Prison official faces rape allegation
Acting colonel assigned to training facility in New Scotland is on administrative leave
A high-ranking member of the state Department of Corrections and Community Supervision has been placed on leave as State Police investigate a sexual assault allegation made against him for an incident at the agency’s training academy in Albany.
A spokesman for DOCCS would only confirm that Capt. Jeremiah F. Brooks, 42, an acting colonel, was recently assigned to the training facility on New Scotland Avenue and has been placed on administrative leave from his $102,093-a-year position. Brooks has ties to the Plattsburgh area and previously worked at Clinton Correctional Facility in Dannemora.
The State Police on Thursday declined comment beyond confirming they have a pending investigation.
State Police investigators were at the training academy early Wednesday and had searched Brooks’ vehicle, according to sources briefed on the investigation. The investigation is examining an allegation that a 28-year-old woman who Brooks met through an online dating app was raped by Brooks in his dorm room at the facility. The alleged attack took place on the first night they were together, according to sources briefed on the investigation.
State Police investigators obtained a search warrant to search Brooks’ dorm room, seize his mobile phone and also search his vehicle, which was parked at the facility on Wednesday. Brooks consented to be interviewed by the investigators this week.
Gregory D. Laduke, a criminal defense attorney in Lake Placid who represents Brooks, said his client denies the woman’s allegation, contends their sexual encounter was consensual and that State Police investigators told Brooks when they questioned him on Wednesday that they lacked probable cause to file any charges.
“They have been investigating Jeremiah for a month now,” Laduke said. “They said ‘we don’t have enough ... even a likelihood that he committed a crime.’ ... If they could have arrested him they would have.”
The woman did not immediately report the alleged incident but had sought unsuccessfully to obtain an order of protection against Brooks in Family Court, according to a person familiar with the case.
“Doing this now to a really good cop, and Jeremiah is a good cop, an honest man, is very disturbing,” he said. “It was thoroughly consensual . ... These guys have been after him for a month. He went there voluntarily.”
The State Police did not respond to Laduke’s request for access to copies of the search warrants and affidavits in support of those warrants that would have been reviewed by a judge before they were approved.
The academy is on the outskirts of Albany and is used for in-service training and to certify recruits who staff prison facilities across the state. It has the capacity to house about 125 people on the small campus. The former seminary is undergoing a $40 million, 38-acre expansion, including a three-story residence, classroom building and a new gym.
Brooks’ role at the academy included assisting in administering the Correction Officer Recruit Training Program and the Correctional Emergency Response Team, officials said.