Rebecca was preparing to audition for The Godfather Part III before her murder (Image: Getty Images)
Rebecca Schaeffer, a promising young actress, was murdered by a deranged admirer .
The former teenage model began her acting career on the soap opera Guiding Light before landing her breakthrough role in the sitcom My Sister Sam. Prior to her shocking death, she was scheduled to meet Francis Ford Coppola and audition for Mary Corleone in The Godfather: Part III.
Rebecca was just 21 and residing in Los Angeles at the time. She was also romantically involved with director Brad Silberling.
Her murder later inspired his 2002 film, Moonlight Mile, which explores a man’s anguish following his fiancée’s killing.
On July 19, 1989, Rebecca was fatally gunned down by Robert Bardo, an unhinged stalker, at her LA flat. Robert initially became obsessed with Rebecca during her stint on My Sister Sam.
Robert penned numerous fan letters to Rebecca, and her psychologist father, Benson Schaeffer, described them as appearing harmless and seeming like correspondence from “just another strange kid who wanted someone to pay attention to him,” according to the Los Angeles Times.
Rebecca had even replied to one of them, writing, “Yours was one of the nicest I got.”
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Robert’s fixation deepened when he travelled to California in summer 1987 attempting to meet Rebecca at the Warner Bros. studio, but was refused entry by security, according to Rhonda Saunders, formerly with the Los Angeles District Attorney’s Office, per ABC News’ 20/20 special.
He was clutching a teddy bear and flowers. When Robert witnessed Rebecca in Scenes from the Class Struggle in Beverly Hills, featuring her in a romantic scene, his obsession became “rageful.”
“All those rageful feelings. … ‘How dare she? She’s mine. … She’s supposed to stay innocent for me.’ That gets … converted into a plan of cold-blooded revenge,” Dr. Kris Mohandie, a clinical police and forensic psychologist, explained to 20/20. “I’m going to punish you and permanently possess you by taking your life.”
In July 1989, Robert tried to buy a firearm at a gun shop in Tucson but was turned away.
Jeff Dunn, a former police detective with the Los Angeles Police Department, revealed that the gun shop proprietor sensed something wasn’t right with Robert and began interrogating him, according to 20/20.
Jeff explained that Robert admitted to the owner about his mental health history. Following this revelation, the gun shop owner realised that Robert was a “prohibited possessor” and couldn’t legally purchase a firearm.
He informed Robert that he wouldn’t sell him the weapon. Robert then persuaded his brother Edward to buy a handgun on his behalf.
Rebecca Schaeffer was just 21 when she was murdered (Image: Getty)
“His brother didn’t know what was going on in his mind, that he was fixated on Rebecca Schaeffer,” Rhoda explained to 20/20. “He just thought, ‘Oh, he wants a gun, he’ll do some target shooting.’ And… told Robert, ‘OK, I’ll get you the gun, but you can’t use it unless I’m with you.'” Robert then employed a private investigator to secure Rebecca’s home address, with the investigator acquiring it from the state Department of Motor Vehicles.
During a prison interview featured on 20/20, Robert revealed what motivated him to contact a private investigator to locate Rebecca. He had learnt about how a Scottish individual, Arthur Jackson, tracked down actress Theresa Saldana in 1982 using a PI.
Arthur pursued and stabbed Theresa, an attack she survived.
Robert boarded a Greyhound bus from Tucson to Los Angeles, travelling to Rebecca’s residence with a bag and the firearm in his possession, according to officials. Inside his bag, he carried a card Rebecca had sent him, her photograph, and the book The Catcher in the Rye, which Mark David Chapman possessed when he murdered John Lennon in 1980.
Robert reached Los Angeles at approximately 5 a. m. on July 18, 1989.
American actress Rebecca Schaeffer (1967 – 1989) on the set of the TV comedy series ‘My Sister Sam,’ (Image: Getty Images)
That very morning, Rebecca was awaiting delivery of the script for The Godfather Part III when Robert pressed her doorbell. The intercom was faulty, so Rebecca descended and opened the door personally.
Robert then presented Rebecca with the signed photograph he possessed of her. She courteously informed Robert she needed to prepare for an interview.
Robert departed for a café to eat before returning to her residence. Rebecca answered the door once more, and Robert alleged that she declared he was wasting her time, claiming that comment triggered his response.
Robert said to Rebecca shortly afterwards, “I forgot to give you something,” before pulling out his gun and shooting her at point-blank range in the chest. Robert fled the scene.
He subsequently told a psychiatrist that Rebecca had repeatedly asked him, “Why? Why?” as she lay dying.
A neighbour who heard the gunshot and Rebecca’s screams immediately rang for an ambulance. Rebecca was rushed to hospital, where she was later pronounced dead.
Robert Bardo stalked and shot Rebecca (Image: Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
According to police, a day after Robert shot Rebecca, he was seen running down a motorway in Tucson, shouting, “I killed Rebecca Schaeffer.”
Paul Hallums, the Tucson officer who arrested Bardo, told 20/20: “We secured him right away. Did a little, quick patdown and search on him, found a picture of Rebecca Schaeffer in his shirt pocket,” adding, “He was disheveled-looking. His clothes were dirty. His hair was a mess. It looked like he hadn’t slept all night. We started putting two and two together.”
Jeff said of Robert: “Robert Bardo was a troubled young man….. There was a history of a troubled childhood. He had threatened neighbors and schoolmates.”
Robert was returned to California, where he stood trial for Rebecca’s murder. He was convicted of first-degree murder by a judge, having waived his right to a jury trial in return for the death penalty being taken off the table in his 1991 trial, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Robert was sentenced to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole in December 1991. Rebecca’s murder resulted in California enacting the first anti-stalking law in 1990, which is now present in all 50 states.
Her death also shaped the Driver’s Privacy Protection Act, which was passed in 1994. The federal law prevents the DMV from disclosing a driver’s personal information, such as addresses.