There’s nothing like physical evidence to turn someone’s memory from hazy into crystal clear. Just ask Beta Theta Pi fraternity President Steven Cabrera ’03.

Last Saturday night, several Beta fraternity brothers and a hoard of Saybrook College students were throwing a party on the fourth floor of Saybrook. Passers-by were not too thrilled with the particular rowdiness of this Saybrook soiree and decided to have the police check it out.

When Yale police arrived on the scene, they found a couple hundred minors drinking beer. And where there’s beer, there are often kegs. In this case, four kegs. Two of which were registered to Cabrera.

Police asked several of the partygoers if they knew where Cabrera could be found, Yale Police Lt. Michael Patten said. They said they did not.

Several minutes later, however, police saw these same partyers entering the Beta house at 36 Lynwood Place. They decided to follow them and finally happened upon Cabrera.

Two officers asked Cabrera if the kegs were registered to him, and he said he did not know. But when police reminded Cabrera that there is a photographic record of all people who buy kegs in Connecticut, he suddenly remembered his purchase, Patten said.

Police then arrested Cabrera on charges of delivering of liquor to minors and misrepresenting his age to obtain alcohol.

Cabrera said yesterday that he did not attend the party in Saybrook but rather purchased the kegs as a favor to two of his fraternity brothers.

Mike Kokkinen, the risk management director for the Beta Theta Pi national organization, said he will investigate the matter but declined to comment further.

Unnecessary roughness

Yale police arrested Eric Diamond ’05, a linebacker on the football team, and charged him with assault after an incident near Yale Station Sunday night.

Police said Diamond told them he had a “bad night,” so he decided to take out his frustration by tearing posters off the bulletin board outside the post office. An onlooker asked Diamond to cut it out, and Diamond allegedly redirected his anger to this man’s face, causing redness and swelling.

When police caught up with Diamond — whose sweater was ripped and whose knuckles were bloody — after the injured man reported the incident, they asked Diamond what had happened.

Police said Diamond told them that he had some trouble with “some guys” and also that they would not believe him if he explained why his knuckles were bloody.

But they apparently did believe the injured person who reported the incident, and arrested Diamond on charges of third-degree assault. He declined to comment on the incident yesterday.

This is one time Diamond may have preferred a 15-yard penalty.

Roaches only the police would exterminate

As an arts and entertainment writer for the Yale Herald, Justin Charles ’06 is used to seeing his name in print. But he may not be used to seeing it in the crime blotter.

After receiving a tip from a Silliman College student of a heavy marijuana smell in her entryway, Yale police responded to the scene early Monday morning. They did not smell any drugs, Patten said, but they did get a musty whiff of incense and air freshener.

The officers decided to follow their noses, which led them to Charles’ single, Patten said.

Police said they asked Charles, who was watching a movie along with four other Yalies, if they could look around his room. He obliged, and the police found two partially smoked marijuana cigarettes in an ashtray.

They then spotted a “colorful pipe,” which Patten said resembled the communal pipes often used to smoke marijuana. Charles told the officers that it was not his pipe and that he did not know how it got there.

He continued to profess that same ignorance when officers observed two more “roaches” next to the pipe. They asked Charles if there was any more marijuana in the room, and he proceeded to show them a small bag of a substance that appeared to be drugs, Patten said.

Charles said he did not know where the bag came from either, police said.

After the substances and pipe obtained from Charles’ room tested positive for marijuana, police arrested him, charging him with possession of drug paraphernalia, and issued him a summons to appear in court.

In an interview conducted through AOL Instant Messenger Tuesday, Charles said police “were just doing their job.”

“You can’t blame them,” he added.