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3.17.2011

annie le murder suspect pleads guilty

Raymond Clark III, the lab technician charged in the 2009 killing of 24-year-old Yale graduate student Annie Le, was back in court this morning to plead guilty to murder and attempted sexual assault: Yale killing suspect pleads guilty to murder.

After an extensive five-day search, Le's body was found stuffed in the wall of a Yale animal research building on what would have been her wedding day, September 17, 2009. As part of his plea agreement, Clark will receive a 44-year jail sentence:
His guilty plea offered one ending to what could have been a protracted, grisly, painful process: a court trial in the murder.

It also added a new wrinkle to the case: Besides admitting to murder, he confessed to a charge of attempted sexual assault.

The state accused Clark of strangling Annie Le, a 24-year-old pharmacology graduate student, to death. On what would have been her wedding day, her body was found stashed in the walls of a Yale animal research building on Amistad Street. Police arrested Clark, who cleaned mouse cages in that building, on Sept. 17, 2009, and charged him with the murder.

"Guilty," Clark, who’s 26, quietly said twice Thursday morning as judge Roland Fasano asked him how he pleaded to each charge.
More here: Clark To Get 44 Years For Killing Annie Le. And here: Clark To Get 44 Years For Killing Annie Le. This article indicates that the full story of Annie Le's murder has yet to be told, including some of the grisly details. At this point, I honestly don't want to know. But forty-four years just sounds like much too short of a sentence for this scumbag.