Former student charged in sexual assault of UMSL student: ‘We haven’t done enough,’ lawmaker says

ABC 17 News is digging into campus safety after a former UMSL student was arrested and charged with sexually assaulting a male student in his on-campus apartment.

23-year-old Devonta Bagley of Belton, Missouri was charged with one count of sodomy, one count of burglary and two counts of armed criminal action. He was taken into custody Monday and is currently being held on a $500,000 cash only bond.

According to a probable cause statement, the victim woke up early Sunday morning to find Bagley standing in his room. When he told him to leave, police say Bagley threatened him before holding him at gunpoint and raping him.

UMSL sent out a notice to students the same day as the assault. The university said there was no forced entry into the apartment and shared a number of safety tips.

Rep. Courtney Allen Curtis (D – District 73) told ABC 17 News that he has safety concerns after this weekend’s incident. Curtis chairs the Urban Issues committee and previously grilled UM leaders on campus safety in a special hearing.

“We definitely have more work to do, we haven’t done enough,” he said Thursday. “No matter what the University of Missouri System has done, they still allow for one more student to become a survivor. That isn’t a compelling reason to attend any of the UM system schools.”

In January, UM System President Mun Choi told Curtis that they held an “all hands on deck meeting” after a reported rape at UMKC to find out where failures occurred.

“As part of that, we revised the way we train our employees who work in the dormitories and the reporting protocol to make sure situations like [that] don’t happen again,” Choi said.

MU spokesperson Christian Basi said the university has a number of policies in place to prevent crime. He said the chief of police talks to nearly every student and parent during summer welcome. University officials also discuss safety tips in every residence hall, and police offer a free defense course for female students.

Basi said MU is not reviewing its policies in response to the UMSL assault. He said each campus has its own police force and its own safety officials, and those officials will review anything that happens. He added that there is a systemwide safety committee that includes all four police chiefs.