probation for stalking singer Jerry Lee Lewis. The punishment later becomes six years in prison after continued stalking incidents. Dies in his sleep in prison on Aug. 4, 2001.

Jan. 8, 1996: Robert Hoskins convicted of assault, stalking and threatening to kill Madonna. Sentenced to 10 years in prison.

July 11, 1998: Jonathan Norman caught breaking into the home of director Steven Spielberg with the intention of raping the director. Sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.

Sept. 5, 2000: Mark Bailey sentenced to 10 years’ probation and ordered to attend counseling twice weekly after sending threatening letters to Brooke Shields.

Dec. 14, 2000: Dante Michael Soiu convicted of stalking Gwyneth Paltrow; sent to a high-security mental facility after judge finds him insane.

Nov. 30, 2004: Ambrose Kappos acquitted of burglary and stalking Sheryl Crow. Outside court, Kappos said he believes he was “delusional” when he thought he was communicating telepathically with Crow.

Feb. 23, 2005: William Lepeska ordered to permanently stay at least 1,000 feet away from Anna Kournikova after swimming nude across a bay, bound for the tennis star’s estate.

Feb. 25, 2005: Dawnette Knight pleads no contest to stalking and threatening actress Catherine Zeta-Jones. She faces up to five years in prison.

March 4, 2005: Zack Sinclair convicted of felony stalking after repeatedly going to “The Passion of the Christ” director Mel Gibson’s Malibu estate, seeking to pray with him. He faces up to 16 months in prison.