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Sexual assault suspect who sent So I rape you message to victim extradited to U.S.
An American man, Ian Cleary, accused of sexually assaulting a college student in Pennsylvania in 2013, has been extradited to the United States.
The 31-year-old was handed over to U.S. authorities at Paris Charles de Gaulle airport on Thursday, according to the French Appeal Court prosecutors’ office in Metz, northeastern France.
Cleary, who hails from Saratoga, California, was arrested in April after a three-year international search. He had been in custody in France pending extradition proceedings since his arrest. The Appeal Court in Metz ruled in July that he could be extradited.
The case against Cleary began when authorities in Pennsylvania issued a felony warrant in 2021, shortly after an Associated Press article highlighted the reluctance of local prosecutors to pursue campus sexual assault cases.
The warrant accused Cleary of stalking an 18-year-old Gettysburg College student at a party in 2013. It alleged that he sneaked into her dorm and sexually assaulted her while she sought help via text messages.
At the time, Cleary was a 20-year-old student at Gettysburg but did not return to campus afterwards.
The victim, Shannon Keeler, underwent a rape examination on the same day of the incident. Over the years, she gathered witnesses and evidence, persistently urging officials to file charges.
In 2021, she approached authorities again after discovering Facebook messages that appeared to come from Cleary’s account.
In those messages, the sender wrote, “So I raped you,” along with other statements such as, “I’ll never do it to anyone ever again,” “I need to hear your voice,” and “I’ll pray for you.”
However, according to the June 2021 warrant, police confirmed that the Facebook account used to send the messages belonged to Cleary.
