On May 8, 2025, Odin Rathnam pleaded no contest and guilty to 28 crimes of child sexual abuse that spanned an approximately 11-year period. The court accepted his pleas including rape of a child causing serious bodily injury. The District Attorney's Office entered the plea agreement in order to resolve the case in a manner that protected the victim from sustaining further trauma through trial testimony. As a condition of the plea agreement, Rathnam will spend between 15 and 30 years imprisoned in a State Correctional Facility and must undergo an additional 10 years of probation supervision consecutive to his prison sentence. He will be a lifetime Megan’s Law Registrant, and he will be required to undergo an assessment by the Sexual Offender’s Assessment Board to determine if he meets the criteria to be classified as a sexually violent predator.

The facts of the case, the victim impact statements, and the statement of the victim's mother highlight what grooming truly looks like. The case demonstrates how abuse can continue undetected for a long period. Rathnam systematically drove a wedge between the victim and her mother. He made the victim believe that she shared a special relationship with him and that her mother would not understand. He isolated the victim from her mother and convinced the victim that her mother was the reason for her medical problems. He told the victim inappropriate stories about her mother and shared that he cared for the victim more than her mother did. At the same time, Rathnam convinced her mother that he loved the victim and her sibling as his own. He spoke of them being his redemption at fatherhood and continued to show up as a parent figure when the marriage ended. His status in the music community and reputation only served to underscore the trustworthiness he claimed to possess.

The grooming process in child sexual abuse is used by offenders to not only gain a potential victim’s trust but also is used to create a trustworthy image and relationship with their family and community. Child abusers are often charming, kind, and helpful. They present as the kind of people that appear worthy of trust, but these appearances can be a tactic used to gain access to children. Parents should be aware of what grooming is and what it looks like. While the tactics may vary, it often follows a similar course. Common methods include victim selection, gaining access and isolation of the victim, trust development and secret keeping, desensitization to touch and discussion of sexual topics, and attempts by abusers to make their behavior seem natural to avoid raising suspicions. For more information on Grooming and Knowing the Warning Signs please visit www.rainn.org and www.safekidsthrive.org .

The grooming in Rathnam’s case was so effective that it took Rathnam's victim several years into adulthood to fully understand what he had done to her. This is not unusual. The Department of Justice reports that 86% of child sexual abuse is not reported until the child reaches adulthood.  Even then, studies show that only 10 to 15% of all child sexual abuse is ever reported to authorities.

The results here can be directly attributed to the strength of this victim who advocated for herself with the support of an effective and thorough investigation by now retired Detective Jeffrey Corcoran of the Lower Paxton Township Police. District Attorney Fran Chardo praised the great teamwork of Chief Deputy District Attorney Katie L. Adam, who prosecuted the case, and Detective Jeffrey Corcoran.