text: SALT LAKE CITY -- A sex offender parolee who killed a University of Utah student whom he briefly dated allegedly threatened to post compromising pictures of the couple online. Melvin Rowland, 37, demanded that Lauren McCluskey send him money to stop him from doing so, authorities said Thursday. 
   
   Rowland, 37, had been lurking on campus for days trying to confront the woman who had broken up with him weeks earlier when she discovered his criminal background, university police chief Dale Brophy said. Rowland spent the hours before the fatal shooting Monday in McCluskey's dorm building socializing with her friends, university police chief Dale Brophy said. 
   
   He later confronted the 21-year-old McCluskey in the parking lot, dragged her into a car and shot her multiple times in the back seat, Brophy said at a news conference. 
   
   Rowland killed himself hours later in a church as police closed in. 
   
   The killing of McCluskey, a track athlete at the school, came weeks after she broke off her month-long relationship with Rowland and filed a complaint with campus police alleging he had demanded money in exchange for not posting compromising pictures of the couple online. She had sent $1,000 to an account in hopes of preserving her reputation, Brophy said. 
   
   Police were investigating the case as sexual extortion and knew Rowland was a sex offender but not that he was on parole, Brophy said. 
   
   NEW in @UUtah student death 
   
   Police say... 
   
   -Lauren McCluskey paid Melvin Rowland $1000 to keep compromising photos private 
   
   -He was on campus Fri to Mon, looking for McCluskey 
   
   -He texted her, posing as cop Monday AM to lure her outside 
   
   -He went on date (dinner, shower) after murder — Michael Locklear (@MichaelLocklear) October 25, 2018 
   
   McCluskey reported receiving numerous emails and messages using different names trying to lure her to locations. Investigators now believe they all came from Rowland, who Brophy called a master manipulator. 
   
   After shooting McCluskey, Rowland was picked up on campus by a woman he met online. They went to dinner, visited the state Capitol and went to her apartment where Rowland took a shower. 
   
   Later that night, after the woman dropped Rowland at a coffee shop, police tracked him to the church where he killed himself. 
   
   The woman had called police when she saw photos of the man being sought for the campus shooting. 
   
   Rowland got the gun by telling an acquaintance that his girlfriend wanted to learn to shoot. 
   
   Brophy said it appears the woman who picked up Rowland on campus and the person who loaned him the gun had been duped and are not expected to face charges. 
   
   "Rowland was a manipulator. If his lips were moving, he was lying," Brophy said. "I don't think he told the truth to anybody based on our investigation." 
   
   Kaitlin Felsted, a spokeswoman for the Utah Department of Corrections, said police didn't make parole officers aware of the complaint filed by McCluskey. 
   
   Brophy said police didn't start the formal extortion investigation until six days after her Oct. 13 report due to workload issues. 
   
   In the early stages of the investigation, they didn't have enough information to pass on to any other law enforcement, Brophy said, adding that there were no indications from McCluskey that Rowland was threatening physical violence. 
   
   University of Utah president Ruth Watkins said outside investigations are being launched to assess campus security and police protocols to determine if improvements can be made to prevent future shootings. 
   
   Watkins said so far she has found no mistakes in how police handled the case. Brophy said he welcomes the reviews. 
   
   Gov. Gary Herbert said corrections and parole officials had approved independent investigations into the handling of Rowland's parole. 
   
   "Clearly in hindsight, we're going to say, 'You should have done this, you should have done that,'" Herbert said during his monthly televised news conference at KUED-TV 
   
   He noted, however, "You never know when these things are going to occur." 
   
   Rowland was paroled in April when he told the parole board that he was a changed man after being a peer leader in prison had helped him tap into his empathy and learn to follow the rules. 
   
   He spent nearly a decade in prison after pleading guilty in 2004 to trying to lure an underage girl online and attempted sex abuse charges, according to court records. 
   
   After he was charged, a woman came forward to report he had sexually assaulted her after a separate online meeting a few days earlier. 
   
   Rowland, a native of New York, was twice sent back to prison for parole violations that included possessing pornography and failure to complete therapy. 
   
   He blamed his "thinking errors" for the actions that kept sending him back in prison, according to recordings of parole hearings from 2010 to 2018 released this week by the Utah Board of Parole and Pardons. 
   
   Rowland said at a hearing in 2012 that he was a womanizer who manipulated women to get what he wanted. 
   
   Brophy offered the same assessment. He said McCluskey met Rowland at a bar where he was working security and started dating him. He visited her often in her dorm and made friends with other students in the building. 
   
   "He was very, very good at getting people to trust him," Brophy said. "Lauren was no different." 
   
   Watkins said she gave McCluskey's parents a posthumous degree for their daughter, a senior from Pullman, Washington, who was majoring in communication. 
   
   Utah Jazz star Donovan Mitchell paid tribute to McCluskey by writing her name on his sneakers before Wednesday's game against the Houston Rockets. 
   
   "It was a scary feeling to be close to that. It's just so sad," Mitchell told NBA TV after the game. "I have a little sister. My mom raised me. Women have to be protected more. She was being harassed for two straight weeks. That's so tough. She was defenseless. She couldn't do anything about it. For a man to do that, that's terrible. For me, I just wanted to be able to dedicate this game to her and her family." ||||| In the wake of the fatal shooting of student-athlete Lauren McCluskey on campus Monday evening, the University of Utah will initiate a pair of separate reviews into campus safety and how the university police department responded to a complaint from McCluskey about her killer earlier this month. 
   
   "Let me be clear: I have great faith that our university police department worked diligently on this incident," university president Ruth Watkins said. "They too welcome an independent review. We will leave no stone unturned in determining anything we can do to prevent something like this from happening again on our campus." 
   
   Melvin Rowland, 37, a convicted sex offender who was free on parole, dated McCluskey, a member of the Utah track and field team, for about a month after they met at a bar where he worked as a bouncer, University of Utah police chief Dale Brophy said Thursday at a news conference. McCluskey ended the relationship Oct. 9, after learning about Rowland's criminal background. In the days following the breakup, Rowland attempted to extort McCluskey and stalked her residence before assaulting her in a parking lot and shooting her several times in the back seat of a car, Brophy said. She was 21. 
   
   Rowland killed himself hours later in a church as police closed in. 
   
   Rowland was convicted of forcible sexual abuse and enticing a minor, both felonies, in 2004 in Utah. On Oct. 9, when McCluskey became aware of his background, she invited him to her dorm to confront him and end the relationship, Brophy told reporters. He said McCluskey allowed Rowland to stay with her that night and borrow her car the next day. 
   
   Lauren McCluskey, a member of Utah's track and field team, was shot and killed Monday evening on campus. University of Utah Athletics 
   
   On Oct. 10, McCluskey's mother, Jill McCluskey, a professor at Washington State University, contacted campus police dispatch because she was worried her daughter would be forced to go alone to retrieve her car from Rowland. 
   
   Police made contact with Lauren McCluskey, but she told them she did not feel uncomfortable having Rowland drop off her car, Brophy said. Police later provided an escort for McCluskey after Rowland dropped her car off in a parking lot several blocks from her dorm. 
   
   Two days later, McCluskey began receiving suspicious messages she believed were from Rowland and/or his friends, and she contacted police, Brophy told reporters. She told police the messages didn't make her feel uncomfortable, but told them Rowland's friends were trying to lure her somewhere and she didn't know why, Brophy said. Police later determined Rowland likely was responsible for all the messages McCluskey received. 
   
   Then, on Oct. 13, she received a demand for money in order to prevent compromising photos of her and Rowland from being published on the internet, and she met the demand by depositing $1,000 in an account, Brophy said. McCluskey filed a report and university police opened an extortion case against Rowland, but the formal investigation did not begin until Oct. 19 due to workload issues, Brophy said. 
   
   Brophy also said the department knew Rowland was a registered sex offender but was not aware Rowland was on parole. In the early stages of the investigation, the police did not have enough information to pass on to any other law enforcement agency, Brophy said, adding that there were no indications from McCluskey that Rowland was threatening physical violence. 
   
   Editor's Picks Utah track athlete McCluskey shot and killed University of Utah track athlete Lauren McCluskey was shot and killed Monday night, the school announced. 
   
   Utah athlete's killer a self-described manipulator The man who killed Utah track athlete Lauren McCluskey said he sought to manipulate those he met in person or online, according to a recording of his 2012 parole hearing. 1 Related 
   
   Rowland was granted parole on Feb. 20 and released in April, public records show. Rowland's address was available on the sex offender database and he was required to check in monthly, according to Kaitlin Felsted, a public information officer for the Utah Department of Corrections. Rowland was last in touch with his parole officer by phone on Oct. 16, and the conversation did not raise any red flags, Felsted said. 
   
   Rowland was granted parole on two prior occasions -- in 2012 and 2016 -- but violated the conditions of his release on both occasions and was returned to prison, according to the Utah Board of Pardons and Parole. During one parole hearing, he described himself as a womanizer who manipulated women to get what he wanted and said he was attracted to teenage girls and vulnerable women, and sought to manipulate those he met in person or online, according to a recording of the 2012 hearing released by Utah state authorities. 
   
   Gov. Gary Herbert said corrections and parole officials had approved independent investigations into the handling of Rowland's parole. 
   
   On the day of McCluskey's killing, Rowland spent several hours hanging out near her residence and attempted to lure her out of her dorm by sending a text message posing as a police officer, Brophy said. When she returned to her dorm, Rowland attacked McCluskey in the parking lot while she was on the phone with her mother and dragged her to the car, where he shot her several times, the chief said. 
   
   According to Brophy, Rowland obtained the gun from an acquaintance, whom he told his girlfriend wanted to learn how to shoot. The acquaintance reached out to police voluntarily upon seeing news reports about the shooting and is cooperating with police, Brophy said, but it remains possible the individual could face criminal charges down the line. 
   
   After shooting McCluskey, Rowland was picked up by a woman he had recently met on a dating website, Brophy said. They had dinner and went to her apartment, where Rowland showered before leaving. That woman contacted police when she saw Rowland's name in news reports about the shooting and is not expected to face charges, Brophy said. 
   
   The external, independent reviews of campus safety measures and the police department's handling of the case will begin as soon as possible, Watkins said. As of Thursday evening, the university had not announced who would lead those reviews. ||||| A University of Utah student who police say was murdered by her ex-boyfriend told officers she wired $1,000 to an account earlier this month to prevent the release of "compromising pictures" of the pair, investigators said Thursday. 
   
   University Police Chief Dale Brophy told reporters that Lauren McCluskey, 21, reported the extortion to his officers on Oct. 13, nine days before she was found shot dead outside an on-campus dormitory. The suspect in her murder, 37-year-old Melvin Rowland, was found dead that same evening of a self-inflicted gunshot wound inside a Salt Lake City church. 
   
   Brophy said that McCluskey had ended her relationship with Rowland on Oct. 9 after she discovered that he had lied to her about his age and was a registered sex offender. McCluskey initially declined police assistance in dealing with Rowland, but later reported receiving numerous emails and messages using different names trying to lure her to locations in addition to the extortion attempt. Investigators now believe the messages all came from Rowland, who Brophy called a master manipulator. 
   
   "If his lips were moving, he was lying," Brophy said of Rowland. "I don't think he told the truth to anybody based on our investigation." 
   
   Rowland was spotted on surveillance video at various locations around the University of Utah's campus during the weekend before McCluskey's murder. Authorities believe he was trying to confront her. Hours before the killing, Rowland was in McCluskey's dorm building socializing with some of her friends. He later confronted McCluskey in the building parking lot, dragged her into a car he had driven to campus, and shot her multiple times. 
   
   After shooting McCluskey, Rowland was picked up on campus by a woman he met online. They went to dinner, visited the state Capitol and went to her apartment where Rowland took a shower. 
   
   The woman later called police when she saw photos of the man being sought for the campus shooting. 
   
   Later that night, after the woman dropped Rowland at a coffee shop, police tracked him to the church where he killed himself. 
   
   Rowland got the gun by telling an acquaintance that his girlfriend wanted to learn to shoot. 
   
   Brophy said it appears the woman who picked up Rowland on campus and the person who loaned him the gun had been duped and will not face charges. 
   
   Police knew Rowland was a sex offender but not that he was on parole, Brophy said. He added that police didn't start the formal extortion investigation until six days after her Oct. 13 report due to workload issues. 
   
   Kaitlin Felsted, a spokeswoman for the Utah Department of Corrections, said police didn't make parole officers aware of the complaint filed by McCluskey. 
   
   In the early stages of the investigation, officers didn't have enough information to pass on to any other law enforcement, Brophy said, adding that there were no indications from McCluskey that Rowland was threatening physical violence. 
   
   University of Utah president Ruth Watkins said outside investigations are being launched to assess campus security and police protocols to determine if improvements can be made to prevent future shootings. 
   
   Watkins said so far she has found no mistakes in how police handled the case. Brophy said he welcomes the reviews. 
   
   UNIVERSITY OF UTAH STUDENT WAS ON PHONE WITH PARENTS BEFORE DEADLY SHOOTING 
   
   Earlier in the day, Gov. Gary Herbert said corrections and parole officials had launched investigations into the handling of the case. 
   
   "Clearly in hindsight, we're going to say, 'You should have done this, you should have done that,'" Herbert said during his monthly televised news conference at KUED-TV 
   
   He noted, however, "You never know when these things are going to occur." 
   
   Rowland was paroled in April when he told the parole board that he was a changed man after being a peer leader in prison had helped him tap into his empathy and learn to follow the rules. 
   
   He spent nearly a decade in prison after pleading guilty in 2004 to trying to lure an underage girl online and attempted sex abuse charges, according to court records. 
   
   After he was charged, a woman came forward to report he had sexually assaulted her after a separate online meeting a few days earlier. 
   
   Rowland, a native of New York, was twice sent back to prison for parole violations that included possessing pornography and failure to complete therapy. 
   
   MARRIED COUPLE FOUND DEAD AT INDIANA HOME IDENTIFIED AS TEACHERS 
   
   He blamed his "thinking errors" for the actions that kept sending him back in prison, according to recordings of parole hearings from 2010 to 2018 released this week by the Utah Board of Parole and Pardons. 
   
   Rowland said at a hearing in 2012 that he was a womanizer who manipulated women to get what he wanted. 
   
   Brophy offered the same assessment. He said McCluskey met Rowland last month at a bar where he was working security and started dating him. He visited her often in her dorm and made friends with other students in the building. 
   
   "He was very, very good at getting people to trust him," Brophy said. "Lauren was no different." 
   
   Click for more from Fox13Now.com. 
   
   The Associated Press contributed to this report.
target: – Lauren McCluskey's killer was a master manipulator who penned messages under various names—even posed as a police officer—in an effort to lure and extort the 21-year-old University of Utah student before her death, according to police. Nine days before she was fatally shot on campus by an ex-boyfriend later found dead of a self-inflicted gunshot wound, McCluskey told university police she'd wired $1,000 to an account to prevent the release of "compromising" photos of her and the killer, 37-year-old Melvin Rowland, says University Police Chief Dale Brophy, per Fox News and ESPN. McCluskey had ended her relationship with the registered sex offender days earlier after discovering he'd lied about his background. "If his lips were moving, he was lying," Brophy says of Rowland, who described himself as a manipulator of women at a 2012 parole hearing. Rowland told an acquaintance, for example, that he needed a gun because his girlfriend wanted to learn to shoot, reports CBS News. After shooting McCluskey multiple times in the backseat of a car he’d driven to campus, Rowland was picked up by a woman he'd met online. Before she recognized him as the murder suspect and called police, the pair went to dinner and back to the woman's apartment where Rowland showered before leaving, Brophy says. Meanwhile, the investigation into McCluskey's extortion complaint had been delayed by workload issues, and the Utah Department of Corrections had yet to be notified. Gov. Gary Herbert announced an investigation into the handling of the case on Thursday. Hindsight is 20/20, but "you never know when these things are going to occur," he said. (McCluskey was on the phone with her mom at the time.)