(LAGRANGE) - A Branch County man has been sentenced in relation to an abduction and sexual assaults in 1986.
LaGrange County Superior Court officials say 62 year old Ricky McClatcher of Quincy plead guilty to felony counts of criminal deviant conduct and criminal confinement. He was sentenced to 42 years in prison with eight years suspended to probation. McClatcher was also ordered to register as a sex offender for life and to have no contact with the victim.
In October 1986, the LaGrange and Steuben County Sheriff's Office along with Indiana State Police Detectives began investigating a sexual assault that happened near Howe. On October 23, the female victim had stopped her vehicle to remove an object from the road. It was determined the victim was abducted by McClatcher and held against her will in Howe where she was sexually assaulted, then taken to a location near Orland and sexually assaulted again.
During the initial investigation all leads that were available were exhausted and the case was left unsolved.
In 2015, an Indiana State Police detective learned of the case and got the DNA evidence that was collected, but no matching results were found. Then in 2023 the DNA evidence identified a family line, which was narrowed down to one person, and McClatcher was arrested in February 2025.
With this guilty plea, a separate trial set for later this month in Steuben County has been canceled.