/ 6 September 2004

Man arrested over GPS ‘stalking’

A Californian man has been arrested for allegedly using global positioning system technology to stalk a former girlfriend.

Ara Gabrielyan is said to have attached a mobile phone with the tracking system to the woman’s car, allowing him to follow her movements.

The unidentified woman said he had turned up unexpectedly while she was having coffee at a bookshop, picking up a friend from the airport, visiting her brother’s grave and at dozens of other places.

”This is what I would call stalking of the 21st century,” said a police spokesperson.

Gabrielyan (32) from Glendale, is said to have phoned the woman 30 to 100 times a day after she ended their two-year relationship six months ago.

She called the police and had him arrested after seeing him underneath her car, changing the phone’s battery.

The phone, which had a motion switch that turned on when the car moved, sent a signal to a satellite, allowing Gabrielyan to track her movements on the internet.

He is being held on $500 000 bail and faces up to six years in prison.

The police spokesperson said: ”It was an obsession, an obsession to the point where 24-hours a day he had to know where she was, what she did, who she met and how she carried out her daily routine.” – Guardian Unlimited Â