He said the masters began to harbor animosity toward he and Kay after they complained about the room changes.

"We made the mistake of telling people, including other tutors, about what had happened to us," Kane said in the e-mail. "They [the masters] are not people who tolerate such things."

Kane said the animosity then escalated into backstabbing. When he applied for the senior tutor positions, Kane said that Mitchell played a "two-faced" role.

"He claims, on the one hand, that he is telling the other Masters that I would make a great senior tutor while simultaneously telling me that I am such a lousy tutor that he has no choice but to kick me out of Eliot," Kane said.

Moreover, Kane said that the masters expressed an unprofessional attitude toward other tutors as well.

For example, he said that they fired married tutors Sean Gallagher and Aida Vidan in an underhanded manner last year for an undisclosed reason. Nevertheless, Kane said that he did not speak up then because he believed the masters were acting in the best interests of the House.

Students say that Kane's allegations are not without validity.

An anonymous Eliot House senior who declined to give his name said that his blockmates were very good friends with Gallagher last year and heard of the reason behind their dismissal.

"Aida happened to be good friends with this Ukrainian student [who] sued Eliot House, and [the House] lost money and were bitter about it," he said.

He believes that Aida, and indirectly, her husband Steve, were asked to leave because Aida had befriended and associated with a controversial figure.

Of Mitchell and Forsgard, he said, "They definitely play favorites in Eliot House, even among the students."

Another Eliot House senior, who also declined to give his name, concurred. "I have to agree with David Kane in terms of how two-faced the masters may seem, but I don't interact with them very often," he said.

However, the students had only kind words for Kane. "He didn't have an enemy in the world," the first senior said.

"Of all the House tutors that I knew, David was one of the only ones that knew my name," said a third anonymous Eliot House senior who declined to give his name. "I talked to him about many issues like sports and women and other things."

However, resident tutors sympathized with Mitchell and Forsgard.