Canadian Actress Convicted Of Stalking Alec Baldwin
NEW YORK (AP) — A Canadian actress was sentenced Thursday to six months in jail by a judge who found her guilty of stalking Alec Baldwin in New York.
Genevieve Sabourin, 41, who had already been facing 30 days in jail for repeatedly disrupting court proceedings during her trial, was well-behaved but defiant after the verdict was announced.
"I haven't done anything wrong. I'm innocent," she told Judge Robert Mandelbaum. "You're doing a mistake right now."
The judge found Sabourin guilty of stalking, attempted aggravated harassment, harassment and attempted contempt of court, saying she had no right to pursue contact she knew to be unwanted.
At the trial, Baldwin testified that the actress had turned his life into a horror film after they met once for dinner. He said she besieged him with unwanted phone calls and emails and started showing up at his homes and at public events.
"Your relentless and escalating campaign of threats and in-person appearances in private spaces served at a minimum to harass, annoy and alarm Mr. Baldwin, and intentionally so, and terrorized his wife," Mandelbaum said.
Sabourin testified that she had a legitimate, though brief romance with Baldwin, and just wanted him to explain why he didn't want to see her anymore.
In his summation to the judge, defense lawyer Todd Spodek said Baldwin "doesn't have carte blanche to use the criminal justice system to sort out his relationships."
"He set her up at a luxury hotel. He took her on a once-in-a- lifetime, fairy-tale date. ... Was Ms. Sabourin wrong to think that this was more than a one-night stand?"
The judge ordered Sabourin to serve the six months after the 30 days she previously received for contempt of court. There was no jury in the case, at Sabourin's request.
Baldwin and Sabourin agree on this much: They met during a 2000 movie shoot in Montreal and had dinner a decade later in New York. The dinner came after mutual friend Martin Bregman, producer of movies including "Scarface," had Baldwin call her as she sought career help.
She says the dinner ended in a sexual encounter, which the actor denies.
He said Sabourin then flooded him with calls and emails. After a March 2012 message said she could infiltrate his apartment building and his now-wife's yoga class, "I knew that she was dangerous," the "30 Rock" star testified.
Then Sabourin showed up at a film screening he was hosting and at his Hamptons and Manhattan homes. She was arrested outside his apartment building in April 2012.
Sabourin, however, said the actor invited her to New York in 2010, took her on a dream date that ended in an amorous night filled with promises for the future, and then dropped her.
She said they maintained a fraught email and phone relationship over the next two years. While he did send some friendly emails, he says he also implored her to leave him alone.
She says the overall message from him was mixed, and she felt entitled to ask what had gone wrong.
"It's not because he's rich and famous that he can take advantage of women and throw them in the garbage," she said.
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