A Texas Man Has Been Charged With Murdering and Sexually Assaulting a College Cheerleader

A Texas man has been charged with the October murder and sexual assault of a Trinity University cheerleader after turning himself in to local authorities.

Mark Howerton, 22, told Bexar County Police on Wednesday that he had consensual but rough sex with Cayley Mandadi, a 19-year-old Trinity sophomore whom he was dating, before her death over Halloween weekend last year, KENS 5 reports.

The two had attended the Mala Luna music festival in San Antonio before Howerton brought Mandadi, unresponsive and nude from the waist down, to Luling’s Seton Edgar B. Davis Hospital on Oct. 29. Howerton told authorities he had noticed that Mandadi stopped breathing and attempted to perform CPR before bringing her to the hospital.

In Howerton’s arrest report, however, officials note that Mandadi’s injuries — including extensive bruising, blunt force trauma to the head and a brain bleed — were consistent with sexual assault. Her official cause of death was listed as complications from blunt force head and face trauma, the report notes.

Based on that evidence, authorities charged Howerton with sexual assault and murder.

An October public safety alert from Trinity Police informed students of a criminal trespass warning associated with Howerton, who was not a student at the school, but it was not initially connected to Mandadi’s death, KENS 5 reports.