Senate majority leader Joe Bruno's missing granddaughter was found yesterday wandering the streets of Times Square with a self-declared pimp - who uses the Internet to entice young women into selling their bodies, police sources said.
Rachel Bruno, a beautiful 20-year-old blond, ran away from her parents' upstate home last week after meeting the married grifter, John Savage, on MySpace.com, the sources said.
Images of half-naked women and piles of money decorate Savage's MySpace page, which declares: "pimpin at its best."
"I believe that I'm the solution for those who r lost or need elevation to there situation," Savage writes. "My name is Jazzo and my interests in myspace is to meet beautiful young women that want to travel and get down wit a playa."
Police were investigating if the admitted 30-year-old pimp had committed a crime relating to Rachel Bruno's disappearance. He was arrested on an unrelated outstanding warrant.
Cops found Bruno on W. 45th St. near Broadway shortly before 2 a.m.
Savage - who lists his occupation as "entertainment" and his income as "$60,000 to $75,000" on MySpace - was idling nearby in a new SUV. The cops asked Bruno to call him and tell him to drive over. When he did, they grabbed him, sources said.
"She was hysterically weeping," Joe Bruno said after his granddaughter was found.
"She was relieved to be home and scared to death and afraid she would be harmed," the Republican added, before saying his granddaughter suffers from anorexia and "serious emotional problems" that affect her judgment.
Savage was being held by cops on a probation violation. He has been on probation since pleading guilty to attempting to bribe Bronx cops, offering them $690 for information on prostitution sweeps in 2002.
"You know we have a new mayor and police commissioner and they are going to start cracking down on prostitution. They are hitting me hard," Savage told the cop. "Whatever you and your man can do for me I'll pay you money if you let me know when they're coming out to pick up the hoes."
Savage violated his probation in 2004 when he was arrested in Saratoga Springs for allegedly giving strawberry-flavored Smirnoff vodka and a 12-pack of Pabst Blue Ribbon beer to his teenage stepson and the boy's pals, authorities said.
State Police Superintendent Wayne Bennett said if cops find a reason to charge Savage with a crime related to Rachel Bruno's disappearance "then we most certainly will."
Savage does not hide his lewd agenda on MySpace.
Under the heading "Who I'd like to meet," he says: "Young fine classy women who r open minded to a different way of life. And must be sexy."
"I think when your [sexy], classy or fine you should get what's coming to, like all the money," he says. "I am here with the perfect opportunity for you to travel with me and achieve the finer thing in life."
He later notes: "You must be 18 older. Send picture."
Savage, who says on MySpace that he runs MusthaveIt Escorts, and Rachel Bruno met up last Thursday near Albany and then headed to New York City on Sunday after her well-connected grandfather launched a massive search, authorities said.
Rachel Bruno had a brief telephone conversation with her mother on Monday and said she was fine. But Bennett said the young woman called her mom again Tuesday "in tears and said she wanted to come home."
The state police called the NYPD and investigators tracked down Bruno after tracing her cell phone calls, sources said.
She was being examined by doctors yesterday. Her friends described her as easily manipulated.
Bennett insisted Bruno's case was handled no differently from any other missing-person case.
Originally published on August 3, 2006
