- It was reported that the police received a phone call at 2 am on Monday from a security personnel
- 29-year-old Kevin Garcia Valdofinos has been arrested
An alleged stalker hiding outside Prince Harry and Meghan’s Montecito mansion was arrested in the middle of the night, according to reports.
It is understood that a member of the security team at the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s $14m (£11m) California home put the man on a citizen’s note before alerting local police.
said a spokesperson for the Santa Barbara Sheriff’s Office TMZ They received a phone call on Monday at about 2 am from the security staff.
The newspaper said that Kevin Garcia Valdofinos, 29, was placed under arrest at the entrance of the couple’s home.
Once the police officers arrived, the man was taken into custody and booked for criminal prosecution, before being released on bail.
The law under which Valdovinos was arrested indicated that this was not the first time he had committed such a crime.
He didn’t make it to the property, TMZ reports, and something he said to security prompted them to put him under citizen arrest.
It was not clear if Harry and Meghan – or their children Archie, 4, and Lilibet, 1 – were at home at the time of the arrest.
The couple were in New York City last night for the Ms Foundation Women of Vision Awards, where Meghan was presented with the 2023 prize “for her global advocacy for the empowerment and advocacy on behalf of women and girls.”
The couple and their then one-year-old son moved into the exclusive neighborhood of Montecito in 2020.
They bought the 18,000-square-foot palatial home, which sits on 5.4 acres of land, for $14.5m (£11m).
It was revealed a year later that the police had been called to the mansion nine times in the span of several months.
Twice over Christmas, the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office even responded to pick up an intruder who had traveled to the Sussexes’ home from Ohio.
The property’s alarm system also triggered five times in that time.
The data, obtained under freedom of information laws, was released after the couple shared their security concerns in an interview with Oprah Winfrey.
Nicholas Brooks was the assailant who drove from Ohio. He was caught trespassing on Christmas Eve 2020 and released on a caution. When he returned again two days later, he was arrested and charged.
Brooks later said he may have been “high” at the time of the accident. It was later revealed that he had previously been convicted of participating in an attack that resulted in a broken bone in his face.
‘I don’t know why I went to their place,’ he said, ‘that’s where I ended up. I drove cross country – I know it’s crazy.
I have been told to stay away and never allowed back in but do not have to appear in court. I stayed in jail for a night and they asked me to stay away in the future.
News of Brooks’ abuse came just a week after Harry opened up about his concern for his family’s safety. The prince told about his concerns during the couple’s interview with Oprah Winfrey on March 7, 2021.
Harry revealed how Buckingham Palace took away their security details when they resigned as senior members of the royal family and moved to North America.
He said he signed Meghan to their lucrative deals with Netflix and Spotify because they needed money to cover their security after being ‘financially cut off by minors’ after they left the UK.
“I got what my mom left me, and without that, we wouldn’t have been able to do it,” he told Oprah at the time.
During covid, a friend’s suggestion was, “How about the signs?” “We hadn’t thought about it before,” said Harry, while Meghan added.
‘So, there were all kinds of different options,’ Harry continued. And look, from my point of view, all I need is enough money to be able to pay for security to keep my family safe.
The deals with Netflix and Spotify were said to be worth $100m (£80m) and $25m (£20m), respectively, while Harry has since published a memoir called ‘Spare’, which – according to Guinness World Records Standard – has become the fastest selling non-fiction book of all time in its release history.
It is widely reported that Harry received $20m (£16m) for the book deal.
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