A Cleveland man charged with the murder of his fiancée after claiming that she “accidentally fell” has a long criminal history of violence against women, court records show.
Clarence Bogan III was charged with aggravated murder, felonious assault and domestic violence late last week.
The indictment came nearly two months after Bogan’s 39-year-old fiancée, Stacey Marie Tucker, died of blunt force trauma injuries in Bogan’s apartment on W. 115th Street.
RELATED | Cleveland man charged with aggravated murder, GoFundMe page says fiancée's death "accidental fall"
The aggravated murder charge is the latest in a string of criminal charges and convictions tracing back to 1982.
According to court records, that’s when Bogan was convicted of raping a 15-year-old. He was paroled in 1989 but returned to prison after allegedly assaulting another woman.
While in prison, Bogan was charged with several counts of gross sexual imposition.
Released in 2006, Bogan was again accused of raping a woman in June 2007. The victim said Bogan beat her, choked her and forced her to withdraw money from a bank. Bogan was later charged with kidnapping and raping two more women.
Bogan pleaded guilty to three counts of rape and was sentenced to seven years in prison.
“To my mind seven years seems pretty lenient for three rapes,” explained Jonathan Witmer-Rich, associate law professor at Cleveland-Marshall College of Law. “But on the other hand it was a guilty plea, so we don’t know the circumstances of that plea.”
Ohio is not one of the 26 states with a “three-strike” law that increases prison penalties for habitual offenders.
Witmer-Rich explained that the laws are often contested for their “broad stroke” and high costs for increasing the prisoner population.
“We can’t know if a three-strike policy would have kept this man off the streets,” he said “But this is a bad criminal history. And it seems to suggest a variety of indications that he is dangerous to women.”
On Feb. 10, Bogan told neighbors that Tucker was intoxicated and “fell four times” causing a fatal head injury.
The next day Bogan, 55, published at least two fundraising pages asking for money for Tucker’s funeral expenses, saying she died “from a head injury suffered in an accidental fall in the early morning.”
Apartment Manager Jay Anthony Smith told newsnet5.com that he and others suspected foul play because Bogan was speaking with many of the residents to “make sure they had the story straight.”
Smith said Bogan did not disclose his status as a registered sex offender. Upon notification from the Cuyahoga County Sheriff’s Department, Smith said three fellow tenants requested to move out.
“It’s starting to make me think this man should be kept off the streets,” Smith said.
As of late Tuesday afternoon, Bogan had not been booked into the Cuyahoga County Jail.
