LINKIN PARK - WOMAN PLEADS GUILTY TO STALKING LINKIN PARK SINGER

WOMAN PLEADS GUILTY TO STALKING LINKIN PARK SINGER

A 28-year-old woman has pleaded guilty to stalking LINKIN PARK frontman CHESTER BENNINGTON. Former laboratory worker Devon Townsend admitted she had used government computers at her former workplace Sandia National Laboratories' technology and manufacturing group to access the rocker's email account from January to November 2006. Townsend also hacked into a cellphone firm's website to obtain Bennington's phone number. In a plea agreement filed in Albuquerque, New Mexico on Friday (29Jun07), Townshend pleaded guilty to charges including stalking and unlawful access to stored communications. In the agreement, Townsend said, "On at least one occasion, knowing that Chester Bennington was in Arizona, I travelled to Arizona solely for the purpose of trying to see him. While I was there, I monitored Chester Bennington's voicemails as a means of trying to locate where he might be eating dinner or lunch." She faces a potential of five years behind bars and $250,000 (GBP125,000) in fines. Police allege Townshend also hacked into the email of Bennington's wife Talinda and threatened the former model over the phone.