By MARYCLAIRE DALE, Related Press
GETTYSBURG, Pa. — A person who despatched a Fb message that stated, “So I raped you,” to a girl he had sexually assaulted in school in 2013 was sentenced to 2 to 4 years in jail on Monday.
The sentence got here greater than a 12 months after Ian Cleary was extradited again to Pennsylvania from France over the assault at Gettysburg School and practically 12 years after the sufferer first went to police.
The choose took under consideration Cleary’s responsible plea, his regret and his lengthy historical past of psychological sickness in giving a sentence under state tips. Cleary, 32, stated he despatched the messages as a part of a 12-step program, in hopes of in search of atonement.
Sufferer Shannon Keeler informed the courtroom on Monday that the messages solely reopened wounds she had lengthy carried over the assault, which went years with out being prosecuted.
“The system meant to protect me protected you instead,” stated Keeler, detailing in a strong 10-minute affect assertion the years she spent pursuing prices, which prosecutors are sometimes reluctant to file in campus sexual assault instances.
“This isn’t just my story, this is the story of countless women,” she stated.
Cleary confronted a most of 10 years in jail for the assault, and the 2 sides had initially proposed a four- to eight-year sentence.
Andrea Levy, Keeler’s lawyer, stated the sentence was “less than what we expected and certainly less than he deserves,” however she stated there was aid that the case was over.
Keeler informed police that Cleary sneaked into her dorm on the eve of winter break, when few folks had been left on campus, then pushed his approach into her room and assaulted her. She was an 18-year-old in her first semester on campus on the time.
Senior Decide Kevin Hess stated that anybody with daughters or, like him, granddaughters in school would discover the crime “horrifying.”
Nonetheless, he stated, “the defendant has admitted his guilt, he’s come forward and even though 10 to 11 alarming years have passed in the meantime, we wouldn’t be here today but for his hope for some kind of forgiveness and contrition.”
Cleary left Gettysburg after the assault and in the end completed school in Silicon Valley, California, the place he’d grown up. He then acquired a grasp’s diploma and labored for Tesla earlier than transferring abroad.
In 2019, he despatched the Fb message to Keeler, and she or he renewed her efforts with police and prosecutors after noticing them just a few months later. In 2021, she shared her expertise in an Related Press story on the reluctance of prosecutors to pursue campus intercourse crimes.
Cleary was indicted weeks after the AP story was revealed, and following a three-year search, he was extradited from Metz, France, the place he had been detained on a vagrancy-related cost in April 2024.
In courtroom Monday, Cleary, standing just some ft away, apologized to Keeler and his father.
“I’m committed to getting treatment for mental health and stuff like that as I go forward,” he stated.
Cleary’s relations have declined to touch upon the case and didn’t attend most of his courtroom hearings.
Keeler, in interviews with the AP, described her repeated efforts to influence authorities to press prices, beginning hours after the assault.
“I had been thinking about this moment for 12 years,” Keeler stated after seeing Cleary in courtroom in July, when he pleaded responsible to second-degree sexual assault. She known as it a surreal second.
Authorities within the U.S. and Europe tried to trace Cleary down after the indictment however appeared unable to observe his path, on-line or in any other case, till his arrest within the unrelated case.
Protection lawyer John Abom maintained that Cleary was homeless at occasions and unaware of the costs. Adams County District Lawyer Brian Sinnett stated he had his doubts however couldn’t show that Cleary was on the run.
The AP sometimes doesn’t identify individuals who say they’ve been sexually assaulted except they arrive ahead publicly, as Keeler has finished.
“The system that failed me a decade ago finally delivered accountability, but at a cost. Evidence was lost. Time passed,” she informed the courtroom Monday, noting that outcomes of the rape package she was on condition that evening had been destroyed by the point of the indictment.
“My life moved on, but the impact never went away, not for me, not for my family, not for anyone who had to watch this unfold again and again,” she stated.
Initially Printed: October 21, 2025 at 7:24 AM PDT
