A man was arrested outside of Taylor Swift‘s home in New York City on Saturday according to a report by The New York Post. The unnamed man was trying to access the building where Swift lives when neighbors call the police, reporting a “disorderly person” outside. Neighbors claimed that the man has been stalking Swift for months, but he was actually arrested on an unrelated warrant.
The Post published photos of the person trying to get into Swift’s home on Saturday. He was dressed non-descriptly in sneakers, slacks, a hoodie and a winter coat with work gloves on his hands and a backpack slung over his shoulders. According to a report by local ABC News affiliate 6ABC, police confirmed that he was trying to get into Swift’s unit in particular. He has not been charged with anything in relation to this incident, but he was taken into custody an a previous, unrelated warrant. The man was wanted for failing to order a court summons in Brooklyn in 2017, but it’s not clear what that summons was for.
Taylor Swift’s alleged stalker arrested after trying to get into her building in NYC https://t.co/DEd9ED1W1e pic.twitter.com/dAtjPTmo78
— Page Six (@PageSix) January 20, 2024
So far, Swift and her team have not commented publicly on this close encounter. It’s not clear if Swift was at her New York City home at the time, either. Swift is expected to attend the the Kansas City Chiefs‘ game against the Buffalo Bills on Sunday night in upstate New York, so it’s quite possible that she was staying at her home in the area. Swift will be supporting her boyfriend, Chiefs tight end Travis Kelce. She has no concerts or other public engagements scheduled to pull her away.
While many reports are unclear on the “disorderly man’s” motives, witnesses who spoke to the Post seemed confident that he was stalking Swift. Some said that they had seen this man hanging around their neighborhood for weeks or even over a month. A few said that he made no secret of his intent to find Swift, but complaints to the police went unheeded until now.
“When he arrived before Christmas, my husband asked what he was doing here and he said, ‘I want to see Taylor.’ He even had flowers at one point,” One person said. Another added: “I asked him to leave this morning and he just stared at me, catatonic. Total nutcase.” A third neighbor said that this man has been “sleeping on the stoop, chain-smoking constantly, shouting and generally making everyone uncomfortable.”
However, when it came to the arrest a witness said: “It was all pretty civil. He didn’t resist. There was no yelling or anything.” They said That it was only “a few minutes before they cuffed him.” The man has reportedly not been released from custody yet.