Prosecutors want to imprison for life a 37-year-old convicted sex offender now charged with additional counts in connection with using a blowtorch, knife and blindfold during a torture-filled rape and stabbing of a prostitute in a northeast Minneapolis home.

The newly filed indictment against Matthew J. Reinitz, of Mound, in Hennepin County District Court charges him with second-degree assault and false imprisonment to go along with earlier counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct stemming from the attack on Dec. 4 that sent the bloodied and sobbing woman fleeing to a nearby church.

Reinitz, linked to the crimes thanks to his DNA being on file from an earlier rape conviction, remains jailed in lieu of a recently doubled $2 million bail ahead of a Nov. 9 court appearance.

"Mr. Reinitz has been convicted of a previous sexual assault," County Attorney Mike Freeman said in a statement issued Friday. "Once we had sufficient evidence to link him to last year's torture of a woman in his home, we decided he is a threat to public safety and needs to be taken off the streets for the rest of his life if we can prove his guilt."

The prosecution has alleged that the circumstances of the earlier case, filed in Hennepin County in 2003, "are very similar" to the latest allegations. In that case, Reinitz responded to an ad a woman posted for massage therapy. When she arrived at his home, he threatened her with a gun, choked and raped her. He was given a three-year term in that case.

Reinitz's attorney declined to comment Monday about the indictment filed late last week.

According to the criminal complaint:

Police were summoned to a church and encountered a woman who was crying and bleeding from her neck. She told investigators that she was a prostitute and met with Reinitz at an apartment after he responded to her online ad.

Within minutes of her arrival, Reinitz tied up her hands and legs and, for a while, had duct tape over her mouth and a mask on her face. He cut off her clothes and repeatedly raped her, at one point burning her with a blowtorch.

He eventually took her into the bathroom and stabbed her twice, at least once in the neck. She pleaded with him to let her go and promised not to go to the police. He gave her a towel and her clothes, and she fled out the door.

DNA left at the scene identified Reinitz as the suspect. Under questioning, he admitted to everything except using the blowtorch on his victim.

"It got out of hand, and I stabbed her," the complaint quoted Reinitz as telling a police sergeant. He was then jailed on Sept. 20 and charged the first time that same week.

Paul Walsh • 612-673-4482