(NEWS YORK) — A Michigan man was sentenced to 40 to 60 years in prison for kidnapping and torturing a woman he stalked for more than a decade, in a case that highlighted the potentially devastating impact of stalking.
Christopher Thomas, 39, pleaded guilty to kidnapping, torture and aggravated stalking in December 2023, and was sentenced in 2024. The charges stemmed from a horrific October 2022 incident in which he kidnapped Samantha Stites and held her in a soundproof bunker he had constructed inside a storage unit.
“I wondered if I would see daylight again,” Stites said in her victim impact statement during sentencing. “I shook and sobbed after he raped me, I wasn’t sure he would stop.”
ABC News Studios’ “Stalking Samantha: 13 Years of Terror,” a three-part series, is streaming in its entirety on Hulu and Disney+ from Tuesday, Aug. 19.
While Thomas was initially charged with criminal sexual conduct, those charges were later dropped as part of a plea agreement.
The case gained national attention due to its disturbing details, but also because Stites had previously sought protection from Thomas through the legal system. Just months before the kidnapping, her request for an ex parte — meaning the defendant was not present — personal protection order was denied.
The stalking began in 2011 when Stites was a college student at Grand Valley State University. Thomas, who is seven years older than Stites, began appearing at the same Christian group she attended. What started as seemingly innocent interactions quickly evolved into something more sinister.
“At first I think he is just lonely and for some reason finds me an approachable person to talk to,” Stites told ABC News. “And then at some point, it kind of changes.”
Despite Stites’ repeated rejections and clear boundaries, Thomas’s behavior escalated. He would appear at her workplace with flowers, show up at her sports practices and eventually began following her movements through GPS trackers he secretly placed on her vehicle and those of her friends.
“She felt sorry for him. So she was a little bit nice to him,” Charissa Hayden, Stites’ former roommate, told ABC News. “And he took that and he spun it into something it wasn’t and ran away with it.”
On Oct. 7, 2022, Thomas broke into Stites’ home early in the morning and kidnapped her. He had spent months preparing for this moment, building a soundproof room within a storage unit.
“He spent thousands of dollars on creating this box so he could spend time with Sam,” Detective Mike Matteucci of the Grand Traverse County Sheriff’s Office told ABC News. “And do God only knows what.”
Inside the bunker, Thomas revealed he had tracked Stites’ movements for over a year using GPS devices, showing her the tracking app on his phone. He told her she would be held for two weeks, showing her supplies he had gathered including food, water and a bucket for bathroom needs.
Stites, fearing for her life, strategically engaged him in conversation. When Thomas expressed fear about going to prison, Stites saw an opportunity. After nearly 14 hours in captivity, she convinced him to release her by promising not to report the crime. Once free, she immediately sought medical attention and reported the incident to authorities.
The investigation revealed Thomas had a prior conviction for stalking another woman. Kelli, whose last name was withheld for legal reasons, told ABC News she had obtained a protection order against Thomas in 2009 after he engaged in similar stalking behavior.
“I always knew that there would be somebody else,” Kelli said after being contacted by detectives investigating Stites’ case. “When they called me in 2022, there’s like this guilty feeling like he did do it to somebody else. I was right.”
During the sentencing, Judge Kevin Elsenheimer — who had denied Stites’ ex parte protection order request in July 2022, just three months before the kidnapping — acknowledged the severity of Thomas’s actions and his likelihood to reoffend.
The judge pointed to Thomas’s jail conversations with his mother as evidence of his obsession, noting that Thomas admitted “nothing would have mattered, that nothing would have stopped you from doing what you were going to do.”
If Thomas is ever released, he will be required to wear a GPS monitor for the remainder of his life.
“Justice is a funny thing. It doesn’t necessarily come in the form of prison years,” Stites said. “I can’t ever go back to before I was kidnapped. And that’s something I had to grieve. But knowing that I’m finally turning the page on this and that I should feel safe with him off the street and that I am protected meant a lot. I felt free.”
According to court documents, the case prompted changes in how courts handle protection orders in Michigan. New policies require referees — who consider PPO applications and make a referral to the judge on what to do — to examine any prior PPOs before making recommendations to the court.
According to national statistics presented in the case, one in three women will be stalked in their lifetime.
“I want other women, whether they’ve been stalked or sexually assaulted or not believed, I want them to see my story and think things can change,” Stites said.
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