LOUISVILLE, Ky. — The masked man who locked a fake bomb to the neck of an Australian millionaire’s teenage daughter did not look like your ordinary violent criminal. The gray-haired attacker wielded a baseball bat but wore beige trousers and a light-colored dress shirt, rolled up at the elbows.
Along with demands for money, he left behind an email address that appears to refer to a novel about a ruthless businessman in 19th-century Asia.
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That address helped lead police all the way from the wealthy Sydney suburb where the attack occurred to a well-heeled Louisville suburb where they arrested a 50-year-old investment banker, Paul Douglas Peters, at his ex-wife’s home Monday.
Peters once worked for a company with ties to the victim’s family, according to federal court documents released Tuesday that also reveal more details about Madeleine Pulver’s ordeal earlier this month.
U.S. Magistrate Judge Dave Whalin on Tuesday ordered Peters jailed pending an extradition hearing Oct. 14 in Louisville. Peters faces charges in Australia that include kidnapping and breaking and entering.
An arrest complaint filed in court does not elaborate on Peters’ business ties.
The document says Pulver, 18, was studying for her high school exams Aug. 3 in her bedroom when she saw an intruder walk in carrying a black aluminum baseball bat and wearing a striped, multicolored balaclava. “Sit down and no one needs to get hurt,” he told her.
Pulver sat on her bed and the intruder put the bat and a backpack next to her. She noticed he was holding a black box. He forced the box against her throat and looped a device similar to a bike chain around her neck.
The man locked the box around her neck and placed a lanyard and a plastic document sleeve around her neck. It contained a handwritten note with demands, the email address and a USB digital storage device.
“Count to 200,” he said as he left, taking the bat and the backpack with him. “… I’ll be back … if you move I can see you, I’ll be right here,” she told authorities, according to the complaint.
After a few minutes Pulver texted her mother, and soon after that she called her father. After telling both of them to call police, she saw that the attacker’s note warned not to do that.
Pulver was “crying and hysterical” when bomb technicians, negotiators and detectives rushed to the scene, but she eventually calmed down, the complaint said.
Neighboring homes were evacuated, streets were closed and medical and fire crews waited nearby. Pulver spent 10 hours chained to the device, which was removed after bomb technicians determined it did not contain explosives.
The note around Pulver’s neck said the fake bomb contained “powerful new technology plastic explosives.” Details for delivering “a defined sum” would be sent “once you acknowledge and confirm receipt of this message,” it said. The USB device contained the same note.
The note included a gmail.com address for the family to contact. The email account was in the name of Dirk Struan – the main character in James Clavell’s 1966 novel “Tai-Pan,” about a bitter rivalry between powerful traders in Hong Kong after the end of the First Opium War.
Australian authorities determined that the email account was set up May 30 from an Internet Protocol address linked to a Chicago airport. Travel documents obtained from immigration authorities showed Peters had been at the airport that day.
Records from two stores show that in July, Peters bought a black bat, and a USB device and lanyard identical to those left with Pulver, the complaint said.
The arrest complaint said Peters left Australia on a one-way flight from Sydney to Chicago on Aug. 8 and then flew to Kentucky the next day. Peters is an Australian citizen who has lived in the United States.
On Aug. 11, a Louisville FBI agent spotted Peters in the backyard of the house of his ex-wife, Heather Green, near La Grange, about 30 miles northeast of Louisville, the complaint said.
The FBI arrested Peters there without incident Monday.
Pulver and her family said they were relieved to hear of the arrest.
William Pulver was once CEO of NetRankings, a pioneer in tracking online exposure and readership for companies advertising online. He left after the company was sold in 2007. He is now the chief executive of Appen Butler Hill, a company that provides language and voice-recognition software and services.
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