Police asked to investigate alleged sexual assault allegations at St. Kitts "Monkey Farm"

Hours after news broke in the United States that St. Kitts' Biomedical Research Foundation, known locally as "The Monkey Farm," was named in an alleged sexual misconduct investigation by Yale University, a call has been made for local police to carry out an investigation.

"In light of this am asking that the Special Victims Unit (of the local police force) launch an investigation at the Biomedical Center to ensure that our students who would have gone there over the years were not assaulted," said medical internist, Dr. Terrance Drew.

"I am asking that interns of our country who go there immediately stop. They may be in danger of sexual about. Both male and female," said Dr. Drew at the St. Kitts-Nevis Labour Party (SKNLP) monthly press conference on Wednesday. Dr. Drew is the SKNLP's candidate for St. Christopher 8.

Yale University said it has commissioned an independent investigation into complaints of sexual misconduct against former Yale School of Medicine professor of psychiatry Eugene Redmond.

Yale University spokesman Tom Conroy said the information it has gained so far has been reported to the Yale Police Department and the New Haven Police Department, which will be in contact with The Royal St. Christopher and Nevis Police Force in St. Kitts,

Yale News said Dr. Redmond retired in July 2018 with disciplinary charges pending against him after he was found responsible for sexual harassment by the University-Wide Committee on Sexual Misconduct. Redmond is ineligible for rehire, permanently banned from Yale's campus and University-sponsored events and is prohibited from interacting with Yale students and postdoctoral trainees.

According to Conroy's email, the complaints against Redmond arose in the context of a research facility that Redmond ran on St. Kitts, a Caribbean island. Redmond's former facility, the St. Kitts Biomedical Research Foundation, offered summer research internships to students from Yale and other institutions.

In May 2018, Redmond was found responsible for sexually harassing a Yale College student who interned with him at St. Kitts Biomedical Research Foundation during the summer of 2017. But sexual misconduct complaints against Redmond date back to 1994, when St. Kitts interns brought allegations against Redmond to the University. Yale's investigation in 1994, however, was unable to verify the allegations. Afterwards, Redmond "confirmed that he would end the internship program," according to Conroy's email.

But "at some point in the last several years," Redmond began inviting Yale students to intern on the island. Two University students who participated in the "revived internship program" have since filed formal complaints of sexual misconduct against Redmond — one in 2018, whose complaint led to last year's UWC proceedings, and another complaint in 2019, according to the email.