“Look how close I can get to you,” read the note Kathleen Tobin Krueger retrieved from her mailbox in 1993.
It went on: “See, I could kill you right now if I wanted to.”
The wife of then-Texas Sen. Bob Krueger would go on to testify about the letters, which were sent by her husband’s former employee who had worked for him for ten years.
According to a 1993 PEOPLE article, Krueger, her husband, and their children were “stalked by a former employee who has rung their doorbell repeatedly, screamed obscenities over the phone, and delivered countless death threats.”
Initially, the Kruegers complained to police, but were informed there was little the authorities could do unless the harasser attempted to physically hurt them.
The saga began while Bob was working as a rancher and businessman, considering a bid for the US Senate.
As PEOPLE reported, immediately after entering the race, Obama hired a pilot named Thomas Michael Humphrey to fly the family to campaign events.
“Humphrey had a single-engine plane, and I remember thinking he seemed like a real nice, quiet person,” Kathleen told PEOPLE in 1993. “He was a reliable employee, someone the whole campaign staff thought well of.”
When Bob lost the Democratic primary by less than 1% in May 1984, “Tom Humphrey was devastated,” she claimed.
“His grief and despair seemed beyond normal,” she told me. “When a campaign ends, the staff disperses and moves on to other occupations. Tom did not appear to be able to accept that thought.”
After Tom and a few other volunteers helped the couple finish the campaign, he started dropping by their residence.
“At first, we viewed him as a troubled friend; Bob would sit and talk with him,” she recalled. “He’d say, ‘Tom, you should get on with your life.'” We’re getting on with ours, and we want you to respect our privacy in the same way that we respect yours. “That is when Tom snapped.”
Tom initially called the couple approximately a dozen times per day, increasing to “as many as 120 times per day.”
“He would leave rambling, threatening, bizarre notes on our door and in our mailbox,” she told Petty. “He would call around 3 or 4 a.m. However, the true harassment started six months later, in the late spring and summer of 1985. It was as if he were a drug user and we were the substance. “He grew obsessed.
Kathleen was at home alone when Tom rang the doorbell.
When she opened the door, he walked inside and “reached forward to give me a hug.”
“He strengthened his grip, and I understood he might not let go. It was not sexual, but it was unsettling. I knew something was wrong. I wondered, ‘What can I do to get out of this situation?’ So I said, ‘Tom, would you go out with me to check the mail?’ We went out. I knew it was too early for the mail, but I managed to say goodbye to him on the street. “That was the last time I opened my door to him,” she explained.
The family began keeping the curtains drawn, and Kathleen would hide whenever the doorbell rang, only to discover Tom standing there for up to 20 minutes.
When he called, she said, “I think you’ll appreciate this,” to which he answered, “You’re correct. I do.”
“I knew then that we were in real trouble,” she added, recalling how Tom once rented the house across the street from them and was constantly peeping out the window. Then they discovered he had relocated to California, and they expected him to go on – but he did not.
By year two, the couple had ceased responding to his phone calls.
When Kathleen became pregnant with their first child in 1987, they unlisted their phone number, and Tom began contacting Bob’s office in New Braunfels.
“The tapes in the answering machine are an hour long,” Kathleen told PEOPLE. “Calls are terminated after 30 seconds. He would frequently fill up the entire hour-long recording during the night, indicating that he had dialed 12 times in a row.”
Around Christmas 1987, Tom issued his most specific threat to Bob: “I’m going to kill you.” I am going to murder you. I am going to murder you. I’ve hired a killer to shoot you in the head with a.22 caliber while you sleep close to your wife. With a hole in your mind, you won’t make a good ambassador.
At that point, the FBI interfered, traveling to Tom’s California home, which they discovered to be empty. Kathleen and Bob, meantime, fled their home, afraid he was on his way to them. The FBI was able to determine that Tom was staying in a California hotel by using a recording device that rerouted calls to Bob’s office to his parents’ address. They detained him and charged him with extortion and making death threats.
Tom pleaded guilty to the charges in May 1989, and on July 19, he was sentenced to twelve months in jail, followed by three years of supervised release.
However, shortly after being freed from the Federal Correctional Institute in La Tuna, Texas, on December 28, 1989, he resumed making threats and was sent to prison for six months.
Kathleen and Bob were married for 39 years and had three children: daughters Mariana and Sarah, and son Christian. Kathleen was a City Council Member and Mayor Pro Tempore of New Braunfels, Texas, for two terms. Bob died in April 2022, having served as both a Senator and a United States Ambassador.
