Freshman Mathew Scherl was expelled on Feb. 4 following drug and trespassing arrests on Quinnipiac property, friends of Scherl told The Chronicle on Monday. Scherl, 18, faced four drug and narcotic charges this morning at Meriden’s Superior Court.
Scherl’s explusion came after a second arrest on the York Hill campus, when he was arrested and charged with first degree criminal trespassing. On Jan. 26, three days after his drug and narcotic arrests, campus security discovered Scherl in a Crescent dorm room.
Freshman Bradley Burkhard, Scherl’s Perlroth suitemate, will appeal a decision to force him off-campus for the school year after he was charged with a drug paraphernalia misdemeanor during Scherl’s first arrest. Burkhard currently lives on campus, and the date for his appeal is unknown.
Associate Vice President for Public Relations John Morgan would not confirm or deny anything about the two cases.
“We are not commenting on this matter,” Morgan said in a Tuesday e-mail.
The charges all stem from the Jan. 23 incident when Hamden Police discovered 52 grams of marijuana, 0.7 grams of cocaine, drug paraphernalia, and $680 in their dorm room.
Friends of Scherl and Burkhard say they were aware of some illegal activity, but cared a great deal about the two students.
“I guess, yeah, he did bad things and he does deserve [stuff], but he’s a really good kid,” freshman Rachel Battino, a Perlroth resident, said. “The way the campus is handling it…I don’t know, I just want Matty back.”
“Hard drugs was a huge surprise,” said freshman Joelle Paolino, Scherl’s Perlroth neighbor. “We’ve become so close to that room, and it’s so hard not to love Mat.”
Julia Hvoslef, Paolino’s suitemate, has known Burkhard for four years through mutual friends.
“I never pictured this happening,” she said. “To be honest, he never would do things excessively bad or illegal. I was really surprised.”
Earlier today in Meriden, Burkhard faced one misdemeanor charge of drug paraphernalia, while Scherl faced two felony charges, sale of a controlled substance and possession of narcotics, and two misdemeanors, possession of a controlled substance and use of drug paraphernalia.
Results of the court appearances were unavailable at press time.
student • Feb 21, 2010 at 8:37 pm
I think the mentioning of these boys should raise a new topic all together; the US is so far behind on how we legally handle drug posession compared to the rest of the world. It is not a matter of whether or not these kids deserved to be punished, or even if the student reporters have a right to talk about it–it’s the fact that these subjects keep being brought up like they are something important, when, in reality, recreational or medicinal marijuana use should not be as big of an issue as it it. Perhaps if the people of our country wisened up and stayed open-minded (a quality that our country was built on, which has since been lost) we wouldn’t have so many tax dollars spent on keeping innocent college students in jail.
anonymous • Feb 17, 2010 at 5:17 pm
everyone needs to leave these boys alone. They have been through enough and enough damage to their reputaiton that its rediculous you keep bringing them up in this paper. LEAVE THEM ALONE. No one wants to be publically humilated for their whole school to see. These issues are non of our business. Have some respect, seriously!
Seriously? • Feb 18, 2010 at 3:11 am
Seriously? It’s not like they just put a new article up for the fun of it to torment the kid. He was arrested. The QU community has the right to know what’s going on. Nobody wants to be publicly humiliated and I don’t think most want to see these kids publicly humiliated, but when you commit a crime you have to handle the consequences which includes (especially with colleges) news stories. It’s unfortunate what happened to him, but he committed the crimes now he has to face the consequences.
Don’t be ridiculous and claim others for disrespecting others when they’re just doing their job.
bNridiculous • Feb 25, 2010 at 10:58 am
what crime? Are you going to allow someone else define what a crime is for you? For along time it was illegal to for women to participate in elections. Do what makes sense, how much sense does it make to humiliate somebody amongst his peers? pretty aggressive isnt it? like getting expelled and dealing with the courts isnt enough?
ohh its your job, to do what your told and believe what your told, and to disrespect other with opposing views?