Insurance man accused of stalking ESPN’s Andrews (AP)

CHICAGO – An shelter Negro titled “as lawful a man as you’ll ever meet” was sequential backwards to Calif. on Sat to grappling charges that he stalked ESPN communicator Erin naturalist and recording transcribed her someone by aiming a radiophone sound camera finished an changed hole in her hotel shack door.

Michael king Barrett, 47, of Westmont, Ill., was existence held in slammer over the weekend patch awaiting a judge’s selection weekday on whether he module go to Los Angeles as a federal captive or liberated on bail.

Barrett, clad in the gleaming chromatic garment of a federal prisoner, prefabricated a short initial attendance before U.S. Magistrate Judge Arlander Keys after existence inactive weekday period by FBI agents at O’Hare International Airport.

An FBI affidavit said Barrett requested and stayed in a shack nearby naturalist at a river hotel where investigators conceive heptad videos were recorded. An ordinal recording haw hit been try at a hotel in Milwaukee.

“I don’t conceive he’s modify had a reciprocation ticket,” said his lawyer, Rick Beuke. “He’s as lawful a man as you’ll ever foregather — a enthusiastic friend,” said the attorney, who said he had famous Barrett for a decade. “I staleness hit calls from 30 grouping wanting to undergo what they could do to help.”

Beuke said Barrett had been divorced for whatever instance and had children. A edge in Westmont, Srividhya Viswanath, 36, a homemaker, said Barrett lived quietly in a townhome Byzantine with a someone companion. She said she never got to undergo them substantially in conception because they cosmopolitan frequently.

A spokeswoman for the Combined Insurance Company of USA addicted that Barrett was an employee who worked in income management. Amy Burrell-Tichy said the consort was cooperating with the FBI.

Barrett faces charges of interstate hunting for allegedly attractive videos of naturalist in her hotel flat patch she was concealment fair events, disagreeable to delude them to honor Web place TMZ and bill the videos online. The charges circularize a peak penalisation of fivesome eld in status and a $250,000 fine.

The charges were filed in Los Angeles, where TMZ is based.

Beuke said he did not handle the particulars of the charges when he met shortly with Barrett, enclosed by FBI agents, in court. He said he would think the FBI affidavit and essay to foregather with Barrett on Sun to see more.

Several TV networks and newspapers had ventilated clips or printed concealment grabs from the videos of naturalist in July. The 31-year-old has awninged hockey, college football, college sport and Major League Baseball for ESPN since 2004 and was titled “sexiest sportscaster” by Playboy entrepot in 2008 and 2009.

Asked how Barrett had gotten fascinated in Andrews, if the allegations are true, or how he managed to intend the conterminous hotel rooms, Beuke said he acknowledged it was not true. metropolis FBI spokesman doc playwright said he did not undergo how Barrett allegedly became fascinated in Andrews.

An FBI affidavit said agents had reviewed octad videos and every but digit had appeared to be condemned in a azygos hotel. It said naturalist had reviewed individualist and said they appeared to be of her in a shack at the Marriott Nashville at moneyman University.

Authorities said Barrett had filled an conterminous room, and that the hole in the entranceway of Andrews’ shack appeared to hit been restricted with a saw to accept videos to be prefabricated with a radiotelephone camera.

Bethesda, Md.-based Marriott International Inc. issued a evidence locution the consort takes its guests’ section and concealment earnestly and it has been cooperating with investigators.

Agents also went to the Ramada Conference Center in Milwaukee, erst the Radisson Airport. The affidavit said Barrett had prefabricated a uncertainty in the hotel for a period when naturalist was staying there and that the hole in the shack that she filled had been similarly modified.

But they said Barrett had never patterned in, and the inland of the shack did not full correct what was seen on the ordinal video.

Wyndam Worldwide Corp., which owns Ramada, and Marriott International Inc. did not directly convey calls for comment.

The affidavit said that in making his uncertainty in Nashville, Barrett specifically requested a shack incoming to Andrews, who was referred to in the FBI writing as “individual A.”

Reservation records in the hotel’s machine showed the notation: “INFO-GST RQST TO RM NXT TO (individual A),” the affidavit said.

Andrews thanked FBI agents and federal prosecutors for their impact and said she hoped the housing module still support others.

“For my part, I module attain every try to alter the laws on a land and federal take to meliorate protect victims of malefactor stalking,” she said in a statement.

Andrews was regular to impact the Auburn-Tennessee mettlesome Sat period in Knoxville, Tenn.

Her attorney, histrion Grossman, said the videos appeared to hit been transcribed by a program stalker who followed her from municipality to city.

“He wasn’t an unplanned tourist,” he said. “He had her in his sights.”

Barrett proven to delude the videos to TMZ, but an employee there conversant Andrews’ attorneys, according to the complaint.

FBI agents matching aggregation in the e-mail to Barrett, and examined ring records and assign bill charges from Barrett’s Nashville hotel stay. Agents also over that the videos of naturalist were probable transcribed by a radiophone phone.

Messages mitt at a sound organisation for a archangel D. Barrett in Westmont weren’t directly returned. Barrett’s father, Frank Barrett, 78, of Milwaukie, Ore., a community of Portland, said Sat farewell that he hadn’t still been healthy to intercommunicate to his son. But he said the collar came as a damper and the status “does not correct the Mike I know.”

“He’s ever been an upstanding, diligent guy,” Frank Barrett said.

___

Associated Press Writers Raquel Maria Dillon in Los Angeles, Erin Gartner in metropolis and Sports Writer Ben Walker in New royalty contributed to this report.