By Lauren Rouleau and Kaitlin Thaney
Three students were arrested and three more will be referred to the Office of Student Conduct and Conflict Resolution due to incidents that occurred shortly after the Yankees beat the Red Sox in Game 7 of the American League Championships early Friday morning. After the game’s conclusion, police witnessed bloody noses, punches to the face and, most severely, a passerby being struck in the back of the head with a golf club.
“There was a lot of loud chanting expressing dislike for the hated Yankees,” said Associate Director of Public Safety James Ferrier. “With the exception of a few cases where people got a little over the edge, it was a pretty well-behaved crowd.”
The few cases Ferrier spoke of were sprinkled up and down Hemenway Street, down to Parker Street.
Just seconds after the game ended,at 12:20 a.m., an officer on Hemenway Street saw a person leave an apartment building, walk up to another person and punch him in the face. The student had a bloody nose, but no other serious injuries, Ferrier said. The officer attempted to detain the person, but he broke away.
Shortly after, NUPD officers witnessed another fight in front of Stetson West, but neither group approached the officers to report anything, Ferrier said.
“They’re just dumbasses,” said Colin Ferguson, a middler civil engineering major. “They could injure someone else, or themselves. [They] are just stupid.”
Officers said three or four 18-year-old male students were approached on Parker Street near the Wentworth Institute of Technology (WIT), walking back towards NU, at 12:30 a.m. The NU students encountered a group of Red Sox fans — with one member initially thought to be a Yankees fan — who attacked the group of NU students. One member of the group of Sox fans was swinging a golf club that hit one student in the back, then in the head.
The group of NU students fled the area, but returned to Parker Street later to locate a friend who was lost during the fight. A WIT officer stopped to see if he could help, and called NUPD to the scene.
The student who was hit with the golf club was taken to the hospital, examined and released. Friday afternoon they found out that the “missing” friend was admitted to the hospital the previous night after being injured in the assault. A description was given of the assailants, but officers do not know the names or any other information pertaining to the assailants, Ferrier said. Boston Police will investigate the assault of the person who was admitted to the hospital.
At 12:45 a.m., a 19-year-old male student, John Kreitz, was arrested for disorderly conduct and assault and battery of an officer after he swung at and pushed an NUPD officer. The officer was attempting to separate Kreitz from another male, who was pushed over the roof of a parked car.
Fifteen minutes later, a female student reported that while waiting to be swiped into Davenport A, she tried to get around a large group of people in the lobby. As she tried to get around one person in particular, a 21-year-old male resident yelled and swore at her for talking about the Yankees. He raised his hand as if to hit her and she held her arm up to keep him from hitting her. He pulled away, and even though she chose not to press charges against the resident, he will be referred to OSCCR for the attempted violence. On top of those charges, officers found the student carrying a bottle of rum that exceeded the building’s permitted amount for students of legal drinking age — 16 ounces of hard liquor, according to the guide to residence hall living.
In a separate incident, at 1:10 a.m., an 18-year old male student wearing a Yankees hat was punched in the face by a man walking down the sidewalk who then ran away. The man who was knocked to the ground was taken to the hospital for evaluation. The assailant was not apprehended, Ferrier said.
Jarett Henderson, a freshman civil engineering major, said he didn’t understand why people chose to riot.
“I am from New York, you just don’t see this all there,” he said. “I understand the Bambino curse and all that, but I think [the riots are] useless.”
“By 1:30 [a.m.] just about everyone was going home,” Ferrier said.
At that time, an officer noticed a young man provoking others around him to start anti-Yankees hysteria. Ferrier said the man was asked numerous times by several officers to quiet down and each time, he moved away from the officer and continued to rile the crowd. By the third or fourth time, Ferrier said, he was approached. John McHugh, a 20-year-old male student from Davenport B, was arrested for disorderly conduct.
A passerby who saw an officer taking McHugh into custody tried to interfere with the officer and was extremely non-compliant. The student, 27-year-old Guy Eran, was arrested for disorderly conduct.
At the same time, two students began what officers observed to be a fight near Smith Hall on Hemenway Street. An 18-year-old male student and a 20-year-old male student told the officer who broke up the fight that is was “intentionally staged” to “distract the officers from crowd control.” Both students will be referred to OSCCR.
While incidents involving violence occurred, Ferrier said the incidents were limited to personal conflicts.
“[There was] no property damage to speak of. A few bottles were broken on the street but no property damage,” Ferrier said.
