Billie Eilish gets restraining order against obsessed fan who turned up at her house seven times in one week
Popstar Billie Eilish has had enough of an obsessed fan who showed up at her place multiple times last week. According to a TMZ report from Monday, May 11, the 18-year-old Grammy winner, with the help of the law firm McPherson LLP, filed legal documents against New York native Prenell Rousseau, who allegedly began showing up over and over again at her LA home.
The ‘Bad Guy’ hitmaker claims that this obsessed fan never practiced social distancing and most of the time, never wore a mask, making her afraid for her own health and that of her family.
A judge, according to TMZ, granted a temporary restraining order that states Rousseau must stay 200-yards away from Eilish and her parents, and cease all contact. The next hearing for this matter will reportedly be held on June 1.
According to Eilish, 24-year-old Rousseau started showing up at her place from Monday last week. He allegedly rang the doorbell, and said, “I think I might have the wrong house, but does Billie Eilish live here?”
Eilish’s father told him that he had the wrong house, but Rousseau did not stop. According to Eilish, he returned at 9 pm the same day, and exhibited what she called “erratic behavior”.
She told TMZ, “While we waited for security, Mr. Rousseau remained on our porch, sat down and began to read a book, while also continuing to engage in a periodic monologue. My father repeatedly asked him to leave, but he refused.”
While security made him leave, Rousseau remained undeterred. He supposedly returned a little while later and laid down behind a wall, with plans to spend the night there. Rousseau reappeared on Tuesday once again and tried to gain entrance. He kept repeating this over the week.
Per Eilish, Rousseau showed up a total of seven times, and in five of these visits, he did not wear a mask, adding that the two occasions where he did wear a mask, he pulled it down while talking to security. He also did not wear gloves according to the pop star as he touched the doorbell and doorknob multiple times.
TMZ reported that while Rousseau was actually taken into custody twice, cops informed Eilish that there was not much they could do, given that trespassing was a non-violent offense. The police have also been trying to keep non-violent offenders out of jail due to the spread of the novel coronavirus pandemic.
This isn’t the first time Eilish has had to deal with obsessed fans and stalkers. Speaking to the Rolling Stone magazine in 2019, Eilish spoke about her family’s home address getting leaked online, leading to three fans showing up in a single day. This included a much older man who had allegedly driven all the way from San Diego.
Following this, for a while, a bodyguard had to sleep in the living room of her house. “It was really traumatizing,” said Eilish. “I completely don’t feel safe in my house anymore, which sucks. I love my house.”
“I’ve loved attention my whole life,” Eilish told the magazine then, “But I don’t think anyone knows what fame actually is. Because if I did want to be famous -- it wasn’t this kind.”