'Stalker' Walks on NBA Court Looking for Player
A 20-year-old woman wandered onto a court during a playoff game between the Los Angeles Lakers and the Denver Nuggets in Denver on Sunday night, which led to police being called in.
The "disoriented" woman, who has been identified as Savannah McMillan-Christmas, walked on to the court at the Pepsi center before she was quickly whisked away by security, according to ESPN.
"She was disoriented [but] did not appear to be intoxicated," Kurt Schwartzkopf, the Nuggets' chief marketing officer, told ESPN.
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McMillan-Christmas, from Denver, reportedly headed towards Nuggets point guard Ty Lawson in search of another player.
"Where's Kenyon?" McMillan-Christmas was reportedly heard asking allegedly referring to former Denver Nuggets player Kenyon Martin, who now plays for the Los Angeles Clippers.
McMillan-Christmas was arrested for trespassing and taken to a detention facility for booking before she was released to her mother.
One source alleged that McMillan-Christmas has a history of "stalking or following several players" and that she was "basically banned from the arena" for those incidents, although Schwartzkopf denied that report.
"We have no knowledge of any of that, nor do we know where it came from," Schwartzkopf said.
Some players were left shaken by the incident and while no one was injured, Lakers star Kobe Bryant said that such instances could potentially be dangerous.
"You'd hate to see a situation in basketball that took place like Monica Seles," Bryant said, referring to a 1993 incident in which Seles, the No. 1-ranked women's tennis player in the world at the time, was stabbed by a stalker.
"You've just got to be observant. I saw her the whole time … I saw her coming. I had my eye on it," he added.
McMillan-Christmas is expected to appear in court on June 5 to answer to the charges.
