
A 55-year-old Texas man has been charged with felony stalking of WNBA star Caitlin Clark, authorities report. Michael Thomas Lewis from Denton, Texas, has been accused of sending numerous threatening and sexually explicit messages to Clark over social media platform X, beginning in December last year and continuing into January, according to court documents released by the Marion County Prosecutor's Office and reported by NPR.
Despite having been questioned by police, Lewis continued to allegedly send messages to Clark, some of which included mentions of attempts to physically track her in Indianapolis. "No matter how prominent a figure you are, this case shows that online harassment can quickly escalate to actual threats of physical violence," Marion County prosecutor Ryan Mears said, per NPR. The situation was severe enough for Clark to alter her public engagements and normal routines out of concern for her safety.
Charging documents go on to detail that recent messages from Lewis were traced to IP addresses in Indianapolis. According to an NPR interview, investigators believe Lewis purportedly sent messages while located at an Indianapolis public library and a hotel near the basketball arena where Clark’s team, the Indiana Fever, plays. "Been driving around your house 3x a day," Lewis is to have written in one of the messages. The concern escalated to the point where Indianapolis Metropolitan Police confronted Lewis last Wednesday concerning the messages, as reported by FOX 4 News.
Lewis reportedly told police during the confrontation that his presence in Indianapolis was merely for vacation, and when questioned about the intimidating nature of some posts, he said that it, "wasn't him," and that the messages were part of what he claimed to be an "imaginary relationship," according to the affidavit cited by NPR. Despite being banned from the arena premises, Lewis allegedly continued to harass Clark.