Sandra Bullock's stalker was hiding in her home for five hours

Los Angeles - Sandra Bullock's alleged stalker was inside her home for almost five hours.

The Gravity actress raised the alarm in the early hours of Sunday morning upon discovering superfan Joshua Corbett going through her personal items, but it has now emerged the star made the call to police several hours after the intruder broke into her Los Angeles mansion.

Joshua reportedly managed to scale over the barbed wire surrounding the property and enter the $16m house at around 01:00 while Sandra was asleep, and she only made the 911 call at 06:30, sources told NBC News.

When officers arrived on the scene within four minutes, they found Joshua in the grounds outside the 49-year-old star's house.

It was reported on Tuesday that Joshua - who is said to have had an "obsession" with the actress and kept a diary about her - was charged with "one felony count each of first-degree residential burglary, stalking and possession of a machine gun", although the gun was not in his possession at the time.

If convicted, Corbett faces a maximum of seven years and four months in state prison.

Luckily the Oscar-winning actress' four-year-old son, Louis, was staying with a nanny at the time of the incident because Sandra had been attending the Spike TV Guys' Choice Awards in Culver City, California, the previous evening.