Coffee cup DNA tied Michigan man to golf course sexual assaults, cops say. He’s sentenced

A man accused of sexually assaulting women at golf courses more than 400 miles apart has now been sentenced in one of the alleged attacks, Michigan officials say.

Kurt Rillema, a 52-year-old man who in December pleaded no contest to criminal sexual conduct, will now spend 10 to 15 years in prison, Oakland County Prosecutor Karen McDonald said in a Jan. 16 news release.

An “avid golfer,” Rillema was accused of sexually assaulting a “young woman” working a food stand at Twin Lakes Golf Club in Oakland County in September 1999, Oakland County Sheriff Michael Bouchard said in 2023.

He came in through an employee entrance, then violently forced the 22-year-old woman into unwanted sex, the sheriff said. At the time, his identity was unknown.

Investigators later learned of a similar case in 2000, when a man raped a 19-year-old Penn State student at knifepoint at a Happy Valley, Pennsylvania, golf course, according to the Michigan sheriff and Centre Daily Times reporting. DNA evidence confirmed the alleged assaults involved the same individual.

As part of the two-state investigation, a DNA technology company helped police conclude the assaults were carried out by one of three brothers, Centre County First Assistant District Attorney Sean McGraw told the Centre Daily Times.

“Investigators honed in on Rillema and trailed him in January (2023), collecting a Styrofoam coffee cup he discarded. The DNA taken from the cup matched the DNA collected as part of the rape investigation,” the Centre Daily Times reported, citing McGraw.

Bouchard said Rillema, of West Bloomfield, Michigan, was not previously on the department’s radar and did not have a criminal history before his 2023 arrest.

Prosecutors agreed to a plea agreement in the Michigan case after consulting with the victim, McDonald said.

“Rillema will serve serious prison time for his crime,” McDonald said in a statement. “I know reliving this trauma after so many years wasn’t easy for the victim. Her strength sustained this case, and I applaud the relentless work by law enforcement that allowed us to deliver a just ending for her.

In 2023 after his arrest, Rillema was named in a lawsuit by the victim in the Pennsylvania case, according to the Daily Times.

Oakland County, Michigan, a northern suburb of Detroit, is about a 415-mile drive from Centre County, Pennsylvania.

This story was originally published January 16, 2025 at 11:58 AM.