Campus police officers caught using security keys to steal food from cafe

WORCESTER — Worcester State University police officers working the overnight shift routinely used their security keys to get into a locked campus café and help themselves to food and drinks without paying, according to university records and officials.

The practice came to a halt last fall after a police dispatcher watching security camera monitors later reported seeing two patrolmen and a sergeant, the ranking police official on duty that September night, taking sandwiches, chips and drinks from the locked café around midnight.

Recorded on security camera footage later reviewed by Chief Rosemary F. Naughton, Vice President of Student Affairs Sibyl Brownlee and other university officials, the three officers initially were suspended without pay for a week and given written reprimands.

But Chief Naughton later arranged to have the disciplinary action against them reversed after it became clear to her that the practice had been going on among officers with the knowledge of some police supervisors for a long time, perhaps years, she said.

“I honestly think the officers thought it was OK. I know them well. They also know there's a camera there. I just feel in my heart that they didn't feel like they were stealing,” Chief Naughton said in an interview this past week.