How big a deal was Rebecca Schaeffer’s murder?

Rebecca Schaeffer

yeah it was terrible

CA enacted new stalker laws because of this tragedy

It was a big deal because it was the first stalker killing of a star. Not sure if the term was even used very often before this case.

As to whether or not she would have been a star, who knows? My Sister Sam wasn't insanely popular but it was popular enough to still be airing when she was murdered.

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It’s a thread about the deceased. If someone wants pics they can Google

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Someone start "Hottest Dead Stars"

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Eddie Waitkus (September 4, 1919 – September 16, 1972) was a Lithuanian American first baseman in Major League Baseball who had an 11-year career (1941, 1946–1955). He played for the Chicago Cubs and Philadelphia Phillies in the National League and for the Baltimore Orioles of the American League. He was elected to the National League All-Star team twice (1948 and 1949).

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Just a few years into the start of what seemed a very promising career, Ruth Ann Steinhagen, an obsessed fan, shot Waitkus at Chicago's Edgewater Beach Hotel on June 14, 1949, in one of the earliest recognized cases of criminal stalking.

Steinhagen had become infatuated with him when he was a Cub, but seeing him every day in-season may have kept her obsession in check. Once he was traded to the Phillies, Steinhagen's obsession grew to dangerous proportions. She checked into the hotel using the alias of a former high school classmate of his and left a note at the desk, asking him to come to her hotel room on an urgent matter.

When he arrived in her room, she shot him with a .22 caliber rifle, the bullet barely missing his heart. She immediately called the desk to report the shooting and was found cradling his head in her lap. Waitkus was taken to the Illinois Masonic Hospital, where he nearly died several times on the operating table before the bullet was successfully removed. Steinhagen never stood trial but instead was briefly confined to a mental institution.

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I just saw a show about it, and I was too young to remember, but they made it seem like she was on her way to stardom. I assume that’s true.

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Yes, she was on her way to stardom. She co-starred with Pam Dawber in the My Sister Sam TV show and started appearing in indie movies like Scenes from the Class Struggle in Beverly Hills. I'd probably consider her a low B-list or high C-list star at the time of her death.

It was covered by the mainstream press not because of how well known she was (only people who watched My Sister Sam would know who she was) but because of how shocking the crime was and because of its similarity to the attack against actress Theresa Saldana 7 years earlier. Saldana was stabbed 10 times but survived.

Schaeffer's killer was directly inspired by Saldana's attacker and used the same technique as Saldana's attacker: hire a detective to find the home address of their favorite actress and then go there intending to kill the actress.

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Selena (more than 20 years ago)

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Happened in my city. I remember I was in 3rd grade when it went down. All of the hispanic kids in my class were crying. The white kids didn’t know who she was. Crazy how the pre-internet world was.

A documentary I watched about her insinuated at least some in Hollywood considered her a rising star at 21 yrs of age. She was up for a major role in Godfather III when she was murdered.