“You can be expelled from school for using a false ID to buy alcohol,” she says. “When you know conclusively that one of your students violently beat up another one of your students, that’s not enough to take action?”
The Court Case
Reyes said that swift action from the KSG is especially needed because the court case has already taken more than six months.
“Delaying, delaying, delaying is really stressful for me,” Reyes says.
In the latest hearing yesterday morning, two motions filed by Mercedes’ attorney were denied, according to Middlesex District Attorney spokesperson Emily LaGrassa.
The first asked the judge to suppress evidence, LaGrassa says, although she didn’t know further details. According to Reyes, the motion was an attempt to suppress police records of Mercedes’ alleged admission that he had assaulted Reyes.
The second motion requested that Mercedes be placed on “pretrial probation”—a six-month period during which his behavior would be monitored by the court, after which a judge could dismiss criminal charges.
Mercedes, who is in the United States on a student visa, could be forced to leave the country if he is convicted or “admits to facts sufficient for a finding of guilty,” according to documents filed by his lawyer, Joseph Belton.
Belton is a third-year law student representing Mercedes as part of the Suffolk Law School Voluntary Defenders program.
According to documents Belton submitted to the court in support of the pretrial probation motion, Mercedes has enrolled voluntarily in the Emerge Program, a “counseling and educational program for men who want to address abuse in relationships.”
Before the alleged assault, Mercedes was actively involved in Kennedy School life, serving on the student government both last year and this fall.
Mercedes, who is from the Dominican Republic, had planned after graduation to apply for a Ph.D. program and to “devote his life work to poverty improvement,” court documents say.
According to court records, students and staff at KSG submitted character statements on his behalf—although one of those statements, by former student government president Kimberly M. McClure, was given without knowledge that it would be used in the court proceeding.
McClure said that when she learned of the charges against Mercedes, she asked him to withdraw the statement and he agreed.
LaGrassa said the court will next take up the case May 7, for a status hearing on any new motions the defense might bring forward.
Reyes, who concentrated in English during her undergraduate years, has studied at Harvard for six years.
She will head to medical school next fall. She has until May 15 to decide between Harvard and Johns Hopkins University—a decision, she said, which will likely be impacted by whether next month’s hearing gives her hope that the case will be resolved soon.
—Staff writer Elisabeth S. Theodore can be reached at theodore@fas.harvard.edu.