Speaker 1: Hey there, folks. It is Tuesday, October the twenty first,
Speaker 1: and a man was just sentenced this week for a
Speaker 1: sexual assault he committed twelve years ago. And it took
Speaker 1: his victim doing her own investigation to get this crime solved.
Speaker 1: And it all came down to him make it a
Speaker 1: confession on Facebook and you know what it said, So
Speaker 1: I raped you with that. Welcome to this episode of
Speaker 1: Amy and TJ Roapes. That's getting a lot of headlines
Speaker 1: the fact that he wrote that message, it was on Facebook.
Speaker 1: But this is an awful story of a woman having
Speaker 1: to solve her own damn rape.
Speaker 2: Well, here's the deal. She knew who.
Speaker 3: Her attacker was almost immediately. She did all the right things.
Speaker 3: She texted for help as it was happening, She had
Speaker 3: her friends come over right after it happened, She went
Speaker 3: to the police, had a rape, and and did everything
Speaker 3: a rape victim is supposed to do to prove her case.
Speaker 3: And even after her assailant sent her that message in
Speaker 3: twenty nineteen, it still took years before he was actually found,
Speaker 3: arrested and held accountable.
Speaker 1: This story is wild. You just went through all those steps.
Speaker 1: It's exactly what they tell women to do. And it's
Speaker 1: also anytime we do have a case, oftentimes that a
Speaker 1: defense will go after the fact, well why does she
Speaker 1: wait so long to report, or why didn't she tell
Speaker 1: anybody immediately? And all of those things. We know, those
Speaker 1: things come up, and this was a case where she
Speaker 1: did exactly exactly what everyone would have told a woman
Speaker 1: in this position to do, and still it took this long.
Speaker 1: I think that's the.
Speaker 3: Right.
Speaker 1: You applaud her for what she did, but man, it
Speaker 1: is sad that she had to do it.
Speaker 2: I read through.
Speaker 3: I was not aware of this, but there have been
Speaker 3: news out there, specifically the AP, the Associated Press, who
Speaker 3: has been following her story for years now, and they
Speaker 3: actually said it wasn't until they did a profile in
Speaker 3: twenty twenty one interviewing her about these Facebook messages, about
Speaker 3: the fact that she went back sent them back to police,
Speaker 3: and it was weeks after they published that article that boil.
Speaker 2: All of a sudden an indictment showed up.
Speaker 1: That's a shame.
Speaker 2: That is a shame.
Speaker 1: So we'll go back. This is twenty thirteen. This young lady. Again,
Speaker 1: she's been out there and been outspoken about this, so
Speaker 1: we can speak on who she is, but her name
Speaker 1: is Shannon Keeler. Would you say she's thirty years old? Now?
Speaker 2: Thirty years old?
Speaker 1: Now okay, But she was a freshman at Gettysburg College
Speaker 1: in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Now the incident, she describes that nice.
Speaker 1: She's stuck to this story. But it was a rape
Speaker 1: in twenty thirteen, after she had gone to a park.
Speaker 3: Yes, and this was all verified by multiple witnesses because
Speaker 3: there was a another young woman with her. He who first
Speaker 3: had been i would say, approached by and bothered by
Speaker 3: this man who they described as this creepy.
Speaker 1: Man at this party. Right, they were dancing, but he
Speaker 1: was going a little too far and even grabbed the woman, yeah.
Speaker 2: Groping her heyes, grabbing her breast, grabbing her but all
Speaker 2: of that.
Speaker 3: So she was going to this other woman, Shannon, they
Speaker 3: met at the party's kind of like help me get
Speaker 3: away from this guy. What ended up happening was the
Speaker 3: guy who they described as the creepy man, turned his
Speaker 3: attention and perhaps affection towards Shannon and actually followed her
Speaker 3: as they were leaving the party. She actually asked a
Speaker 3: male friend to walk her home because she was concerned
Speaker 3: about this guy is following her. And he, according to
Speaker 3: the man who was sort of a friend who was
Speaker 3: walking her home, asked him to leave so that he
Speaker 3: could continue talking with her, and they said go away, leave,
Speaker 3: so he left, but he showed back up once she
Speaker 3: got back into her dorm.
Speaker 2: He actually knocked on the.
Speaker 1: Door, the doorbell when she said she and immediately just
Speaker 1: panic at the time. So sexual assault, rape takes place there.
Speaker 1: Did you read this detail? She said?
Speaker 2: He cried, Yes, afterwards, he cried after he raped her.
Speaker 1: To who knows what that possible. That's just an odd
Speaker 1: and almost sinister detail to hear. But he eventually leaves,
Speaker 1: leaves school even but she gets with her friends. She
Speaker 1: goes back and spends the night with them. But she
Speaker 1: did everything along the way. She told her parents, She
Speaker 1: went to police, she did the rape kit, she documented,
Speaker 1: she did everything, but but no arrest was made because
Speaker 1: they were telling her, you hate to say it, alcohol,
Speaker 1: alcohol was involved.
Speaker 3: Alcoholm She had been drinking at a party and they
Speaker 3: had the rape kit.
Speaker 2: They actually had the dinny as she said.
Speaker 3: She remembers the nurse saying, we got something, So she
Speaker 3: knows that they actually had physical evidence of well was
Speaker 3: left behind from a rape. I mean it was sperm
Speaker 3: some sort of DNA from the assailant, and she thought, okay,
Speaker 3: I've done that part. But once they then went police,
Speaker 3: they said, hey, there was alcoholic.
Speaker 2: Bolics of this difficult situation.
Speaker 3: They reached out this guy reportedly and by email. The
Speaker 3: email he denied it, and so they were kind of like, well,
Speaker 3: it's a he said.
Speaker 2: She said, so there's nothing we can do.
Speaker 1: That's it's tough to hear those details. Now. We're going
Speaker 1: to get more into that story in the second. But
Speaker 1: all of this again, this was in twenty thirteen. She
Speaker 1: would send police updates of witnesses and the phone numbers,
Speaker 1: even of friends. Hey this is somebody you could talk to.
Speaker 1: She got pushback, deny, deny, denied every time. Then you go,
Speaker 1: like you said, ropes. I think it was twenty nineteen
Speaker 1: the first messages started coming in. She got several Facebook messages.
Speaker 1: One of them was from him saying, so I raped you.
Speaker 1: She then takes those messages to police. She then does
Speaker 1: the profile with the associated Press. Then they take this
Speaker 1: up robes and they say, okay, yes, we're going to
Speaker 1: issue a warrant for his arrest, but where the hell
Speaker 1: is he?
Speaker 3: They can't find him. Turns out this man his name
Speaker 3: is Ian Cleary. By the way, he is thirty two
Speaker 3: years old. He went on to another college in his
Speaker 3: home state of California, graduated, got his master's degree, worked
Speaker 3: for Tesla, and he was overseas for whatever reason. Ultimately,
Speaker 3: and I never figured out, did you see what? He
Speaker 3: was actually arrested for something completely different, something.
Speaker 2: That I yes, he's nothing to do with anything.
Speaker 3: Silent, But because he was arrested in France, his name
Speaker 3: popped up and they were able to find him. In
Speaker 3: twenty twenty four, he was finally arrested. So we are
Speaker 3: talking eleven years after the rape, so.
Speaker 1: They finally get him back. He did plead guilty in July,
Speaker 1: but he was just sentenced this week, sentenced to two
Speaker 1: to four years in jail, two to four years for
Speaker 1: this assault. Again, he's been free for the past twelve
Speaker 1: but now he's going to get two to four years
Speaker 1: in prison. You were kind of I guess it's a
Speaker 1: little head scratching, but they to some I guess it
Speaker 1: might be. But the judge did take into consideration that
Speaker 1: he did apologize and confess to what he.
Speaker 3: Had done, but he denied it four years left her
Speaker 3: twisting in the wind, unbelieved by a lot of people
Speaker 3: and probably feeling revictimized for that decade plus by this system,
Speaker 3: by the people who refuse to prosecute. She says. She
Speaker 3: remembers in twenty fifteen there was a two year I
Speaker 3: guess window of opportunities charges. She remembers meeting with the
Speaker 3: detective or whoever was in charge of her case, and
Speaker 3: he said, yes, sorry, we're done, and she still didn't
Speaker 3: let it go and was trying to move on when
Speaker 3: the Facebook messages came about here's the thing that actually
Speaker 3: really got to do both sides sense and the prosecution
Speaker 3: he was well, he pleaded guilty.
Speaker 2: But when that that guilty plea.
Speaker 3: Was put in this awaiting sentencing, both sides asked for
Speaker 3: four to six.
Speaker 1: Years, and yet the judge went, law, look, they have
Speaker 1: discretion and maybe he saw something in this man. Who knows.
Speaker 1: But the judge said this, and I don't know if
Speaker 1: you have a problem, you know what, let me not
Speaker 1: set it up that way. This is just what he said.
Speaker 1: The defendant has admitted his guilt, he's come forward and
Speaker 1: even though ten to eleven alarming years have passed in
Speaker 1: the meantime, we wouldn't be here today but for his
Speaker 1: hope for some kind of forgiveness and contrition.
Speaker 3: I think this woman had been through so much because
Speaker 3: of this man. He chose to do what he did,
Speaker 3: he chose to deny it, he chose to leave the country,
Speaker 3: and because his guilt was nagging on him, or supposed
Speaker 3: to applauded him and were supposed to give him some
Speaker 3: sort of leniency for that. Look, I think four to
Speaker 3: six years was the appropriate sentence that both sides agreed upon.
Speaker 3: So for the judge to go a full two years
Speaker 3: less than what the defense was even asking to me
Speaker 3: is offensive.
Speaker 2: It just is.
Speaker 3: And he mentioned, you know, I have daughters and granddaughters,
Speaker 3: and he mentioned the judge.
Speaker 2: Yes, he brought that into it, But.
Speaker 3: I just can't stand behind that decision woman as a mother,
Speaker 3: I just don't think that because someone admitted something, and yes,
Speaker 3: I appreciate that, And four to six years still seems
Speaker 3: like not very many years given what he did and
Speaker 3: what he was willing to do to somebody. I mean,
Speaker 3: he thought this out, This wasn't some random thing like
Speaker 3: he made choices each step of play. Why should he
Speaker 3: not have to pay for his crime and.
Speaker 1: He got eleven three years right that the judge had
Speaker 1: me up. But I am not judgment. It's not my
Speaker 1: job to do. It's this judges thing to do. And
Speaker 1: if I would have just heard two to four like
Speaker 1: oh okay and going on. But when he said that
Speaker 1: we wouldn't be here today but for his hope for
Speaker 1: some kind of forgiveness and contrition, that's as if we
Speaker 1: are only here today by the good deed of this man.
Speaker 1: That is offensive to the young lady. It's offensive to
Speaker 1: a woman who we are. There were a lot of
Speaker 1: hopes that we could have put on the police charging
Speaker 1: the guy listening to her. We're acting as if the
Speaker 1: only option for this woman getting justice was this guy
Speaker 1: coming forward. No, that's not right.
Speaker 2: I knew who he was. She knew who he was.
Speaker 2: The DNA proved who he was.
Speaker 1: I know, you got to prove a case, but that
Speaker 1: one things for the victim to say, we're only here
Speaker 1: because he was a good enough guy. Damn that sting.
Speaker 3: It really does, and it takes away any responsibility that
Speaker 3: the prosecution has. And look, a lot of folks now
Speaker 3: are looking at this case and even looking back, I
Speaker 3: understand from the outside looking in.
Speaker 2: I don't know what it's like internally to be in.
Speaker 3: A DA's office figure out what to prosecute, what not
Speaker 3: to prosecute. But I understand generally that rape is among
Speaker 3: and sexual assault is among the hardest or among the
Speaker 3: hardest cases to prove period.
Speaker 2: I get that. But this system let this young woman down.
Speaker 3: She had eyewitnesses, she had DNA, she had so many
Speaker 3: things that they wouldn't even consider charges against this slan.
Speaker 1: She did the work. I mean she did her own
Speaker 1: I mean she handed it to him. Here, guys, here
Speaker 1: is are you witnesses, let's knocket out. Look, I'm not
Speaker 1: I don't want to take on the challenge or take
Speaker 1: on what prosecutors and a police have to do. That
Speaker 1: that's a hell of a job. And I you don't
Speaker 1: have unlimited resources and people in the office. You can't
Speaker 1: do every case. It's just one of these things. How
Speaker 1: does this slip through the cracks?
Speaker 3: Well, this is why only one in five, and I
Speaker 3: think that is a low number of women who are
Speaker 3: sexually assaulted, specifically on college campus, has come forward because
Speaker 3: they understand this is what happens.
Speaker 2: She talked about how people a detective even said.
Speaker 3: To her, You're a pretty girl, you have your life
Speaker 3: in front of you, and it's just so offensive that
Speaker 3: even if they are believed and I'm not saying no
Speaker 3: one didn't believe her, it was just they were thinking
Speaker 3: it was probably.
Speaker 2: Hard to be And I don't know is that that
Speaker 2: where we are.
Speaker 1: There are challenges. They have to put their resources here
Speaker 1: or there, They're limited. I don't know. It seems like
Speaker 1: this would be a priority, but again we're on the outside.
Speaker 1: We don't know what they have to do. But folks,
Speaker 1: we told you about the one message that's getting the
Speaker 1: headline that he sent her on Facebook that said, so
Speaker 1: I rape you, but there were several more. Stay here,
Speaker 1: we'll tell you what those other message, as you said,
Speaker 1: and also we are going to let you hear what
Speaker 1: the victim in this case.
Speaker 3: Ms.
Speaker 1: Keeler said herself about why we even got today.
Speaker 3: We continue our conversation today about this unbelievable case. Although
Speaker 3: it is all too common, unfortunately, this one does at
Speaker 3: least have an ending where there is some justice, but
Speaker 3: perhaps not enough, and it certainly came a decade beyond
Speaker 3: when it should have at this point, but thirty two
Speaker 3: year old Ian clearly sentenced this week to two to
Speaker 3: four years in prison for sexually assaulting then college freshman.
Speaker 2: Her name was Shannon Keeler.
Speaker 3: She is now thirty years old, and she has spent
Speaker 3: the better part of a decade trying to prove what
Speaker 3: happened to her in fact happened to her. And it
Speaker 3: took him actually reaching out via Facebook admitting it, and
Speaker 3: even after that admission, it still took another four to
Speaker 3: five years for him to actually have his day in court,
Speaker 3: and her day in court, perhaps even more importantly, not happened.
Speaker 3: This week talked about one of the messages sent her,
Speaker 3: so I raped you, But that wasn't the only thing
Speaker 3: that Ian clearly wrote to her.
Speaker 1: Did I see right? That she hadn't checked her Facebook
Speaker 1: messages and he had sent these over the course of
Speaker 1: a couple of years, but she got them all at
Speaker 1: one time to see that, right?
Speaker 3: Yes, that's the way I understood it too. She was
Speaker 3: on vacation with boyfriend. You know you never check your dms.
Speaker 3: I actually probably do it. I know you've I don't
Speaker 3: think you've ever checked your dams. I probably only checked
Speaker 3: mine maybe once every couple of months.
Speaker 2: She's doing it every couple of years. I get that
Speaker 2: it's a lot to keep up with.
Speaker 1: Yes, so she sees several of these messages. Another said
Speaker 1: I'll never do it to anyone ever again. That's that's
Speaker 1: a hell of a confession, is it not.
Speaker 3: He's basically wanting to admit to her because he's I mean,
Speaker 3: I can only get inside his head imagining the only
Speaker 3: reason why you would do this is relieve yourself of
Speaker 3: some sort of guilt you're feeling.
Speaker 2: For getting away with it, so to speak. But you're
Speaker 2: also trying to.
Speaker 3: Get her not to pursue charges or not to use
Speaker 3: this against you by telling her, please, please, I won't
Speaker 3: do it again, like, don't turn me in, but I
Speaker 3: won't do it again. But I want you to know
Speaker 3: that I'm acknowledging it and I'm sorry for it.
Speaker 1: But does he think that's going to go by putting
Speaker 1: it in a Facebook message? I mean, how do you
Speaker 1: think this is going to go?
Speaker 2: He's gotten away with it for so long.
Speaker 1: He's writing confession you know what? He sent them to her,
Speaker 1: and he didn't hear back from her for years. Maybe
Speaker 1: he forgot about it. I'll be damn another message. I
Speaker 1: need to hear your voice. I don't know what that
Speaker 1: was about, but that's another one she got. And then
Speaker 1: another one on Facebook from the guy who raped her
Speaker 1: when she was a freshman in college, saying I'll pray
Speaker 1: for you. And that was a series of messages they
Speaker 1: were able to then trace back to him. They confirmed
Speaker 1: or at least went forward with charges. Still they had
Speaker 1: to track him down. Finally got back here charged this
Speaker 1: week after twelve years essentially, but.
Speaker 3: The point being crazy enough when she sends and gives
Speaker 3: the police these Facebook messages, they went through the whole thing. Well,
Speaker 3: we'd have to track down the IP address and doesn't
Speaker 3: even look like he lives in the country anymore.
Speaker 2: I mean they were dragging their feet.
Speaker 3: They were almost like, ugh, paperwork, haven't you put this
Speaker 3: to bed already? And really, truly, it wasn't until Ap
Speaker 3: published story that things actually started to forward.
Speaker 1: How many folks maybe listening, maybe gone through that or
Speaker 1: know somebody who had the same experience of trying to
Speaker 1: get somebody or maybe somebody in law enforcement to believe
Speaker 1: them to listen to what they're saying. That's tough, but
Speaker 1: a story like this, did you go full wow. I
Speaker 1: know this is one police department.
Speaker 2: But right it makes me feel so. I mean, look,
Speaker 2: you have daughters.
Speaker 3: I think about Annalise, who's nineteen years old, and that's
Speaker 3: about the age of this young woman. She might have
Speaker 3: even been younger, a freshman first semester, she was probably
Speaker 3: eighteen years.
Speaker 2: Old, you know.
Speaker 3: And I just think about, like she described who she
Speaker 3: was before that date in December, this excited, happy, go
Speaker 3: lucky cross player she was.
Speaker 2: She had her whole life in front of her and
Speaker 2: she still does.
Speaker 3: But what she thought of the world, how the world
Speaker 3: was all robbed taken from her in that moment, at
Speaker 3: that horrific hour, and the fact that no one stood
Speaker 3: up for, no one vended her, no one looked out
Speaker 3: for other women could have come into oh.
Speaker 2: Yeah, decade.
Speaker 3: I think about the fact that, Okay, as far as
Speaker 3: we know, no one else has come forward. But the
Speaker 3: fact that he actually went after two different women that
Speaker 3: same night because her friend has spoken out about her
Speaker 3: experiences grabbing her.
Speaker 1: He assaulted to him that night.
Speaker 2: It's hard to.
Speaker 3: Imagine, and perhaps maybe the guilt of doing it made
Speaker 3: him stop, But it's hard to imagine that he just
Speaker 3: suddenly became this kind person who stopped assaulting women.
Speaker 2: I don't know, but we don't know what he twelve years.
Speaker 3: It really hasn't been explained at all to anybody, and
Speaker 3: I don't even know. I couldn't even find out why
Speaker 3: he had been arrested in France in the first place.
Speaker 1: And while the arrest did come, as we say, a
Speaker 1: robe so late. When it did happen, Shannon Keeler had
Speaker 1: a quote here that kind of sums it all up.
Speaker 1: At the time, She said, while I am moved to
Speaker 1: tears by this result, which I have waited for over
Speaker 1: seven years at the time for I am mindful that
Speaker 1: this moment came because I went public with my story,
Speaker 1: which no survivor should have to do in order to
Speaker 1: obtain justice period that I mean, T shirts should be
Speaker 1: printed with that on it. That is it. Nobody should
Speaker 1: have to do this, just get justice.
Speaker 3: And maybe the other thing I wanted to point out
Speaker 3: because this is also agreedious to me when I was
Speaker 3: the whole story behind this, or young woman who I
Speaker 3: have to applaud, What an amazing person to ever give
Speaker 3: up to keep fighting because it's exhausting, I can say,
Speaker 3: I want.
Speaker 2: To go away, I want to boast to bed. It
Speaker 2: is what it is. I'm dumb thinking she pursued it.
Speaker 3: But when she found out after she get gets these messages,
Speaker 3: goes to police and says, hey, look he's admitting it.
Speaker 2: Like imagine the validation and.
Speaker 3: Vindication you would feel in that moment, and then to
Speaker 3: find out that they not only destroyed.
Speaker 2: Her rape kit, but she was told it was ever tested.
Speaker 3: So here she is thinking full time, she's got this
Speaker 3: in a proof that at the very least there was
Speaker 3: sexual intercourse. I mean, you can't prove necessarily with just
Speaker 3: the DNA evidence, but at least you can prove that
Speaker 3: sexual and it's sexual encounter happened. Say it was against
Speaker 3: your Well, she believes that it was never that. She's
Speaker 3: just saying, that's how little I was regarded. That's how
Speaker 3: that's what little importance my story was to them.
Speaker 2: My experience was law enforce.
Speaker 3: That is a sad, sad statement to any woman out
Speaker 3: there who feels like they can.
Speaker 2: Turn police when they're assaulted or justice.
Speaker 1: It is a tough story. You applaud what she did,
Speaker 1: but your heart breaks that she had to do it.
Speaker 1: This is great that she's getting justice. She should not
Speaker 1: have gone through this, and this story does nothing, in
Speaker 1: my opinion, to help other women come forward.
Speaker 2: No it doesn't.
Speaker 3: This is and the judge giving him two years less
Speaker 3: than the defense was even asking for because he was
Speaker 3: such a good guy for admitting he raped a woman.
Speaker 3: I have a major problem with that as well. It
Speaker 3: was I just feel like this woman just I'm so
Speaker 3: happy that he is behind bars. I am so happy
Speaker 3: for her that she got someb bit of justice, but
Speaker 3: it's still appalling.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, folks, we uh, this was one that
Speaker 1: jumped out at us that we thought you'd be interested
Speaker 1: as well, so I wanted to wanted to share, but
Speaker 1: as always, we appreciate you listening with us on DJ
Speaker 1: Holmes on Behalf My Dear Amy Robach. We'll talk to
Speaker 1: you as soon