Do you recognize this man? If you live in Dongan Hills on Staten Island, you may have seen him in the past week or so, but only now would you realize you crossed paths with a would-be sexual predator, wanted for trying to rape a 22-year-old domestic worker as she walked to work on the morning of January 12th. The incident happened near the Staten Island Academy and the Richmond County Country Club, and now some local residents are up in arms, because the police didn't start notifying them until yesterday.
"I was startled that we didn't know about it earlier. I was surprised by that," Diane J. Hulse, the head of Staten Island Academy, told the Advance. Parents only learned of the knife-wielding would-be rapist when police approached them Tuesday outside the school with drawings of the perp. The area around the Staten Island Academy is patrolled by a private security company which was hired in the wake of the famous "Ninja Burglar" house break-ins in 2007. Police say it took time to investigate the incident, develop a sketch of the suspect and conduct multiple interviews of the victim.
The attacker is described as a Hispanic man, about 25 years old, with a slim build, about 5 feet 8 inches tall. He grabbed the woman from behind around 7:30 a.m. and, brandishing a knife, attempted to drag her into a wooded area. But she broke free and managed to flag down a passing car. Now parents are freaking out, and those with hired help are nervous, too. "There are a lot of domestic [workers] that come up in the morning," observes one local. "It's really quite frightening,"
