Report: Slain Utah athlete repeatedly called school, Salt Lake City police about harasser

Lauren McCluskey, the 21-year-old Utah track athlete who was abducted outside her Salt Lake City dorm and killed in October, had called both University of Utah police and Salt Lake City police multiple times to report her attacker’s harassment before her death, according to 911 calls obtained by CNN.

McCluskey was found dead in a parked car on campus on October 23 shortly after she had an argument outside of her residence hall with 37-year-old Melvin Rowland. McCluskey and Rowland had met in a bar in September and dated for about a month, per the report, before McCluskey learned that he was a convicted sex offender and had lied about his age and name. Rowland spent more than a decade in prison, was released on parole three times, and violated his parole and returned to prison twice. He killed himself hours after McCluskey’s death following a police chase.

McCluskey ended the relationship on October 9, blocked all communication from him and his friends, and even had university police accompany her to retrieve her car, which she had let him borrow. Rowland, though, wouldn’t leave her alone.

Over the next two weeks, according to CNN, McCluskey called University of Utah police multiple to report the harassment and an attempted extortion. She told police that she sent him $1,000 “in hopes of keeping compromising photos of her private.”