Celebrities obviously tend to attract quite a lot of attention, but it’s not always
positive, and sometimes it can even prove fatal.
Here are a few stars whose lives were cut short by their own fans.
Christina Grimmie was a 22-year-old up-and-coming superstar.
She had just wowed viewers on The Voice, placing third in her season, and was beginning to
branch out on her own.
"You’re more comfortable than I am up there, almost."
"Wow."
"And that is the moment where you realize that this person could be a huge star."
But that came to an end when a crazed fan named Kevin James Loibl offed her in front
of a crowd of stunned fans in 2016.
Loibl was described by a friend as a severe loner who, over the previous year or so, had
grown psychotically attached to Grimmie.
He would watch her videos on YouTube non-stop, altered his appearance so he might look good
for her, and got angry whenever it was pointed out that the chances of Loibl winning Grimmie's
heart were slim to none.
Finally, Loibl decided to meet Grimmie, and apparently thought that if he couldn't have
her, nobody could.
On June 10th, Grimmie was signing autographs after a show when Loibl approached.
He took out one of the two guns he had somehow smuggled into the building and shot the singer.
Grimmie’s brother quickly grabbed Loibl, who managed to struggle and escape, only to
shoot himself immediately after.
Latina songstress Selena Quintanilla-Pérez was a rising star when her fan club founder,
Yolanda Saldivar, gunned her down in 1995.
According to Time, Selena befriended Saldivar soon after the fan club was founded in 1991,
eventually hired her as an assistant and later brought her on as manager of the Selena Etc.
clothing boutique.
That's when the trouble began.
Saldivar was fired after reportedly embezzling funds from the Grammy winner.
Some time later, Selena agreed to meet with Saldivar at a Days Inn in order to retrieve
some financial records.
It was there that Saldivar shot Selena in the back.
According to the New York Times, a nine-hour standoff with police followed before Saldivar
eventually surrendered.
She was sentenced to life in prison, most of which she has reportedly spent in solitary
confinement, for her own protection.
"Can you tell me if you were angry?
Frustrated?"
"No I was never angry, I was never frustrated."
The killing of up-and-coming actress Rebecca Schaeffer in 1989 has left a lasting impression
in the law ever since.
The 21-year-old star of My Sister Sam was shot in the doorway of her Hollywood home
by obsessed fan Robert John Bardo on July 18th.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Bardo had stalked Schaeffer for three years prior
to the crime and even sent her letters in an attempt to meet with her on the set of
her sitcom.
When his gestures went unanswered, Bardo spent $250 on private investigators to track down
Schaeffer's address, which they acquired from the California DMV.
Bardo then paid his crush a fatal visit, reportedly ambushing her when she answered the door.
After Schaeffer's death, legislation was passed to prohibit DMV employees from disclosing
addresses.
Damageplan and former Pantera guitarist Dimebag Darrell was shot while performing on stage
on December 8th, 2004.
His killer was diehard Pantera fan Nathan Gale, a former football player and U.S. Marine
whose friends described as having been a good guy until something snapped inside him.
Gale reportedly began thinking that he'd penned some of Pantera's songs.
One-time friend Jeramie Brey told The Columbus Dispatch:
"He was off his rocker.
He said they were his songs, that Pantera stole them from him and that he was going
to sue them."
According to the Daily News, Gale also blamed Darrell for the breakup of Pantera.
During that fateful show in Columbus, Ohio, the 25-year-old reportedly rushed the stage
screaming, "You broke up Pantera!" Gale killed the guitarist and three others before being
shot and killed by a police officer.
Perhaps the worst thing about John Lennon's death at the hands of Mark David Chapman on
December 8th, 1980, is that it happened for virtually no reason at all.
Chapman was a Beatles fan earlier in his life, but he wasn't exactly obsessed with Lennon
until Chapman had a religious awakening, and thought he saw hypocrisy in Lennon's lyrics.
But mostly, Chapman targeted Lennon simply because he was famous.
"Why did you kill John Lennon?"
"I thought by killing him, I would acquire his fame."
In his mind, he figured that assassinating a major celebrity would earn him instant and
long-lasting fame.
To that end, he approached Lennon outside his apartment in New York, asked for an autograph,
got it, and then came back later and shot him dead.
According to the Telegraph, when Chapman went up for parole for the ninth time in 2016,
he told the board that he had, quote, "a true sociopathic mind."
Unsurprisingly, the parole board rejected his request for freedom, just as they had
done eight times in the past.
He was up for parole again in 2018, but received his tenth rejection, to the surprise of absolutely
no one.