When a reporter on a train in Boston spotted a former student of an elite New Hampshire prep school who was free on bail after a high-profile rape trial last year, she could not resist peppering him with questions.
Now, the interview may lead to his bail being revoked.
The defendant, Owen Labrie, 19, greeted her warmly and answered all of her questions, the reporter, Susan Zalkind, posted on Twitter and later wrote for Vice.
Labrie, a graduate of St Paul’s School in Concord, was sentenced to a year in prison after he was cleared of felony sexual assault charges, but convicted of having sex with an underage student.
Labrie, who is free on US$15,000 bail pending an appeal, is subject to a 5pm curfew, when he must return to his mother’s home in Tunbridge, Vermont, about 241km from Boston.
Zalkind tweeted about their discussion immediately after the train ride on the afternoon of Feb. 29, and it raised eyebrows in law enforcement.
Prosecutors said in court documents that the tweets “prompted an investigation into the defendant’s travels.”
The conclusion was that: Labrie “has violated a condition of his release by failing to comply with his curfew, traveling outside the parameters of his curfew at least eight times.”
Prosecutors asked for an expedited hearing and for his bail to be revoked.
Jaye Rancourt, Labrie’s lawyer, said in a telephone interview on Monday that she did not know which dates the prosecutors believe he missed curfew.
“We’re waiting for more information from the state regarding the specific allegations,” she said.
Labrie’s trial attracted national attention because it exposed a culture of sexual gamesmanship at one of the nation’s most exclusive boarding schools, known for having graduates from hedge fund executives to senators.
Labrie, who was 18 at the time, said that the encounter with his 15-year-old accuser had been consensual and that it stopped short of sex.
“I thought she was having a great time,” he testified.
Prosecutors said he took the girl to a mechanical room on campus as part of his “senior salute” — a ritual in which upperclassmen proposition younger students for sexual activity — and raped her.
The girl said in emotional testimony that she had said “no” more than once.
On the train ride, Zalkind said, Labrie told her he was in Boston to visit his girlfriend of three years. He liked to take her out to brunch, he said, but was in a hurry to make it home before his curfew.
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