STORRS, Conn. — A Washington state man was arrested by the UConn Police Department on Friday for allegedly harassing UConn employees and a student-athlete repeatedly.
Robert Cole Parmalee, 40, was charged with second-degree breach of peace, second-degree harassment and stalking that caused fear of death to person or family. Parmalee is being held in UConn police custody this weekend on a $100,000 bond and will appear in Rockville Superior Court on Monday.
UConn police arrested Parmalee on an active warrant, which they say stems from Parmalee’s ongoing instances of online harassment toward an individual over the past two weeks. Through an investigation, police determined Parmalee’s social media content, posts and captions on multiple electronic platforms were consistent with continued behavior that alarmed the individual and others.
In June, a UConn employee alerted campus police that their department received several emails referencing a specific UConn student-athlete and players in some other schools’ athletic programs.
UConn police say a UConn detective looked over the email and gathered information about Parmalee, discovering that he has no connection to UConn. Police communicated with multiple law enforcement agencies in Oregon, where Parmalee was living at the time he sent the messages. UConn Athletics officials were also informed.
Initially, UConn police say the contents of the emails did not meet the criteria for actionable criminal conduct, but the relevant parties remained in contact to monitor potential developments.
UConn police add that UConn employees, and dozens of other people throughout the country with no ties to UConn, continued receiving emails in the coming weeks that were provided to law enforcement and reviewed for potential actionable criminal conduct.
UConn police say they also remained in touch with Oregon law enforcement agencies throughout the summer while the investigation was occurring.
On Aug. 27, Connecticut State Police told UConn police that Parmalee had been taken into custody in Windsor Locks under an active warrant for his arrest in Oregon, which was not related to UConn’s investigation. Parmalee was supposed to be extradited to Oregon.
However, in recent days, UConn learned that Oregon law enforcement officials would move to dismiss the charges against Parmalee and that he would be released from Hartford Correctional, where he was being held.
The UConn warrant was then served, and Parmalee was taken into custody by UConn police on Friday.
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Dalton Zbierski is a digital content producer and writer at FOX61 News. He can be reached at dzbierski@FOX61.com.
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