A Distress Call
The trials and tribulations of 1993 actuallyhad its roots in 1991, when seven security guardsfiled suit with the Massachusetts CommissionAgainst Discrimination (MCAD) claiming a patternof racial and ethnic harassment by supervisors andfellow guards.
During this time, guards say, their departmentwas rife with discrimination, enmity betweenpolice officers and guards and poor supervision.
During the controversy surrounding theharassment claims, union leader and veteran guardStephen G. McCombe was one of the University'smore vocal antagonists. McCombe eventually filedhis own lawsuit charging the University treatedhim unfairly after he become a union spokesperson.
According to MCAD files, none of these caseswere ever concluded. However, later that yearHarvard fired Viatcheslav G. Abramian, a Russianimmigrant who had been one of the guards to file asuit with MCAD.
The University claimed this firing stemmed froma fight between Abramian and another guard andAbramian's filing of a false police report.However, Abramian sued, saying he had beenwrongfully terminated.
In July of 1997, a Middlesex Country jury foundHarvard liable for $2.5 million in the case.
The controversy over the harassment chargescreated friction within the guard unit.
In an interview with The Crimson in 1993,McCombe had accused then-Harvard University PoliceDepartment (HUPD) chief Paul E. Johnson and threeother administrators with a "pattern ofretaliation" against the guards.
In making his protest, several current guardsand one former guard allege, McCombe disclosedconfidential information about guards'disciplinary records.
On April 18, 1993, 25 guards-a fourth of theentire force-presented a signed petition to unionleaders demanding McCombe's ouster.
They charged McCombe with making the guards'case too public and leaking confidentialinformation.
"He told people something that is actually aconfidential thing, that no one, that neithermanagement nor union representation had the rightto tell," said Andrew J. Kluttz, a former guard.
Kluttz allegedly threatened McCombe last year,and was fired shortly afterward. He says that whenMcCombe spoke to Crimson reporter Joe Mathews '95in 1993, "he violated the union code."
McCombe says he continues to deny this charge:"That's just not true."
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