Ex-Bethel football player charged with raping 3 students
ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — A former football player at Bethel University in Minnesota is accused of raping three students last year.
Gideon Erhabor, 21, of McKinney, Texas, was charged Tuesday with third-degree criminal sexual conduct. Prosecutors allege the rapes happened on or near the school's Arden Hills, Minnesota, campus in the fall of 2018.
According to court documents, Erhabor told Minnesota sheriff's deputies that sex was consensual in each case.
The cases involve an 18-year-old, a 19-year-old and a 21-year-old student.
According to the charges, the 18-year-old said Erhabor invited her to his dorm room on Sept. 11, 2018, to watch a movie.
While in his room, she turned Erhabor down for sex, but he allegedly forcibly kissed and groped her before raping her,
In the second case, a 19-year-old student said she was at a house party on Oct. 6, 2018, in Roseville and drank two alcoholic drinks. About 2 a.m. she went outside and felt disoriented. Later that morning, she awoke in a friend's apartment "totally confused about what happened the night before."
On Nov. 30, Erhabor came to her room and got in bed with her, and she told him she did not want to have sex. Erhabor asked why and explained they had sex at the house party in October, according to the complaint.
In the third case, the 21-year-old said she was at a house party on Dec. 8, 2018, in Shoreview with three of her college friends. She recalled mingling at the party for about 30 minutes before blacking out and waking up late the next morning feeling groggy and queasy, with pain in her genitalia. She reported the incident the next day to her former resident assistant
Erhabor was a running back for Bethel, a private, Christian, liberal arts university, in 2017 and 2018. He left the school at the end of 2018.
Erhabor was arrested Tuesday in Texas and is awaiting extradition to Minnesota, the Star Tribune reported. Court records do not list an attorney who could comment on his behalf.
