Youth Baseball Coach Accused of Stalking Rival
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(YAPHANK, N.Y.) — The coach of a youth baseball team called the Long Island Vengeance allegedly pursued a real-life vengeance of his own against a rival coach.
Robert Sanfilippo, 45, was arrested Friday on 20 counts of aggravated harassment and one count of stalking during a game at Baseball Heaven in Yaphank, N.Y.
Police said Sanfilippo bought an untraceable cell phone after an altercation with John Reardon, a rival coach, in May.
He then sent “several text messages with pictures, threatening to do harm to the victim, his son, and his wife,” the Suffolk County Sheriff’s Office said in statement.
Reardon told Newsday the texts included pictures of him and his wife that appeared to have been taken with a long-distance zoom lens. Even more disturbing, Reardon told the newspaper, the person threatened to pick up his 10-year-old son at the bus stop.
“When he suddenly started mentioning my son by name, it just hit me that it was this guy,” Reardon said of Sanfilippo. “That’s when it got scary and that’s when I went to the police.”
Sanfilippo was scheduled to be arraigned today at First District Court in Central Islip, N.Y. It was not immediately clear if he has an attorney.
Copyright 2012 ABC News Radio