VIRGINIA BEACH, Va. (WAVY) — A man was sentenced to 20 years for raping a Virginia Wesleyan student.

A jury found Daniel Ricardo Lane Adams guilty of rape on Sept. 22. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison with five years suspended, leaving him 15 years to serve.

According to the Commonwealth’s Attorney for the City of Virginia Beach, on April 28, 2022 a female student went to a cookout on campus with friends where she met Adams.

The victim exchanged Snap Chat names with Adams who claimed to be a 23-year-old Harvard student. Adams was actually 29 years old and worked on a social media app promoting parties.

The victim and Adams later ended up at the same party and continued to talk. Eventually, the two went back to the victim’s house and interacted with one another.

When the victim told Adams that she wanted to go to sleep, he forcefully sexually assaulted her while holding her hands above her head and choking her until he finally stopped and rolled over to go to sleep.

Immediately afterwards, the victim left the room and told a friend what happened to her. She then returned to her room and told Adams he had to leave.

The next day, she reported the assault to a counselor, who encouraged her to go have a Sexual Assault Nurse Examination (SANE exam) done.  The nurse performing the SANE exam noted bruising and redness on the victim’s body.  Adams’ DNA was a match to samples of fluids taken from the victim’s body during the SANE exam. 

On Jan. 30, Adams was arrested and denied having sexual intercourse with the victim.

After his arrest, two additional victims came forward and reported being sexually assaulted by Adams. Although these cases were not prosecuted, the allegations were allowed to be heard in court during the sentencing hearing.