PROVO, Utah (Scripps News Salt Lake City/Court TV/AP) — A Utah judge sentenced a man who appeared to fake his death and flee the United States to avoid arrest on rape charges to five years to life in prison on Tuesday.
The sentence was for Nicholas Rossi’s second rape conviction in Utah, for which he was convicted in September in Utah County. Rossi raped the victim, an ex-girlfriend, in Orem in 2008.
Nicholas Rossi appears in court at his second sentencing hearing on Tuesday, Nov. 4, 2025. (Court TV)
In August, Rossi was convicted of raping another ex-girlfriend in Salt Lake County. He was sentenced to anywhere from five years to life in prison for that case in October. The sentences will run consecutively.
In the latest case, Rossi’s ex-girlfriend claimed she ended a relationship with him over his aggressive behavior and failure to pay her the money he had borrowed.
Rossi had the woman come to his house in September 2008 under the pretense of repaying her the money, but instead raped her.
Prosecutors say Rossi faked his own death in Rhode Island, where he grew up in foster care, and fled to Europe after being identified as a suspect in the rape case in Orem, Utah. In 2020, Rossi, who was an outspoken critic of Rhode Island’s Department of Children, Youth and Families, told a media outlet that he had late-stage non-Hodgkin lymphoma and had weeks to live. An obituary published online claimed he died Feb. 29, 2020, reported The Associated Press.
Rossi was arrested in Scotland in December 2021 after he was hospitalized with COVID-19. At the time of his arrest, he insisted he was an Irish orphan named Arthur Knight and had never set foot on American soil. In court appearances, he said he was framed by authorities who took his fingerprints while he was in a coma so they could connect him to Rossi. He was extradited to Utah in 2024.
The Associated Press and Scripps News Salt Lake City, an E.W. Scripps Company, contributed to this report.
