Former Sheffield Lake man gets 15 to 30 years in prison for sexually assaulting Pennsylvania girl

A former Sheffield Lake man will serve 15 to 30 years in prison after pleading guilty to sexually assaulting a child victim for more than a decade in Pennsylvania. The Dauphin County, Pennsylvania, District Attorney's Office offered Odin Rathnam, 59, a plea deal in February: Plead guilty to all 28 felony and misdemeanor sexual assault charges against him in exchange for 15 to 30 years in prison and five years probation upon release. The deal was offered, according to media reports, to prevent the child victim — now an adult — from having to testify against Rathnam and relive the trauma of his many assaults. On Thursday, Rathnam took the deal, pleading guilty and no contest to multiple charges. He was immediately sentenced, multiple media reports said, and will be on a sex offender registry for the rest of his life. Rathnam was facing felony charges including rape of a child, rape of a child with serious bodily injury, aggravated indecent assault of a child, unlawful contact with a minor/sexual offenses, statutory sexual assault, sexual assault, and indecent assault; and misdemeanor charges of indecent exposure and corruption of minors. Media reports did not say specificize to which charges Rathnam pleaded guilty or no contest. Rathnam is the former concertmaster of the Harrisburg Symphony Orchestra, in Pennsylvania's capital city, and a former part-time Cleveland State University strings instructor. The crimes occurred during his tenure there, and he left the orchestra in 2012 according to news reports. At his sentencing Thursday, PennLive.com reported that the victim told Rathnam: "rot in hell." "I pray there is a special person in prison who will do to you what you did to me," she told him. Rathnam's assaults on the victim when she was a child caused physical injuries so severe she later required surgery and is unable to have children of her own naturally, according to multiple media reports. The victim also told Rathnam: "You have a darkness inside of you. No apology or crying from you will change the way I feel." In court Rathnam said the alcohol abuse he claimed had caused him not to remember his crimes "did not absolve me from the darkest mistakes I've ever made" and that he could not "put into words the remorse I have," WHTM-TV in Harrisburg reported. The victim reported the assaults to Lower Paxton Township (Pennsylvania) police in May 2024. In a news release following Rathnam's arrest, the police department said the assaults took place in multiple locations in Pennsylvania between 2008 and 2019. After leaving Harrisburg, Rathnam moved to Sheffield Lake, continued performing and was an instructor at CSU until the university learned of the criminal charges and "removed him" from his position, it said in a statement to local media. Following his July 11, 2024 arrest at his home in Sheffield Lake, Rathnam was extradited from Lorain County to Dauphin County, Pennsylvania to face trial and was being held without bond.