1984 – Butterfield residents request help from Auxiliary Services to keep their in-dorm kitchen open. Auxiliary Services Director Asnoke Ganguli helps to keep the kitchen open by hiring a chef and providing funds. In return, all students that want access to the Butterfield dining hall are required to go on the Deluxe meal plan. It remains open as the only working in-dorm kitchen on campus.
April 24, 1985 – A female student knocks a man to the ground after he follows her into Butterfield dormitory.
April 30, 1992 – Housing Services takes down the Butterfield “Jolly Roger” pirate flag and installs metal bars on stairwell windows to the roof to keep residents from flying the flag again. One week later, the flag flies again and the bars mysteriously disappear.
December 19, 1994 – Police raid 403 Butterfield in connection with the drug-overdose death of Amherst-Pelham High School student Harrison Klate, 17. They confiscate a plastic bag of marijuana bud, two packages of rolling paper, five glassine wrappers, three razor blades, and a plastic straw, all of which are covered in heroin residue.
March/April 1995 – Brothers and Butterfield residents Mark, 21, and John, 22, Ciarametaro withdraw from the University of Massachusetts after police press charges on them in connection with Klate’s death. John is charged with involuntary manslaughter, dealing heroin, several counts of possession of cocaine, heroin, and marijuana, and possession with the intent to distribute. Mark is charged with several counts of possession of cocaine, heroin, and marijuana.
November 28, 1995 – John and Mark Ciarametaro both change their pleas from innocent to guilty and are convicted for their crimes. John is sentenced to two and a half years of jail time for involuntary manslaughter. Mark is sentenced to two years of probation with a monetary fine for several counts of drug possession.
October 14, 2000 – Eric Stout, 20, is arrested in Butterfield for assault on a police officer after police responded to a disturbance call at 4 a.m. Police report that “several incidences were occurring” while they were at Butterfield for the first disturbance call.
December 1, 2000 – Police raid Butterfield after a semester-long investigation. Brendan Sean Ryel, 20, Michael Cook, 21, Peter Olsen, 20, and Cory Scott Howard 20, are charged with a variety of crimes, ranging from possession of class A, C, and D substances to battery on a police officer (at time of arrest) and carrying a dangerous weapon (a double-edged knife).
April 27, 2001 – Thomas Degnan, 20, falls 35 feet off the Butterfield roof after retrieving the pirate flag flying over the building. He remains in a coma today.
May 25, 2001 – Unnamed Butterfield residents go on a vandalism spree, discharging every fire extinguisher in the building, spray-painting graffiti on the building inside and out, pulling a water fountain from a wall, breaking glass in fire doors and windows, lighting a couch on fire, and throwing fire doors and cinder blocks out from windows. An estimated $30,000 in damage occurs, and no one living in Butterfield that night reports any problems to authorities.
July 3, 2001 – UMass decides to clean out Butterfield dorm, removing all of the returning residents from Butterfield 2000-2001 out and into separate dorms. It announces that the “new” Butterfield will house nearly all freshman, many of which are in honors learning communities.
