Yale University hires investigator after claims of sexual misconduct at St. Kitts' Biomedical Research Foundation

St. Kitts' Biomedical Research Foundation is named in an alleged sexual misconduct investigation and its founder Dr D. Eugene Redmond Jr. has been permanently banned from Yale University.

Yale University has commissioned an independent investigation into complaints of sexual misconduct against former Yale School of Medicine professor of psychiatry Eugene Redmond, according to an email sent to Yale News by University spokesman Tom Conroy on Monday night.

Yale University also 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,

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.

"I have ordered a comprehensive and independent investigation of possible additional misconduct by Redmond, based on the information that came to our attention during the disciplinary process and subsequently in recent weeks," Salovey wrote in a statement provided to the News. "We must learn whether there are additional survivors who wish to come forward, and we need to understand the facts relating to the internship program."

Yale News said Dr. Redmond and his attorney, Joseph Garrison, could not immediately be reached for comment.

Yale hired former U.S. Attorney Deirdre Daly, an attorney at Finn Dixon & Herling, to conduct the independent investigation, according to the email. Daly will be contacting students, alumni and other individuals who may have relevant information. The investigation's results will be shared with the Yale community.

"I have been retained by Yale University to conduct an internal investigation of complaints of sexual misconduct against a former professor," Daly states in her voicemail.

Yale has also reported the information it has gained so far to the Yale Police Department and the New Haven Police Department, which will be in contact with law enforcement in St. Kitts, according to the email. Yale will "cooperate fully" if the police conduct their own investigations.

Representatives from the Yale Police Department, NHPD Spokesman Captain Anthony Duff and Daly were not available for comment.

"Sexual harassment and misconduct have no place at Yale," Salovey said in his statement.

"I am deeply angered by what we have learned of Professor Redmond's behavior, and I am committed to the investigation that will shine more light on it: a university dedicated to the pursuit of truth can ask no less of itself."