MIAMI – A Miami Beach lawyer accused of cyberstalking his ex-girlfriend for months after they broke up and affixing a GPS tracker to her car faced a judge Wednesday morning.
Grant Sarbinoff, 37, was arrested Tuesday and charged with one count each of stalking, identity theft, identity theft with 20 or more victims, unlawful installation of a GPS tracking device, harassing phone calls and unlawful use of a communication device. He was also charged with 16 counts of unauthorized access to a protected computer system.
According to an arrest warrant, Sarbinoff cyberstalked his ex-girlfriend, whom he met on the dating app Tinder, in some form nearly every day since their relationship ended in September.
The arrest warrant details how Sarbinoff allegedly used a variety of online services, including her Florida Power & Light account, to impersonate his ex-girlfriend, shutting off her electricity and making multiple charges to her credit card.
Among the other allegations made in the warrant are that Sarbinoff used ride-sharing apps such as Uber to be dropped off near his ex-girlfriend's home late at night more than 20 times after they broke up, made hundreds of telephone calls to her using a phone device to make it appear as if the calls were coming from someone else, left dozens of messages on her phone, made numerous harassing calls to her new boyfriend and affixed a GPS tracking device to her car.
"This was an ex-boyfriend who just couldn't deal with the fact that she tried to amicably end their relationship," the woman's attorney, Matt Karp, told Local 10 News.
Karp said his friend and client came to him last December with a plethora of proof that she was being stalked and harassed by Sarbinoff. It turns out, she was not his only alleged victim.
"This is not his first issue with stalking behavior as it (relates) to ex-girlfriends," a prosecutor said during Sarbinoff's bond hearing. "He has an outstanding injunction from Broward County."
A judge set Sarbinoff's bond at $262,000. If he is released, Sarbinoff would be subject to house arrest and required to wear a GPS tracking device.
"Judge (Mindy) Glazer wisely ordered a GPS monitor to be placed on him, so this time, he'll be the one being tracked," Karp said.
Sarbinoff was admitted to the Florida Bar in 2010. He was being held at the Turner Guilford Knight Correctional Center.