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Criminal Records - Most Wanted |
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Profile |
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Name: Peter Braunstein
(Peter Brown, Peter Grant, Peter Bronson )
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Sex: Male |
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Race: White |
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Age Now: 44 |
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Height: 5'11" |
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Weight: 147 lbs. |
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Hair (Color, Description, Facial Hair): Black
Curly |
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Wanted for :
Kidnapping, Manhattan, NY;
Oct 31, 2005
Burglary, Manhattan, NY;
Oct 31, 2005
Robbery, Manhattan, NY;
Oct 31, 2005
Sexual Abuse, Manhattan, NY;
Oct 31, 2005
Probation Violation
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Location(s) |
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Last Seen : Manhattan, NY |
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Possible Location : Indianapolis, IN
Cleveland, OH
New York, NY
Columbus, OH |
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Last Known : Unkown |
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Traits |
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Fascinated with the 1960s and 70s |
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May wear vintage clothing |
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Has a number of sexual fetishes |
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Belongs to several membership-based pornographic websites |
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Speaks French fluently |
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Police say he has a history of harassment and paranoia |
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Reported to use marijuana and cocaine heavily |
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Enjoys Chinese Food -- Beef with Curry and Extra Mustard |
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Doesn't drive |
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Has a U.S. Passport |
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Pays for purchases with cash |
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Is now clean shaven and extremely thin |
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Case Story |
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Police Confirm AMW Tip -- Braunstein's Been Walking In Memphis |
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Thanks to an AMW tipster who kept her ears and eyes open, police got one step closer to tracking down Peter Braunstein -- the man they say sexually abused a woman for more than 13 hours in her apartment on Halloween.
On Dec. 12, 2005, the tipster called AMW with information about someone she ran into at a blood donation center in Memphis where she worked. It was Braunstein -- and he'd made no attempt to conceal his identity. Braunstein gave her his real name and presented a U.S. passport instead of a driver's license, saying he doesn't drive.
The tipster says Braunstein was extremely thin, clean-shaven and was wearing a wool jacket with three-quarter-length sleeves. The tipster says Braunstein told her he was a freelance journalist who wanted to exchange his blood for $20 to "continue to travel," mentioning Kansas as his next stop.
His "travel," say police, has included stops in places all over the East Coast and Midwest. And they say he's packed a lot of activity into each place he's stopped.
Police: Braunstein Makes Bold Moves In Midwest
In early November, police tracked Braunstein to the Cleveland area. There, they say he was pretending to be a movie producer, a retired LAPD officer, and was spouting his lies and flashing his fake U.S. Marshals badge at Moriarity's -- a Cleveland pub. AMW sat down with the bar owner, a bartender and a regular customer, who all had conversations with Braunstein. Even though they all discussed different things with the accused sexual offender, they agreed on one thing: Braunstein is a smooth-talking phony.
Yet despite not knowing when to keep his mouth shut, police say Braunstein's latest lies are not even his boldest misstep.
In an incredible act of bravado, Braunstein went so far as to place an ad in The Cleveland Plain-Dealer for a chauffeur. In the ad, Braunstein used the alias, "Peter Grant" and indicated that he would be paying the driver $11/hour in cash. Police believe Braunstein has been hanging around strip clubs.
In fact, based on information AMW tipsters gave police, there is reason to believe Braunstein had even chosen his next victim. Our tipsters told police Braunstein was seen outside of one strip club waiting for an employee of the club to walk out. Luckily, Braunstein never hooked up with the woman, and shortly after that night, took off to Columbus, Ohio.
But the bizarre tale of how police say Braunstein assaulted his first victim is straight out of a horror story. |
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A Terror-Filled Halloween |
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The calm of Halloween evening in the chic Chelsea section of New York City was disrupted when several small fires broke out in an apartment building on West 24th Street.
A 34-year-old woman opened her apartment door and was relieved to find a man dressed as a New York City firefighter already on the scene dousing the flames. But cops say moments later, the man forced his way inside her apartment saying he needed to check for smoke damage. The woman would soon discover, however, that his motives were much more sinister.
The moment the woman let Braunstein in, he shoved a chloroform-laced rag into her face, and while she went in and out of consciousness, he sexually assaulted her. The victim told police that the most eerie part was that he taunted her by spouting out intimate details about her life. She says he knew she had just been laid off from her job, and that he named many of her co-workers.
For the next 13 hours, this faux fireman -- who police were later able to identify as Peter Braunstein -- sexually assaulted the woman in her own home. Police think he may have raped her, and maybe even videotaped the whole thing. Investigators also say that Braunstein used complex homemade explosives to start the fires and pulled out a gun during the attack.
Police say that although Braunstein fled the woman's apartment early the next morning, he didn't go far initially. Surveillance tape shows him nervously checking into a motel in Manhattan where police say he paid in cash and used a passport he had obtained two days earlier.
In addition, police believe that shortly before the attack, Braunstein bought a number of items on eBay, including a firefighter uniform, a Detroit police badge and a significant amount of potassium nitrate. |
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An Interesting Background |
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Witnesses saw a man around the woman's apartment the night of the attack, and they gave police enough information to produce a composite sketch of the suspect.
Soon, police received calls saying that the sketch resembled 41-year-old Peter Braunstein. But when police went looking for Braunstein to talk about what happened that night, he was nowhere to be found. But police were soon able to piece together his background and reveal some interesting facts.
For one, Braunstein is already on probation for menacing his ex-girlfriend -- an editor who worked with the victim. Police also discovered that Braunstein has a number of fetishes and is very much into pornography.
What's more, Braunstein is a writer and journalist himself, who has written forThe Village Voice and Women's Wear Daily. In 2004, Braunstein even wrote an off-Broadway play about famed pop artist Andy Warhol.
Police warn that although he has been spotted several times in the Cleveland area and in Memphis, he could be anywhere. One of our tipsters said he may be traveling to Kansas and police say he may have plans to travel to California, Philadelphia or even France. Authorities say Braunstein speaks French fluently and has a history of paranoia and harassment. |
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