PITTSBURGH (AP) - A South Carolina man has been charged with harassing a Pennsylvania woman by sending prank hostage messages to restaurants, including one in which he allegedly pretended to be a missing man who later turned up dead.
Twenty-eight-year-old Nathaniel Dunlap was to appear before a federal magistrate in Pittsburgh on Friday afternoon on cyberstalking and aggravated identity theft charges.
Prosecutors aren’t saying why Dunlap allegedly targeted the woman.
But they say he sent messages in December and January to two Pittsburgh pizzerias pretending to be the woman and claiming to be held against her will. Then, in February, Dunlap allegedly sent a message claiming to be a Duquesne University graduate student who went missing in January and was found dead in the Ohio River last month.
Dunlap’s attorney declined to comment.
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