Meet Eric Frein's Unfortunate Doppelganger

While some people are lucky enough (?) to look just like Kim Kardashian, others are stuck looking like someone off of the FBI's Most Wanted List — specifically, like alleged cop-killer Eric Frein: his doppelganger, James Tully, has been stopped over 20 times by police officers looking for the criminal. In fact, it's become such an issue that a Go Fund Me campaign was started Wednesday to get Tully a car — so that he'll no longer have to trek on foot through the police's watch zone — and it's already raised $3,897.

It's been a rough few weeks for Tully. While state authorities in Pennsylvania have been doing their best to find the man who allegedly murdered police Corporal Bryon Dickson on Sept. 12, Tully has just been trying to get through his daily commute — two hours on foot through the Pocono Mountains — without being harassed. Unfortunately for him, he looks just like the man the cops are looking for.

According to ABC, Tully's been stopped at least once a day, at least twenty times in the last five weeks. "I’ve lost count after 20 in total,” Tully told WNEP-TV. “The most on one round-trip stretch was about seven times.”

Although most of the checks have been no big deal — they ask for his ID, they ask him where he's going — one police officer apparently got over-enthused at the idea of having found Frein. Dressed in camouflage and driving an SUV, the officer apparently jumped out "screaming like a lunatic," rifle in hand. Said Tully to the Morning Call:

I had my ID out, but he just kept yelling at me ‘Get on the ground, get on the ground!’ I was scared. I just thought to myself, ‘Just let me live through this.’”

All this is in spite of the fact that Tully is several feet shorter than Frein and has, according to the Pocono Record, recently started wearing a reflective vest, hat and gloves (courtesy of his mother, apparently). He told NBC News:

Many people think from a distance I look like the one they’re trying this manhunt for. What I don’t understand is, how can you confuse someone 5-foot-8-and-a-half for someone 6-foot-1? Once you get closer, you can see there is no resemblance.

On Wednesday, an acquaintance of Tully's who'd heard of his bizarre predicament, decided to take matters into her own hands: she started a Go Fund Me page with the aim of raising $2,500 — enough to buy Tully a car, so that he'd be able to drive to work instead of walking for five miles through the manhunt zone. The page reads:

Please help James Tully buy a car. James Tully has been stopped by police over 20 times in the manhunt for Federally wanted criminal Eric Matthew Frein. He has been retained so roughly that he even has physical injuries from these stops. This man cannot afford a car but diligently walks to work 2 hours each way every day that he works. That is so admirable in this day and age.

Within a few hours, they'd raised half that amount, and by Thursday, they'd exceeded it. Now, over 190 people have donated $3,897, and the page has been shared over 1,400 times. As his acquaintance told the Morning Call:

Everyone I've talked to says he's just an all-around good guy. He's shy. He wouldn't hurt a fly.

If his interview (below) is anything to go by, that description is right on the ball.

Images: Getty Images (2)