Ariela Lopez
Staff Reporter
ariela__lopez | ariela.lopez@yale.edu
Ariela Lopez is the 148th Editor in Chief and President of the Yale Daily News. She previously covered Cops and Courts and City Hall for the City Desk and laid out the weekly print paper as a Production & Design editor. Ariela is an English major in Branford College, originally from New York City.
Author Archive
ARIELA LOPEZ & TINA LI
Two years after downtown policing push, juvenile arrests at a low

A collaborative effort instituted in 2022 between New Haven police and public school officers has led to a calmer downtown.

September 20, 2024

MAIA NEHME & ARIELA LOPEZ
NHPD, YPD plan crackdown on “Kia Boyz,” auto thefts

University and municipal police departments around New Haven county are negotiating setting up a task force to deal with heightened auto theft in the area — largely by adolescents.

September 19, 2024

ARIELA LOPEZ
Omni hotel strike ends without contract settled

Omni hotel employees and organizers with UNITE HERE Local 217, the union that represents them, announced that they will return to work on Monday, ending a four-day stoppage.

September 15, 2024

TYSON ODERMANN & ARIELA LOPEZ
Omni workers start second day of strike

Ten months into contract negotiations, members of UNITE HERE Local 217 went on strike for a fair contract at the Omni hotel, joined by state and local leaders on the picket line.

September 13, 2024

ARIELA LOPEZ
Omni workers begin strike

Employees of the Omni hotel and organizers with UNITE HERE Local 217, the union that represents them, began picketing early Thursday morning after voting to approve a work stoppage in August.

September 12, 2024

ARIELA LOPEZ
Suspended YPD officer charged with assault for allegedly striking spouse

The warrant to arrest a Yale Police lieutenant alleges that he beat his spouse with a golf club or a hammer last week, hints at repeated abuse.

September 11, 2024

ARIELA LOPEZ
Yale officer arrested for assault, suspended from PD

Roosevelt Cesario Martinez, an officer for the Yale Police Department, was arrested in Stratford on Wednesday for an assault in the second degree.

September 9, 2024

ARIELA LOPEZ
External review of May protester arrests acknowledges “lapses” in YPD conduct, exonerates chief

Commissioned in May, the review — which has not been made public to the Yale community or YPD officers — concludes that an officer used “disproportionate” force to arrest a non-Yale-affiliated pro-Palestinian protester on May 1.

September 3, 2024

ARIELA LOPEZ
In New Haven, nearly 200 sensors listen for gunshots. How do they work?

ShotSpotter gunshot statistics have been used by Yale’s police union to brand the city as dangerous, but the sensors most often record gunshots fired away from campus.

August 30, 2024

YOLANDA WANG, NORA MOSES & ARIELA LOPEZ
Pro-Palestine protesters rally for arrested encampment protesters, campaign for charges to be dropped

Hours before 14 Yale affiliates arrested in the April 2024 divestment encampment were slated to appear before a judge, hundreds gathered on the steps of the New Haven Superior Court to dissent against the protesters’ trespassing charges. A motion to dismiss the cases will be heard on Oct. 31.

August 28, 2024

ARIELA LOPEZ
Police union welcomes McInnis with “subdued approach” to first-year move-in action

Two billboard trucks emblazoned with messages warning of rising New Haven crime drove around campus under direction of the Yale police union on Aug. 18. This marks at least the fourth time the union has framed the University’s host city as dangerous this contract negotiation cycle.

August 27, 2024