The assault did not trigger a "timely warning" to the campus, which are messages to students from MSU alerting them of an incident or giving advice about potential dangers. Last academic year, such alerts were issued over a robbery in Snyder Hall and thefts of defective Kia cars on campus, among other things.

The university declined to send an alert about this case because "the victim and suspect knew each other, the suspect's identity was known by the police, and it was determined there was no on-going threat to the community," said an MSU Police spokesperson.

The State News learned of the case through a public records request for the police report, which the university took months and multiple delays to fulfill. 

Stalking and assault

The incident was reported to MSU Police in December 2023.

Officers met with a student in Shaw Hall, who said she believed she had been sexually assaulted. The university redacted her name in the police report.

That morning, a man who had been messaging her online repeatedly asked her to hang out, saying he was on campus. She told him no multiple times, saying she was busy and couldn't see him.

After she had lunch, she returned to her dorm in Shaw. She was struggling to find her ID and open the door to her floor, the victim told police.

As she searched, the victim noticed a "strange guy behind her that she did not recognize," the report says. 

She asked him if he needed help getting into the floor, and he said no.

The man was "Val," he told her, the same Val who had been messaging her that morning.

The victim told him she had to go, but he "said he was going to follow her," according to the report. She said she had a lot of schoolwork and couldn’t see him, but he persisted.

The man followed her to a study room, where she took out her computer and started doing work. He sat next to her.

Before long, she told police, he reached over and "started rubbing her leg on the thigh." He then reached into her pants and touched her vagina.

The man then tried to take his pants off as she told him to stop. He then grabbed her hand and placed it on his penis.

The victim snapped her hand back and said "I think you should go."

He asked her to walk him back to his car, which she refused. He eventually left, before coming back a minute later to say "Are you sure you don’t want to have sex with me?"

After the victim reported the incident to MSU Police, a witness supported it with contemporaneous text messages from the victim about what happened.

Police investigate further

Security camera footage further fleshed out the story.

In the hours before the incident, the man described could be seen in front of Shaw Hall, sitting in his 2003 Honda Pilot, before repeatedly entering and exiting the lobby.

The footage also showed how he "ran into Shaw directly behind her" when the victim arrived. Additional cameras documented him following her up the stairs and entering her floor.

After he left, the footage showed him again in his car, before he followed another group of women into the building and left again.

Police soon identified the suspect as Valor Harrison, a 22-year-old resident of Rochester Hills. He was not an MSU student and there was no record of previous interactions between him and the university, according to the report.

Officers successfully sought a warrant to get into the social media messaging account Harrison used to communicate with the victim. MSU redacted the name of the platform he used in the police report.

Police found the messages described by the victim, but also discovered that Harrison had been sending copy-pasted messages to numerous East Lansing women asking them to "link" or "hook up."

"Bby can I come over," one message said. "I’m in East Lansing."

Suspect questioned

MSU Police then went to Harrison’s home to speak with him and execute a search warrant for his DNA and cell phone.

Harrison agreed to speak with the officers in his detached garage, the report says.

They asked Harrison if he had been to MSU’s campus recently. He said yes.

The officers then asked why he made the trip.

"I was like introducing myself to a couple girls," he replied. "Um, I didn’t like harass them or anything."

The officers asked Harrison to explain what he meant.

"I didn’t like harass them or touch them or anything," he replied, according to the police transcript of the interview. "Just asked for their numbers and whatnot."

The officers asked him about the girls.

"There’s a girl, uh, I met her in the dorm," he said. “And then we like went into a more private room. And she was never really like, get away. But I was like, like touching her thigh and stuff." 

"Um, and then eventually I noticed she was not comfortable with it, and at that point, I was like 'ok, it’s time for me to leave,'" said Harrison, who could not be reached for comment.

The officers then asked Harrison what the girl’s name was, but he didn’t know. They said the victim’s name, which he said “rang a bell,” before describing the way she pushed his hand away as he reached inside her pants.

Harrison told the officers he left soon after that and "went to talk to more girls."

How does he go about that, the officers asked?

He told them how he drove around campus looking for a "cute girl," before pulling over and trying to talk to her.

The officers asked if he had any success doing that. Harrison said no.

They then asked Harrison how he found the victim in her dorm at Shaw Hall. The two had never communicated about where she lived in the messages. Harrison told the officers it was a "coincidence."

The officers pressed him further, questioning how he could coincidentally wind up outside her building just as she arrived. They showed Harrison the footage of him sitting in his car and following women into Shaw.

Still, Harrison maintained that it was purely coincidence.

It’s unclear if MSU Police ever figured that out. The police report doesn’t provide any explanation and a spokesperson declined to answer questions about it.

The officers then asked Harrison if he understood how the watching, following and assaulting could be scary for the victim.

"Fair," he replied. "Especially a woman."

'Please forgive me'

The officers ended their interview by issuing a notice of trespass banning Harrison from campus until Dec. 21, 2024.

They then told him that he should not contact the victim for any reason. He asked if he could write her a note that they would deliver, and the officers obliged.

A partially redacted copy is included in the police report.

"I know that I was inappropriate in the way I approached you," Harrison wrote. "At the time I thought (redacted). I did not treat you with the respect you deserve. Please forgive me for making you feel uncomfortable or unsafe, I’m very very sorry."

After the interview with Harrison, an officer again met with the victim.

He asked her if she wanted to press charges against Harrison, and she said no. MSU redacted her explanation.

Despite the victim’s preference, the case was forwarded to the Ingham County prosecutor, who authorized a felony warrant.

In December, Harrison pleaded no contest to one count of fourth degree criminal sexual conduct, prosecutor John Dewane said in an email. A second count was dismissed.

No contest is a legal plea where the defendant doesn’t admit or deny guilt, but accepts punishment for a crime as if they are guilty. It’s commonly invoked as part of a plea bargain with prosecutors.

Harrison is set to be sentenced in early March.