Woman was abducted and assaulted in 1986, Indiana cops say. Man arrested 39 years later
A woman getting out of her car to move something out of the road was abducted in 1986, Indiana police said.
Her abductor then sexually assaulted her, according to Indiana State Police. She was driven from LaGrange County to Steuben County and was sexually assaulted again, police said.
Evidence was collected at the scene, but the case went cold for nearly four decades.
Thirty-nine years later, a 62-year-old Michigan man has been accused of abducting the woman in October 1986, Indiana State Police said in a Feb. 11 news release.
Ricky Devonne McLatcher, who lives in Quincy, Michigan, was identified after years of failed DNA identification, according to police.
Investigators reopened the case in 2015 to search the DNA found at the scene, but no results matched the sample, officials said. In 2023, however, the family line of the DNA evidence was identified.
Police later narrowed down the list of potential suspects to McLatcher and arrested him on Feb. 10.
Now, the man is charged with criminal deviate conduct, burglary and criminal confinement, police said.
He’s currently held in Branch County Jail in Michigan and is awaiting extradition back to Indiana, according to the news release.
LaGrange County is west of Steuben County and about a 185-mile drive northeast from Indianapolis.
This story was originally published February 12, 2025 at 5:59 PM with the headline "Woman was abducted and assaulted in 1986, Indiana cops say. Man arrested 39 years later."
