News

Actions

Kalamazoo rape suspect linked to nine other attacks

Posted at 11:05 AM, Sep 15, 2014
and last updated 2014-09-15 18:04:35-04

KALAMAZOO, Mich. – A truck driver from Tennessee, who investigators say is linked to several other attacks, is being charged with raping a woman in Kalamazoo in 2008.

The charges against 57-year-old Calvin Ray Kelly (a.k.a. Larry Calvin Jackson), of Memphis, Tenn., were announced at a joint press conference Monday morning at the Kalamazoo Dept. of Public Safety.

Kelly is being charged with kidnapping, three counts of first-degree criminal sexual conduct, one count of first-degree attempted criminal sexual conduct and for being a violent offender, fourth offense.

The incident began at Interfaith Apartments back on April 8, 2008.

After investigators say the victim was abducted by Kelly, she was raped several times at knife point.

According to the probable cause hearing earlier this month, the attack happened along U.S. 131, south of Parkview Ave.

The victim was eventually freed before she fled to the Parkview Hills area, along U.S. 131 . That’s where she was able to flag down a public safety officer from Kalamazoo.

Following the attack, investigators in Kalamazoo sent the victim’s sexual assault kit to the Michigan State Police Forensic Science Division for analysis.

That’s also when Kelly’s DNA profile was entered into a national database.

Kelly’s DNA was connected to incidents in three additional states: Missouri, Tennessee and Virginia.

A prosecutor with the Michigan Attorney General’s office says Kelly has also been connected to at least nine other rapes between 1985 and 2010.

According to the attorney general’s office, it was in 2012 that the AGCCSA “allegedly” linked Kelly’s profile to the incident.

Both the attorney general and Kalamazoo County prosecutor would not comment on why it took two years to file charges and/or arrest Kelly.

Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuette did say the charges were the result of “old-fashioned, hard-nosed police work.”

The arrest was finally made after an investigation that partnered the Attorney General Cold Case Sexual Assault Project (AGCCSA), the Kalamazoo County Prosecutor’s Office and the Kalamazoo Dept. of Public Safety.

Kelly is now awaiting extradition and Kalamazoo County Prosecutor Jeff Getting expects Kelly to be in west Michigan by the end of the month.

Kelly was arrested on Sept. 9 by the Shelby Co. Sheriff’s Dept. Fugitive Team.

Kelly waived his extradition the following day.

If convicted on any of the sexual assault charges, Kelly will be registered as a sex offender in Michigan for the rest of his life.

The AGCCSA, funded by a grant from the U.S. Dept. of Justice, is an agency within the office of the attorney general dedicated to solving sexual assaults.