Kids fear the rapist
Fiend lives by HS
Parents and kids in The Bronx were horrified Monday after learning that a rapist lives across the street from a highschool campus where nearly 2,500 students are enrolled.
“He can easily walk this way,” said worried mom Ivette Colon, whose 15-year-old daughter attends school at the Adlai Stevenson Educational Campus. “So if she’s waiting at the corner for the bus, he can easily make her a target.”
The Post revealed on Monday that convicted child rapist Arthur Ceasar managed to fly under the radar when he moved to an apartment building at 1965 Lafayette Ave. in Soundview — because he gave authorities the wrong ZIP code.
That meant anyone who was signed up for sex-offender updates through the NY-Alert system didn’t get the notification that Ceasar was new to town.
Still, the 50-year-old Ceasar — who repeatedly raped and sodomized a 15-year-old girl in 1993 — is free to live across from Stevenson, which includes multiple schools in one massive building, thanks to a state law that only prohibits sexual predators who are on probation or parole from living within 1,000 feet of a school.
“There shouldn’t be a loophole,” railed Angel Johnson, whose younger sister, Elizah Cartagena, goes to the school. “He’s not on parole, but he still did the crime.”
Cartagena, 17, chimed in: “Yeah, why wait until he strikes again? . . . It makes me feel scared.”
Ceasar was released from prison in 2001 after serving two-thirds of a six- to 12-year sentence for the rape. He wound up serving out the max sentence after being busted again for two parole violations.
Ceasar is currently being held in lieu of bail after getting arrested last week for failing to update his correct address with authorities.