According to Shannon English, a disagreement over the ownership of a closet door lock sparked the bloody dispute between her and her roommate last week in Biever Hall.
Management major English, who claims she never got along with chemical biology major Rebecca Engel from the beginning of their time living together, was almost done moving her belongings out of Biever room 627 when she approached Engel about a lock English says she lent her.
The two started yelling at each other over ownership of the lock, and when English concluded, “You can pay me for it,” she turned around to retrieve something out of her closet.
At that point, according to English, Engel grabbed her by the hair and slammed her forehead into the closet door. Because closets in Biever dorm rooms are ajacent to the front door, English broke free from the area and made her way to the hallway, where she began to scream for help.
Prior to the incident, English says she had asked for a room switch, which Robert Reed, director of Residential Life, had granted.
Mass communication freshman Cyrille Braithwaite, a neighboring resident, arrived after the commotion but just in time to see “blood stains in front of my door and traveling down the hallway,” she said in an e-mail to The Maroon.
Neighbors rushed to English, pressed a washcloth to her head, and later saw her get taken to the hospital, where English said she had two staples placed to seal the wound.
Neighbors also said Engel got arrested.
“It wasn’t a fight,” English said. “It was an attack.”
Engel wrote in an e-mail to The Maroon that the matter is now before the Office of Student Affairs and a hearing is being scheduled to fully address the incident.
“I’m declining the invitation to provide any details of the incident other than to say that I regret that this incident occurred and that I wil cooperate fully in the investigation and trust that I will receive a fair hearing,” she wrote.
Reached by phone in North Dakota, Engel’s grandfather told The Maroon that the attack was out of his granddaughter’s “easygoing” character.
“She lived with us a couple of years while she had gone to school up here,” said James Engel Sr. “If she did what they say she did, I’m sure she was provoked. She’s always been a very easygoing girl.”
English said that she’s back on campus and attending classes again. “For the most part,” everything is back to normal, she said.
English added that she has pressed charges through the New Orleans Police Department and is in the middle of working through the disciplinary process with the university.
‘I WANT NOTHING NEGATIVE SAID ABOUT RES LIFE’
English said that the situation with Engel had soured from the very start.
“We just didn’t get along,” she said. “I guess she just had just had an attitude.”
So English asked to switch rooms to keep the situation from escalating. At first, she said she had trouble arranging that with a Res Life staffer.
When she approached Res Life director Robert Reed about it, she said he promptly set the room switch process in motion to resolve the situation.
“I want nothing negative said about Residential Life. They had taken care of it,” English said.
She was thankful with Reed and his office, noting that the borrowed lock sparked the incident only at the tail end of the process.
Ramon Antonio Vargas can be reached at [email protected].
