Rutgers suicide: Prosecutors wrap up, call Dharun Ravi anti-gay

Rutgers student Tyler Clementi, who killed himself after roommate Dharun Ravi used a webcam to monitor his intimate visit with another man, was fearful that his sexual orientation would be exposed, prosecution attorneys argued Tuesday.

Citing a series of tweets, prosecutor Julia McClure summarized her case against Ravi. The former Rutgers student is charged with violating Clementi’s privacy by using the webcam during the September 2010 encounter; days after becoming aware of the webcam, Clementi killed himself by jumping from the George Washington Bridge.

Clementi was worried that his “private sexual activity had been exposed ... exposed by words in that tweet,” McClure told jurors. Ravi never wanted a gay roommate as part of his college experience, she said.

“What do you think he’s thinking?” McClure asked of Clementi’s reading of tweets about his sexual orientation. “You don’t think that he was intimidated by learning that information” was being spread by tweets, she asked. Clementi was fearful of being exposed to others in his dorm and elsewhere, she said.

“The defendant’s action were malicious” and criminal, McClure said. “I ask you to hold him responsible.”

Ravi is charged with 15 counts in the case, including bias intimidation and violating Clementi’s privacy. Two of the charges are hate crimes punishable by up to 10 years in prison.

Jurors are expected to begin deliberations Wednesday and will determine whether Ravi committed a hate crime; the case has garnered national attention for what gay rights advocates charge is an example of anti-gay bullying.

During his summation, defense attorney Steven Altman painted a different picture of Ravi, arguing that he was just a student who had no hatred of gays or of his roommate. The lawyer insisted that there was no recording of what happened in the dorm room between Clementi and a man identified as M.B. Nor was anything posted on the Web for all to see.

But both sides agree that Ravi saw at least part of a video from the webcam in the room he shared with Clementi on the Rutgers University campus. That video was sent from the room to a computer in another student’s dorm Sept. 19, 2010.

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michael.muskal@latimes.com