Captain of Harvard football team facing criminal charges

July 8, 2006

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (AP) -- The captain of the Harvard football team was indefinitely suspended and could be kicked off the team after he allegedly broke into his former girlfriend's dorm room and later assaulted her.

Matthew Thomas, 22, faces charges after his arrest June 5, including assault and battery, domestic abuse and breaking and entering with intent to commit a felony at a campus dorm.

Witnesses saw the 6-foot-1, 245-pound Thomas choke the alleged victim with one hand before "he suddenly lifted her and drove his knee into her chest," according to a criminal complaint filed in Cambridge District Court by Harvard police.

The woman was treated at Mount Auburn Hospital in Cambridge for her injuries, including a large welt on her lower back, police said.

Thomas, a senior from Mount Airy, Md., was an all-Ivy League linebacker.

"I'm deeply troubled by the allegations," Harvard coach Tim Murphy told The Boston Globe for Saturday's editions. "Based on his arrest, I suspended him indefinitely from the team on June 8. If the allegations prove to be true, he will be dismissed from the team. We are just awaiting due process."

A call to a listing for a Matthew Thomas in Mount Airy wasn't immediately returned Saturday. A spokeswoman for the Middlesex County District Attorney's press office said no further information about the case was immediately available Saturday.

According to police, the alleged victim returned to her room after a party that she and Thomas attended separately, and she found him passed out on the floor. She woke him to confront him about a relationship with another woman, the two began yelling and he began to hit her, according to the police report.

Officers said they needed to awaken Thomas after they aided the alleged victim and that he appeared confused about why police were there.

His arrest was first reported last month by The Harvard Crimson, the student newspaper.