Burton, who dresses and identifies himself as a woman named Peaches, according to acquaintances, was arrested Tuesday. Cops said they found the 22-year-old suspect walking with a man near 12th and Spruce streets, carrying some of Brady's belongings.
Bob Geary, a longtime friend who attended Penn State with Brady, was among those reeling from the unexpected twist.
"It turns out to be a transgendered with 36 arrests. How much more horrific could it be than that?" said Geary, who lives in Tennessee.
"If you would have told me a month ago that this would have happened . . . that's not the Pat Brady I know. I don't think any of us knew the Pat Brady that died there that night.
"Nobody knew that Pat Brady, but we're just going to hold onto the Pat Brady that we know and love."
Brady, an information-technology specialist who worked at Thomas Jefferson University Hospital, checked into the Omni late on Oct. 29.
Friends said earlier this week that Brady frequently stayed at hotels because of his work. A.J. Williams, the general manager at Omni, confirmed that Brady had stayed at the hotel several times.
So nothing seemed out of the ordinary until the following day, when Brady never made it to the Thorndale home he shared with his wife, Suzanne, and their 9-year-old daughter.
Shortly before 10:20 a.m., a small fire broke out in Brady's eighth-floor hotel room. Firefighters extinguished the blaze in a matter of minutes, then made the grim discovery.
Brady had suffered "obvious" head and body injuries, and an autopsy later determined that he had been strangled, said Homicide Capt. James Clark.
"Someone obviously set fire to the room to cover his tracks," Clark said.
