Foxwoods security officer recovering from assault

Tribal police have identified suspect, applied for warrant

Mashantucket — By her account, Brooke Wyngaard, a Foxwoods Resort Casino security officer, was responding to a report of an incident in The Fox Tower early Sunday morning when an assailant punched her in the face as she came around a corner. She never saw it coming.

The blow left her with multiple facial fractures and a broken nose.

“I’ve heard from a lot of people that I need to find a new job,” Wyngaard, 35, of Preston said Wednesday in a phone interview, adding that she does intend to eventually return to work. In the meantime, she faces surgery.

Mashantucket Pequot tribal police have identified a suspect in the attack and have applied for an arrest warrant. They will not release the suspect’s name until a New London Superior Court judge has signed the warrant, William Dittman, the tribal police chief, said Wednesday.

Wyngaard, a Foxwoods security officer for barely a year, said she was serving in a supervisory role when another officer called in “a fight” on The Fox Tower side of the sprawling casino property.

“When a fight gets called out, everybody responds if they can,” Wyngaard said of the security personnel employed by Foxwoods.

When she arrived on the scene, she said, a man was on the ground and a number of other people — she couldn’t say how many — were surrounding him.

At some point, Wyngaard and another officer started to follow a man who had separated from the group and appeared headed for The Fox Tower parking garage. Another person intervened.

“I went to go around him, and as I was going around a corner another guy comes out of nowhere and punches me in the face,” Wyngaard

said. “It was a cheap shot — his right fist to the left side of my face. One good hit.”

Wyngaard said she maintained consciousness but “really wasn’t with it” when medical responders arrived. She was taken to the emergency room at The William W. Backus Hospital in Norwich, where she was treated and released later Sunday morning. She said a tribal police officer spoke to her at the hospital.

Wyngaard spent more than 10 years in the U.S. Army, during which time she played the French horn in the Army Band.