January 8, 2015- The Honorable Judge Deborah E. Curcillo today sentenced Jyrell Selvey to 17-34 years of incarceration in a state penitentiary.  The Judge also classified Selvey as a sexually violent predator and ordered him to serve a consecutive 12 term of probation on top of his prison sentence.  In June, July and September of 2013, three unrelated women reported to police that were sexually assaulted after being approached by a man who was brandishing a weapon.  One woman described a gun; another a knife; and a third said she was threatened with a pipe-like item.  After being coerced into a secluded area, each woman was raped and sodomized.  The police believed that the three assaults were potentially the same suspect because in each case, the perpetrator eerily apologized repeatedly to the victims as he was assaulting them.  Each woman went to the hospital immediately and DNA evidence was collected and entered into a national database.  The police had been unable to identify a suspect because the perpetrators’ DNA was not yet in the database.  In September of 2013, when the third victim was sexually assaulted she had the courage to lie to the perpetrator and say that she enjoyed being with him and requested his cell phone number.  The assailant gave it to her and that allowed police to identify a suspect which them led to the acquisition of a search warrant for his DNA.  Once his DNA was uploaded into the database—he was identified as the assailant in all three cases. The defendant has a history of mental illness and reported that he sees people who are not really there and that they talk to him.  He expressed remorse for his actions prior to being sentenced. 
This case was prosecuted by Chief Deputy District Attorney Jennifer Gettle.  Harrisburg Police Department detectives Richard Iachini and Shawn Donofrio spearheaded this criminal investigation.