Student allegedly assaulted by officer

After a birthday party gone wrong, a Public Safety officer is being investigated for possibly assaulting a student.

Caitlin Frankel ('10) threw a party for her roommate, Amy Boyce's ('10) 22nd birthday party on Tuesday, May 5. Guests began showing up at the party at around 10:00 p.m. By 12:30 p.m., the party had reached its peak. About 20 minutes later, Public Safety Patrol Officer Ronald Maialetti knocked on the door, responding to a noise complaint. According to Frankel, before anyone at the party could react, he opened the door. "He started knocking on the door and then he just basically walked in," Frankel said.

Boyce, who did not know about the noise complaint, began telling Maialetti she knew her rights, and he wasn't allowed to come into her townhouse. "My hope was to go outside and speak with the officer, apologize for the noise and turn the music down," Boyce said in her complaint statement to Public Safety. "Most of all, I was concerned about the people who had come to celebrate my 22nd birthday getting in trouble."

According to Boyce and Andrew Parham ('10), when Maialetti saw Parham, a student who is not supposed to be on campus except to attend classes because of previous run-ins with Public Safety, he began yelling at him, telling him he wasn't supposed to be there. Parham had obtained permission to be on campus earlier that day from Associate Dean of Campus Life and Student Affairs Frank Merckx. "[Parham has] always been aggressive with [Public Safety]," Boyce explained.

Boyce and other students who were attended party describe Maialetti as being very loud, aggressive and, in Frankel's words, "shocking." "It escalated pretty fast," Frankel said. "He was screaming in [students'] faces. I was surprised…I felt like he was out of line the way he was screaming at people."

"He started cursing," Andrew Cohn ('12), who was sitting on a nearby couch with a few friends, said. "He said 'get the fuck out of my way,' and 'I'm fucking coming in here.'"

After unsuccessfully trying to get Maialetti's attention several times, Boyce put her hand on Maialetti's shoulder to get his attention "in a way that could only be interpreted as me trying to be personable," she said in her statement. According to Boyce, Maialetti grabbed her and pushed her to the ground. Although she said she had about five mixed drinks throughout that night, she said she had been dancing earlier and she would not have lost her balance if he hadn't pushed her. "He put a significant amount of force on me," she said.

Some students said they saw this happen, but others said that their view was blocked and they were unable to see Boyce being pushed. "He pushed her on her left shoulder," Parham said.

"I just remember [Maialetti] grabbing her and throwing her onto the ground," Cohn said. "She hit the beer pong table, and beer spilled everywhere."

Vladimir Alexandre ('09) said, "I didn't see him push her."

Frankel added, "I was sitting on my bed…I didn't actually see him push her." She said her view of Boyce was blocked because there were people standing in front of her. She does, however, remember seeing Boyce fall.

After Boyce fell, Parham began getting aggressive with Maialetti. According to Cohn, "Andrew started pushing the officer."

Maialetti then took Boyce and Parham back to headquarters. According to Boyce, Maialetti kept interrupting her. He kept telling her that she was in the wrong to have a party and that she was drunk. "He was interrupting her and yelling at her," Parham, who was in the room next to Boyce's, said. "She was trying to tell her story."

According to Boyce, she asked Maialetti to breathalyze her. She said Public Safety refused and said that they were trained to know when a person is drunk.

When Maialetti walked Parham to the campus gate, Parham said he kept making derogatory comments towards him and threatening him. "He started threatening me like 'you want me to take this badge off?'… The officers are aggressive and abusive to the students," Parham said.

Director of the Department of Public Safety Chief Thomas Evans and Maialetti both declined to comment. Evans said that the incident is under investigation.

Edited on May 20, 2009