How father of Sarah Lawrence student got sentenced to 60 years in prison for exploiting daughter’s friends

Lawrence Ray was convicted in 2022 of racketeering conspiracy, extortion, sex trafficking, forced labor, and tax evasion

Lawrence Ray, a man convicted of exploiting his daughter’s ex-college roommates at Sarah Lawrence College, has been sentenced to 60 years in prison.

Ray, 63, was sentenced on Friday (20 January) in Manhattan. He was convicted in April 2022 of racketeering conspiracy, a violent crime in aid of racketeering, extortion, sex trafficking, forced labor, tax evasion, and money laundering offenses, the Department of Justice announced at the time.

Allegations against Ray initially surfaced in April 2022, when The Cut published a longform investigation titled “The Stolen Kids of Sarah Lawrence: What happened to the group of bright college students who fell under the sway of a classmate’s father?” The article prompted authorities to investigate Ray’s conduct, leading to criminal charges, and to his conviction and sentencing.

Before his arrival on the Sarah Lawrence campus, Ray had served time in a New Jersey prison on charges related to a child custody case. After he moved with his daughter Talia Ray, The Cut reported, he “planted himself in the common area, cooking steak dinners and ordering expensive delivery for Talia and her seven housemates.” He reportedly shared stories with them, “loved to preach the values of the Marine Corps”, and could be “charming” and a “good listener.”

Ray eventually “persuaded his daughter’s friends to stay … at his Manhattan apartment” during the summer that followed his arrival at the Sarah Lawrence dorm, the Associated Press reported during his trial in 2022, citing Assistant US Attorney Lindsey Keenan. Over time, Ray allegedly built up his influence on a group of young adults, prompting them to believe they should adhere to his values and leading them on what The Cut called a “program of personal transformation”.

The publication reported that he asked them to share personal stories and collected “hundreds of pages” worth of confessions from them. He profited “off their labor, their money and even their bodies,” Keenan told the court according to the AP, adding: “Once he gained control of their lives ... he took over their lives.”

Ray’s abuse, as described during the court proceedings, was mental, physical, and sexual. A witness at his trial, recalled an “escalating pattern of physical abuse”, with Ray “calling him ‘hemorrhoid’ and ‘scum’ and holding a knife to his throat and genitals or putting him in a chokehold, berating him until he agreed with Ray that he’d done wrong,” the Associated Press wrote after the witness testified in March 2022.

.Judge Lewis J Liman, who sentenced Ray, said he charmed his victims with his “exaggerated sense of self” and his intelligence before “robbing them of their relationships, self worth, memories and then their bodies”, the Associated Press reported.

“Through psychological terror and manipulation, he convinced them what they knew to be true was in fact false,” Liman said. “He beat his victims. He tortured them and at times he starved them. He degraded them sexually to the point where they lost any self worth.”

Additional reporting by The Associated Press