A grand jury has indicted 21-year-old Inyoung You in the death of her boyfriend, Alexander Urtula, NBC News reports. She faces charges of involuntary manslaughter for her alleged involvement in her boyfriend’s suicide.
Urtula and You were both students at Boston College. Urtula was a biology major from Cedar Grove, New Jersey, and a member of the Philippine Society of Boston College. He took his own life the morning by jumping off a parking garage on May 20, the morning he was set to graduate.
According to The Boston Globe, District Attorney Rachel Rollins announced on Monday (Oct. 28) morning that a grand jury had indicted You on October 18. You is currently in South Korea, but prosecutors will seek her extradition if she does not return to the US to face the charge.
Prosecutors said that You and Urtula exchanged 75,000 text messages in the two months leading up to his suicide, NBC News reports. Rollins said that You sent Urtula “demeaning” texts despite being aware of his depression. She allegedly encouraged Urtula to kill himself. She told him that his family and the “world would be better without him.”
Rollins added that You also tracked Urtula’s location on her phone. She was even at the parking garage when Urtula killed himself.
The case in Boston is similar to the 2017 Michelle Carter case. Carter urged her boyfriend Conrad Roy III on the day he committed suicide. Carter was convicted of involuntary manslaughter by the Supreme Judicial Court for her role in her boyfriend’s suicide.
Rollins, however, seemed to imply that the case against You maybe even stronger. In the Carter case, Rollins said there was “very limited physical contact prior and some very egregious language” leading up to Roy’s suicide. According to The Boston Globe, Carter had only recently been released from a psychiatric hospital the month before Roy’s suicide.
“We have, quite frankly, the opposite of that,” Rollins said. “We have a barrage, a complete and utter attack on this man’s very will and conscious and psyche by an individual to the tune of 40,000 text messages in the two months leading up.”
However, a legal analyst for CBS News named Rikki Klieman said the case may be harder to try because You went to see Urtula at the parking garage.
“We don’t know what happened there,” Klieman said.
It is not clear when legal proceedings will begin. The direction prosecutors take within the next few weeks will be influenced by whether or not You willingly returns to the US to face the charge. According to NBC News, neither You or a representative for You could be reached for comment.
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