Dean of the College L. Fred Jewett '57 and other University officials have become key players in lawsuit filed by a rape victim against the University.

The suit, filed last year by the daughter of a Harvard Professor, alleges that the University failed to provide her with adequate security. As a result, the suit says, a man, who has never been identified, was able to break into her family's Faculty Row home in April 1991 and rape her.

In recent months, the dean's office, the Harvard police department and the Office of physical Resources have become embroiled in the suit.

And on December 23 of last year, Jewett, Police Sgt. Lawrence J. Fennelly, Director of the Office of Physical Resources Michael N. Lichten and Associate Director for Building Services Robert L. Mortimer were added to the suit as defendants.

Jewett refused to comment yesterday. Fennelly, Lichten and Mortimer did not return phone calls.

The suit alleges that Jewett, who lives in Faculty Row, was negligent in not ordering an inspection or security survey of the plaintiff's residence and by not requesting installation of an alarm system in the residence. The suit alsochrages that the dean failed to warm the plaintiffof prior break-ins to Faculty Row residences.

"The entry was proximately caused by thefailure of Harvard to have adequately secured theapartment from unlawful entry." says the amendedcomplaint filed in December.

The complaint also charges the "Harvard wasaware that the plaintiff's apartment wasvulnerable to break-in."

Alarm Systems

In the complaint, the plaintiff's attorneys,Max B. Stern and Lynn Weissberg, argue thatHarvard neglected to install an alarm system inthe apartment occupied by the professor and hisfamily.

The complaint notes that alarm systems wereinstalled in the Faculty Row apartments occupiedby Jewett and North House Master J. WoodlandHastings '66, Magelsdorf professor of naturalsciences.

The University conducted an inspection ofHasting's and Jewett's apartments to determinewhether they should install alarms, according tothe suit. But no such inspection was ordered forthe family's apartment.

The security inspection of Jewett's housefollowed a break-in in 1987. As a result of theinspection, the University installed an alarmsystem in Jewett's apartment. Hastings' alarm wasinstalled in 1981.

Harvard, in its opposition to the amendedcomplaint, contended that it was merely a stalltactic by the plaintiff to shift the focus of thecase before the close of the discovery process.

Lawyers for the professor's daughter had arguedthat the University failed to secure theapartment's glass sliding door and that theplaintiff was not properly instructed how to lockand secure the door. But attorney Richard J.Riley, who is representing the University,contends that the shift was prompted because earlyevidence discounted these two key claims of theplaintiff.

In his response to the plaintiff's amendedcomplaint, Riley says that Jewett should not be adefendant in the case.