AEPi-MIT: 51 bottles of liquor + 15 gal of Bud Lite
 

Fraternity to face alcohol charges
By Suzanne Smalley, Globe Staff _|_ February 6, 2005
Boston police broke up a fraternity party late Friday night, finding 51 bottles of liquor and liqueur, more than 15 gallons of Bud Light, a blocked fire exit, and 35 underage drinkers inside the Alpha Epsilon Pi house near Kenmore Square, police spokesman John Boyle said yesterday.

The party involved students from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and other area universities. The action occurred as police put the final touches on their security plan for controlling the students who are expected to spill into Kenmore Square tonight if the Patriots win the Super Bowl.

Mayor Thomas M. Menino and Police Commissioner Kathleen M. O'Toole announced in January that they would crack down on public drinking, vandalism, and loud parties by students. The new plan, Operation Student Shield, was a response to the death of Emerson College student Victoria Snelgrove in October as police tried to control packs of young people celebrating the Red Sox American League championship victory.

As part of the operation, officers were patrolling near a house at 165 Bay State Road on Friday night when they saw party guests in the street, drinking from red plastic cups, Boyle said. The officers also observed a young man enter the fraternity house with a case of beer.

When the police knocked on the fraternity house door, Boyle said, it was opened by a person drinking from a red plastic cup similar to the cups police saw students holding in the street.

The student told officers a party was being held in the basement. When detectives entered the basement they saw about 40 young men and women, many of whom were drinking from red plastic cups and appeared to be underage.

Boston police called MIT police to help inspect the fraternity house, where officers found a bar containing dozens of bottles of rum, vodka, and other liquors, as well as three Bud Light containers holding about five gallons of beer apiece. Near the bar, detectives also found evidence of the drinking game beer pong, Boyle said. There, several pitchers of beer and plastic cups filled with beer littered a table top.

The president of the fraternity, who is not underage, took responsibility for the party when detectives asked for the person in charge.

Detectives also found an industrial-sized vacuum cleaner blocking one fire exit and another exit that was locked.

Boyle said the fraternity house had a license from the City of Boston Licensing Board, which issues alcohol licenses to public premises. Police could not say which kind of license the fraternity held, but Boyle said it was issued a licensed-premise violation and representatives will have to appear in court for serving alcohol to minors, keeping and exposing alcohol, a locked fire exit, and a blocked fire exit. Boyle said criminal complaints against the keepers of the fraternity house will be sought in Roxbury District Court this week.

Students who answered the fraternity house door yesterday declined to comment.

MIT has paid close attention to the issue of student alcohol abuse since a freshman died from binge-drinking after undergoing fraternity hazing in 1997. In 2002, MIT became the first university in the country to hire an administrator to manage alcohol use by students.

MIT spokeswoman Sarah Wright said yesterday that the majority of the 35 underage students found at the party were not MIT students. The fraternity has not had a history of problems, Wright said. Wright could not say why Boston police called MIT police if most of the students were not attending MIT.

Wright said that MIT will be hosting several alcohol-free parties for students tonight in an attempt to control them following the Super Bowl.

Darn. I wonder what the chapter's defense (if any) will be? Given MIT's admissions standards, it can hardly be claimed that they were too dumb to know better.

They are tied for the highest GPA at MIT.

I haven't ever heard of anyone claiming to be too dumb.

-Rudey

Seems to be a lot of suppositions here. Just happened to be driving by, saw someone drinking from a Red Cup, saw someone who they thought was underage walking into a house carrying beer.:mad:

Being an Ex I know that a reason can be found for anything for a situation to be checked out.

Actually, it sounds like a B S Deal to me.

Hope they can afford a good Lawyer to make The Local Law Dawgs look foolish for how it was handled.

Intrapment sounds a little good even though this doesnt apply here, just, wow, lets go bust these kids.:(

exactly


red plastics cups are hardly probable cause

and appearing to be young.. ok

Are cops allowed to just come in without some sort of order?

-Rudey

Actually the police can. I have a sorority sister who use to be a police officer and she said as long as there is probable cause they can go where ever they think something bad is going on.

I'm surprised this doesn't happen more often. The house is actually on Boston U's campus. I'm not sure about this particular house, but most of the fraternity houses in the area were once Boston U. fraternity houses; they were sold to MIT when the school made an attempt to drive out the Greek system.

Bay State Road used to be the signature road at the school, the one shown on all of the tours. If you pay close attention, it's kind of an odd mix; MIT fraternity houses surrounded by BU residences and classrooms.

It's really an area that the school keeps a close eye on. For any type of party in the area (by BU especially), a line outside the door can be a quick precursor to the party being shut down and people being arrested. It used to be that if there were parties going on, things were kept quiet and lines were kept to an absolute minimum. (this doesn't mean for AEPI specifically, but for any of the houses that had events).

Too bad for the AEPi guys...hope everything works out for them.

How do they justify 'red cups' as probable cause?

Couldn't the lines at the door indicate that the chapter is checking IDs and that people are on the guest list?

Frankly, it seems like the police are using this and the 'red cup scare' as an excuse to try to crack down.

On our campus, we would hire off-duty policemen to work as doormen at any party.

If there was ever an act of aggression, this off-duty cop who looked bigger than the guy from Green Mile, would step in and it would stop right there.

When there were parties and disturbances, our university sent campus police to check it out - never the Chicago Police Department.

Because we had a doorman, he would also act as a conduit to speaking with any campus police, flash his badge, and everything would be diplomatic.

-Rudey

I'm sure this is exactly what they were doing and in my opinion the students should have been smarter than to be drinking from them outside. Because of the problems in the area after the last two Super Bowls and the ALCS, Menino, O'Toole, the university presidents, and the student government presidents had all worked together to put out an absolute zero tolerance policy for the World Series and the Super Bowl. Streets were closed down, cops were out in riot gear, and cops were going to be patrolling everywhere making sure everything stayed calm. This was something that everyone knew about. It was said everywhere that the police would be out checking and looking for those signs. I'm sure because this was a fraternity house, it made the news. But it could have been any house and I'm sure it happened at others too.

That also contributed to it, no doubt. There has to be even more of a crackdown lately, and I've seen more police around when I've been in the area.

With the location of the house, though, the chapter had to be even more careful. If you're out by Kenmore Square, on another college's campus, you really have to be careful. You can't drink outside in Boston; it's just one of those things.

That is what we also do, it helps that we have alums who are cops in the city.