Cyberstalker Harassed Woman Who Survived Attack as a Girl

A Florida man is going to prison for his particularly cruel version of cyberstalking. Alvin Willie George, 25, harassed a woman who survived a throat-slashing as a child by sending her photos of the crime scene along with messages threatening to rape and kill her, reports the Washington Post. George has been sentenced to 51 months in prison for the abuse, according to a Justice Department release. The origins of the case go back to 1999. A serial killer named Tommy Lynn Sells attacked two young girls in a Texas home and slit both their throats, per NBC News. One of the girls died, but her 10-year-old friend survived the attack by playing dead. Sells was convicted and executed in 2014. Prosecutors say George researched the crime and tracked down the surviving victim.

After his arrest, George admitted that he set up fake Facebook accounts and began sending the woman and her sisters crime-scene images and threatening messages in 2016. George also made clear he knew where the woman who survived the 1999 attack lived in Idaho. Details remained sealed, and it's not clear why he targeted her or what drew him to the case. When his prison term ends, George will be under three years of supervised release. The Post notes that George was prosecuted under a federal statute on cyberstalking that makes it a crime to put a person "in reasonable fear of death or serious bodily injury" or cause them serious emotional distress. (In another cyberstalking case, the alleged perpetrators are staffers at eBay.)