Updated

Updated · TODAY · Jul 22

Jennifer Garner Recalls 20-Year Paparazzi Bond After Seeking Help From 1 Photographer

Updated

Updated · TODAY · Jul 22

Jennifer Garner Recalls 20-Year Paparazzi Bond After Seeking Help From 1 Photographer

Q: After two decades of pursuit, what turned Jennifer Garner's relationship with two paparazzi into something resembling Stockholm syndrome?

It stemmed from years of constant contact with the same two photographers, especially one man who had followed Jennifer Garner for roughly 20 to 25 years, combined with a moment when that adversarial relationship unexpectedly felt protective. Garner said the nonstop pursuit created an “odd respect” and a strange familiarity. The key incident came when she felt threatened by another person and, instead of fleeing from the paparazzo, ran to him because she knew him, trusted him in that moment, and believed “he and I would be OK.” That experience turned a long-running harassment dynamic into what she described as “kind of a Stockholm syndrome thing.” Her account does not suggest the harassment stopped. She said she still calls police regularly to ask for basic privacy, including being able to walk around the block with her children and dog without being followed. But after two decades of being trailed by the same people, the relationship became psychologically complicated: intrusive and damaging, yet familiar enough that one of the photographers briefly became someone she sought out for safety.

Q: Jennifer Garner helped pass a law to protect celebrity children in 2013. Thirteen years later, has it actually worked?

Yes, but only partly. The law Garner helped champion with Halle Berry in 2013—California’s SB 606—was designed to punish paparazzi who harass children because of a parent’s fame. By Garner’s own account in 2026, it appears to have worked in its narrowest aim: the worst behavior she described from her children’s early years—cars running red lights, photographers blocking a pediatrician’s entrance, children being knocked over outside preschool, and soccer games overwhelmed by pursuing vehicles—has been curbed. She said the legislation prevents the kind of harassment her children grew up with. But the law has not ended paparazzi intrusion. Garner says two photographers still trail her regularly, and she still calls police to get basic privacy, even for a walk around the block. That suggests the statute reduced the most dangerous and child-focused harassment without eliminating the broader business of following celebrities in public. There are also reasons the improvement may not be due to the law alone. The paparazzi market has changed since 2013, with social media reducing the value of some candid photos and giving celebrities more control over images. That likely weakened incentives for the most aggressive chases. So, 13 years later, the evidence points to a mixed result: SB 606 seems to have helped stop the most extreme conduct aimed at celebrity children, but it did not solve the larger problem of persistent surveillance and intimidation by paparazzi.

3 articles · Updated · TODAY · Jul 22

Jennifer Garner said on a July 21 podcast that she once ran to a longtime paparazzo for help when she feared someone following her might hurt her.
Two photographers have been assigned to Garner for more than 20 years, she said, creating what she described as an "odd respect" mixed with a "Stockholm syndrome" dynamic and repeated calls to police.
Garner tied that relationship to years of aggressive pursuit centered on her 3 children, saying photographers ignored other stars but followed her because she had the kids.
At schools and sports events, she said paparazzi knocked over preschoolers, swarmed fields with cars, and even prompted one child to leave a soccer league, reinforcing her support for California's 2013 child-paparazzi law.