WASHINGTON - A 30-year-old Laurel, Maryland man, Jesse Baker, has been sentenced to a term of 15 years in prison for stalking and repeatedly threatening his former girlfriend after already having been convicted of stalking, threatening and destroying the property of the same victim previously, U.S. Attorney Jeffrey A. Taylor announced today.

Baker received his sentence yesterday in the Superior Court of the District of Columbia before the Honorable Robert E. Morin on six counts of felony threats and one count of stalking. The defendant was found guilty of these offenses by a Superior Court jury on April 21, 2008.

Previously, on November 23, 2004, Baker had been sentenced to four years of imprisonment after being convicted of Stalking, Threats, Destruction of Property, and Contempt, based on a series of threatening and destructive acts against his former girlfriend. The evidence presented at the 2004 trial established that Baker stalked the victim in 2003 by following her to her workplace, defacing her property, and by leaving numerous threatening messages on her cellular telephone. In these messages, the defendant threatened to kill the victim, stated that he would not rest until he made her life a living hell, and stated that we would be back for her one day.

According to the evidence in the most recent case, on October 2, 2006, the defendant was released to a halfway house in order to transition into the community after incarceration. Between October 9, 2006 and October 11, 2006, while Baker was in the halfway house, his former girlfriend, who is the same victim from the 2004 case, received 27 text messages from a telephone number she did not recognize. These text messages were threatening, offensive, and obscene with such statements as: “An eye for an eye don’t think I forgot,” “What do u think happens when u let a lion out out the cage??,” “An apology will dead this...it will be your last mistake,” and “...I gots to pay u a visit.” The number associated with the text messages was traced to a prepaid cellular telephone purchased in Laurel, Maryland. However, the telephone itself was never located. Nonetheless, the defendant’s identity as the sender of those messages was established through the substance of the messages. In the text messages, the defendant referred to the prior trial, the prior offense, his incarceration, his relationship with the victim, and the witness who testified in the prior trial. The defendant also mentioned his family and friends by name and made reference to both his mother’s telephone number and the name of her street. Additionally, there were calls made from that telephone number to the defendant’s mother and employer.

In announcing the sentence, U.S. Attorney Taylor praised the outstanding investigative efforts of Criminal Investigative Unit supervisor Tommy Miller and Metropolitan Police Department Detective Chad Howard. Mr. Taylor also praised the work of Victim Witness Specialist Maria Shumar, and Litigation Specialist Joseph Calvarese, who produced some compelling trial exhibits. Mr. Taylor commended the efforts of former Assistant U.S. Attorney Sasha Foster, who indicted the case, and Assistant U.S. Attorney Sarah McClellan, who prosecuted the case at trial.