Secret admirer charged with stalking, attacking man’s girlfriend

HAZEL PARK — An infatuation with a man at the gym escalated to a dangerous confrontation, police say, when the secret admirer stalked the man’s girlfriend using a GPS tracking device placed on her car and pistol-whipped her outside of her home.

“This was an extremely dangerous situation,” said Hazel Park Police Chief Brian Buchholz. “Unbeknownst to the victims, this woman was watching them for an extended period of time and wanted to harm the girlfriend. It’s very fortunate that it didn’t go further than it did.”

The suspect is Jie Yu, 52, of Rochester. She was arraigned in Hazel Park in the 43rd District Court April 2, charged with aggravated stalking and felonious assault — each punishable by up to five years in prison — and two counts of possession of a firearm in the commission of a crime, each punishable by up to two years in prison.

She was also charged with one count of carrying a concealed weapon, which is another five-year felony, and illegally using a tracking device on a motor vehicle, which is a 93-day misdemeanor.

She was being held on a $1 million cash bond and, according to court officials, did not have an attorney of record at press time.

The attack occurred in the 90 block of West Shevlin Avenue in Hazel Park on the morning of March 29. Police received calls around 8:20 a.m. reporting that shots had been fired. Officers rushed to the scene and found that while a gun was involved, no shots were fired. Rather, a 35-year-old woman was reportedly struck in the face with a pistol.

The victim had reportedly been sitting in her car in the driveway with the driver’s window down while she talked on her cellphone. That’s when the suspect allegedly approached her, carrying a bright red bag similar to those used by food delivery workers. She told police that the suspect first asked her about the address and then walked away before returning moments later with a 9mm Glock pistol. Without saying anything, the suspect reportedly used the gun to pistol-whip the victim, and at some point, she allegedly racked the slide on the gun and dropped a live 9mm round onto the ground near the car.

“The suspect was manipulating the weapon when she confronted the victim and racked the slide a couple times. It does make you wonder if she would’ve shot and killed this woman if she knew how to correctly use the gun,” Buchholz said. “It’s hard to say, based on her actions, how the suspect would’ve expected the victim to know to stay away from the boyfriend, or what her purpose was.”

The attack occurred after the victim had returned from the home of her boyfriend, who is also in his 30s. The victim saw the suspect’s getaway vehicle, which she described as a gray 2018 Ford F-150 pickup truck. Police used surveillance footage from nearby homes and businesses to get the number on the license plate, which linked the truck to the suspect’s estranged husband, a resident of Auburn Hills.

Upon executing a search warrant at Yu’s home in Rochester, police reportedly found the packaging and codes to two tracking devices. One was found on the vehicle of the man she was apparently interested in, and the other was found on the vehicle of the man’s girlfriend — the woman she allegedly attacked.

Yu returned home a short time later. At first, she kept changing her story, police said, but in a subsequent interview she allegedly admitted to feeling lovestruck when she saw the man at the gym, and that she had been stalking them for some time prior to the attack. She also reportedly told police that she had intended to “scare” the man’s girlfriend.

Yu has no prior criminal history, and no prior connection to either victim. When the man was shown Yu’s picture, he recognized her from the gym, but he knew nothing else about her.

Buchholz commended the work of his team solving the case.

“All of the patrol officers, command officers and investigators involved did excellent work here. They really did. This started with nothing to go by that made any sense. But little by little, they put the pieces together to develop this case,” Buchholz said. “They located the suspect and arrested her within six to seven hours of when it happened. They basically had to sacrifice their Easter weekend and work extra hours to figure this out. But they did a great job.”