Rutgers Freshman Commits Suicide After Roommate Puts Sex Tape Online

By Reuven Fenton, Ada Calhoun and Dan Mangan

Sept. 30, 2010--Just a day before he committed suicide by jumping off the George Washington Bridge, a shy Rutgers freshman may have complained about his roommate on a social networking site that a gay encounter of his had been secretly streamed live on the Internet.

The Rutgers student may have sought online advice about peeping roommate before committing suicide

Days after Tyler Clementi, 18, was spied on by his roommate Dharun Ravi, he reportedly reached out to a gay website to complain about it.

The messages, written by someone identified as "cit2mo" and first cited by Gawker.com -- recount a webcam spying incident by a college roommate similar to the one that occurred to Clementi.

In the posting dated Sept. 21, "cit2mo" was upset that comments after the incident sympathized with his roommate for having to share his room with a gay person.

"People have commented on his profile with things like 'how did you manage to go back in there? are you okay?' and the fact that people he was with saw my making out with a guy as the scandal, whereas I mean come on ... he was SPYING ON ME ... do they see nothing wrong with this?" he wrote.

Gawker reported that Clementi had also written posts on a gay website the morning of his death on Sept. 22. In the posting, he said he's written a letter to his dorm's resident advisor about the incident.

The tragedy was set in motion on Sept. 19 in Davidson Hall on Rutgers' idyllic Piscataway campus, where Clementi and his alleged tormentors, Ravi and his friend Molly Wei, started school a month ago.

Ravi, 18, activated the webcam on his computer and headed to high-school classmate Wei's room down the hall.

Using Skype, the two remotely accessed the feed and saw Clementi engaged in a "sexual encounter" with another man, authorities said.

That's when they had their "American Pie" moment -- callously sharing it with Ravi's network of friends on iChat.

It's unclear how many people saw the streaming video, but Ravi bragged about his sordid spying in a Twitter post later that same night.

"Roommate asked for the room till midnight. I went into molly's room and turned on my Web cam. I saw him making out with a dude. Yay," Ravi tweeted.

The Plainsboro, NJ, resident then tried to use the same webcam to watch and transmit another sexual encounter he expected Clementi to have Sept. 21, authorities said. Prosecutors refused to elaborate.

Last Wednesday, Clementi drove an hour from campus, up the New Jersey Turnpike to the bridge, leaving the car on the Jersey side.

The troubled teen posted his final grim message on his Facebook page and then walked more than a mile onto the span.

Clementi placed his cellphone and wallet -- with his Rutgers ID and New Jersey driver's license inside -- on the roadway, climbed over the railing and temporarily paused in a crouched position before leaping to his death.

Ravi was arrested Tuesday, charged with invasion of privacy and freed on $25,000 bail. Wei, 18, of Princeton Junction, was arrested Monday on privacy-invasion charges and released without bail.

Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/rutgers_student_sought_suicide_advice_Gdu40TH2yEL2HhURrE0sgP#ixzz111qSjNhQ