by Christopher Whitten
University of Memphis

Several students say the man arrested for allegedly raping a University of Memphis woman in March was living in an on-campus apartment and masquerading as a student.

Demetrius Winters, freshman health and human performance major, said Cortney Cortez Adkins had been staying with him in the Thomas G. Carpenter Student Housing Complex off and on since February. Campus police arrested Adkins on March 26 after a student reported he had raped her.

Several students said they saw him on campus and at student events, where he posed as a student. Adkins told one student he lived in Carpenter and another that he had to go home to write a paper for class.

Winters, who said he and Adkins referred to each other as cousins, described Adkins as “girl-crazy, but not to the extent that he would rape a girl.”

Adkins was charged with rape after he admitted to sexually assaulting the victim.

Director of Public Services Bruce Harber said a TigerText alert was not issued to the campus community because he didn’t feel there was a threat.

In the 12 years Harber has worked for The U of M, he said almost all of the rape cases on campus involved two people who were acquainted.

“So that poses the question,” he said. “Does that create a threat to anyone else in the community? If we had a blatant sexual predator, we would have issued an alert.”
 

This story is follow-up reporting to the original Daily Helmsman article, also by Christopher Whitten, about the arrest of Adkins on rape charges. Read the full story here, and the original report here