CAMBRIDGE, Mass. (AP)-An MIT senior and a recent graduate pleaded innocent Friday to drug charges stemming from an investigation into a fatal laughing gas overdose on campus.
Susan Mosher, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology brain and cognitive science major, and Rene Ruiz, were arraigned on charges tied to illegal drugs and paraphernalia, including laughing gas, discovered in their dorm room, where Richard A. Guy was found dead Aug. 31.
The charges, which carry a maximum penalty of more than 20 years in prison, do not establish a direct link between the suspects and Guy's death from nitrous oxide inhalation.
No charges were read aloud in court Friday because the suspects waived any reading of the facts. Innocent pleas were entered into the court docket.
The suspects, both 22, were released on personal recognizance and ordered to appear in court Oct. 15. Cambridge District Court Judge Severlin Singleton said they cannot return to the MIT campus without an MIT police escort and cannot leave Massachusetts without court permission.
The charges include possession with intent to distribute nitrous oxide, hallucinogenic mushrooms, amphetamines and marijuana. They also are charged with conspiracy, possession of hypodermic needles, and cruelty to animals, a cat.
Police said they found drug packaging supplies, a scale, a nitrous oxide tank and other drug-related items in the dorm room the two shared. Although Ruiz had already graduated, he appeared to have been living with Mosher in her dorm room in East Campus, the same building where Guy also lived.
Mosher and Ruiz declined to comment to reporters as they quickly left the courthouse Friday.
Guy, a 22-year-old junior physics major from Mission Viejo, Calif., was the second student to die of substance abuse at MIT in two years. In 1997, freshman Scott Krueger died three days after he was found in an alcohol-induced coma on the floor of a fraternity.
His death prompted MIT officials to require all freshmen to live on campus, starting in fall 2001. The fraternity where Krueger partied was indicted on criminal charges, but the case was ultimately dropped because no one from the fraternity appeared in court.