Police Log: Roommate Assaults Fellow Renter Over Noise

John Albert Trites, 48, of 34 Burnside Ave., apt. 3R, was arrested Nov. 26 at about 6:37 p.m. for getting  physical over a disagreement about noise his roommates were making, throwing a man against a wall and denting it with his head.  

On Nov. 25 at about 4:15 p.m., Babacar Seck visited the Woonsocket Police Department on Clinton Street to report that Trites, his roommate, had entered the room he shares with his wife while they were listening to music and drinking, and told them to be quiet the previous evening.

Seck refused, he said, and Trites responded by grabbing him with both hands around the throat and pushing the back of his head into a plaster wall. Seck had a phone in his hand at the time and told Trites he would call 911, but Trites grabbed the phone from his hand, according to Seck's report, and threw it. 

Seck said he gathered some belongings and left. When he returned at 5 a.m. Nov. 25, he said, using the sliding lock on his room, Trites shoved the door in, breaking the lock, told him, "I told you to be quiet," and choked him again, Seck reported.

Officers responded to the apartment to investigate the report, finding a head-shaped hole in the wall about level with Seck's height. They also observed the broken lock, and holes in the plaster from the door knob and door hanger.

They arrested Trites, charging him with domestic simple assault, and refusing to relinquish a phone.