Altercation At The Mansion
Part of the fun of planning pARTy in the Park has been meeting at the Lockwood Mathews Mansion once a week. The people there have been gracious in accommodating our expansive meetings, and are excited about the festival highlighting the park and of course the mansion. This morning’s meeting was the last all group meeting before the event, and one of the first things we chatted about, between quotes from Airplane! was this news item:
Police had to clear an “out of control” bat mitzvah party Saturday night at the Lockwood-Mathews Mansion Museum.
Brian Fischer, rental coordinator for the museum, told police the younger guests at the Jewish ceremony, which celebrates a girl’s coming of age, tore out ceiling tiles and a light fixture in the 141-year-old, 62-room mansion. Fischer said he saw several boys and girls engaging in oral sex in the bathrooms, Officer Carleton Giles said.
A Wilton man, reportedly intoxicated, was charged with resisting arrest.
After Fischer could not bring the party to order, he called police shortly after 11 p.m., Giles said.
The first officer said he walked into the main room of the mansion, bought by the city of Norwalk in 1941 and saw about 150 guests.
“The party appeared to be out of control, with kids running up and down the stairs and through the rooms,” the report said.
Several barricades that prohibit entrance to some of the rooms were knocked down, Giles said.
Sheldon Gerarden, executive director of the mansion, built by banker and railroad tycoon LeGrand Lockwood in 1868, confirmed Monday that there was minor damage.
“It is a shame because we have worked so hard through the years to provide this facility to the public for different events, and it may mean that we have to review our policies,” Gerarden said.
Sheryl Finnie Baker, who rented the mansion for her daughter’s bat mitzvah, said the reports are “blown way out of proportion.” Fischer overreacted, she said, and to say the party was out of control is ridiculous.
“All I knew was that I was dancing, and then there were five police cars outside,” Baker said.
We will pause here to question how this woman who was dancing would know what was going on in the rest of the mansion. Back to the story:
No one told her the kids were upstairs or that there were allegations involving oral sex, she said. She saw no inappropriate behavior in the bathrooms, she said.
“These kids are not the type to do oral sex,” Baker said.
Gerarden said the carpet was stained, but he declined to provide a damage estimate. He said he is confident that those responsible will pay for repairs.
Baker’s brother, Peter Finnie, 52, of 24 Duck Pond Road, Wilton, was charged with first-degree criminal trespass, disorderly conduct and interfering with an officer, Giles said. No juveniles were arrested, Giles said.
According to Giles, Finnie was “terribly belligerent” to the officers, and challenged their authority to disperse the party. Officers detected alcohol on his breath, Giles said.
According to a police report, Finnie’s wife shook her head in disgust and told police, “My husband is an ass when he is drunk.” Finnie was released after his wife, Leslie Ann Finnie, posted $475 bond, his court file shows.
This woman apparently was at least cognizant of what her husband was doing. The Mansion rents out the building for events because it needs the operating funds. This is the dynamic for museums in general, they act as stewards of history and culture and want to remain as accessible to the public as possible so they rent out the facilities to private events, and keep admission fees as low as possible. It’s a tradeoff that happens because while we spend gobs of money on prisons, education and social services, we spend little on tourism, economic development and cultural activities. Take a look at the pie chart.
source: Greenwichtime, Norwalk police clear bat mitzvah gone awry; Witness reports sexual activity, broken fixtures at mansion, By John Nickerson, 06/15/2009
