BERLIN — State Police Trooper Alexis Hayes, who has previously accused superior officers of sexual wrongdoing, is facing charges of attacking a municipal police officer.
The attack came when police responded to a domestic incident in her home in Berlin borough in July, according to the Camden County prosecutor’s office.
Her attorney, William Buckman of Moorestown, said the charges are “baseless.”
Hayes filed a federal lawsuit in December saying a superior officer sexually assaulted her and an academy instructor sexually harassed her.
Jason Laughlin, spokesman for the Camden County prosecutor, said two Berlin police officers were dispatched to Hayes’ house at about 2 a.m. on July 26 after a neighbor reported a domestic incident there.
The officers heard an argument and entered the home, Laughlin said. When no one opened a locked bedroom door, officers kicked it down, he said. Inside the bedroom was Hayes, her toddler child and the man with whom she was arguing, who has not been charged.
When the officers tried to take Hayes into custody, a fight started. Hayes is accused of “punching and kicking the victim” — meaning Berlin Sgt. John Gregory — “about the head, face and body while the officer was attempting to arrest” her, according to a criminal complaint filed by Berlin police.
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Hayes is charged with aggravated assault, resisting arrest and a disorderly persons offense, records show.
Laughlin said the prosecutor’s office is still investigating the case and notified the State Police of the charges.
State Police spokesman Sgt. Stephen Jones declined to comment on the charges or disciplinary issues involving Hayes except to say she has been suspended without pay since January 22.
Hayes’ suspension began a week after she was charged with driving drunk in Haddon Heights last October. That charge was dismissed on July 13 this year, municipal court records show.
The incident at her home in Berlin occurred two weeks later, and Hayes remains suspended. Buckman said Hayes has been singled out for unfair punishment.
“There’s no basis for any disciplinary charges,” Buckman said. “If she wasn’t suing the State Police … she wouldn’t be suspended without pay.”
Hayes filed a lawsuit in December saying a superior officer, Lt. Thomas King, sexually assaulted her while they were on assignment in April 2009 with other troopers in Pittsburgh. She also said an academy instructor, Sgt. Christine Shallcross, sexually harassed her during training in 2005.
The lawsuit is pending, and King and Shallcross have been suspended without pay. A criminal investigation into King was closed in May without charges filed.
A decision from an administrative law judge on the disciplinary case involving Shallcross is expected within the next two months.