Police arrested 21-year-old former MIT student Ethan Mark Kunde Zentner on Wednesday, March 18, for entering residence halls in the Quint courtyard without permission and possessing a knife classified as a dangerous weapon, according to a campus-wide email on Thursday from Chief of Police Ken Ferguson. 

On March 15, Zentner reportedly entered multiple residence halls in the Quint without authorization. 

The following day, March 16, Zentner was found again unescorted in residence halls. Public safety officials found him to be in possession of a knife, classified as a dangerous weapon by Massachusetts law. Zentner was formally trespassed from campus that same day, making any future entries by Zentner criminal acts. 

Two days later, police arrested and charged Zentner with trespassing and possession of a dangerous weapon. He has since been released on bail and is awaiting arraignment. 

In a campus-wide email on March 18, Ferguson said that Public Safety identified “a dangerous individual,” but stated that there was “no immediate threat” at the time. Ferguson’s statement on Thursday affirmed that there was no immediate threat, and that the College was sharing this information “out of an abundance of caution.”

A Wellesley senior who knew Zentner and wished to remain anonymous out of fear of retaliation said she met Zentner her sophomore year and was “super shocked” after hearing the news.

“He was such a good, sweet person, and super bright,” she said, describing him as being heavily involved with revitalization efforts at his former fraternity, Phi Kappa Theta. “I don’t really know what happened, but [it seemed] that he was not doing great mentally and was being reckless.”

The College’s Public Safety Department did not comment on Zentner’s motives, and declined to answer further questions. 

This is not the first time unauthorized individuals have made students feel unsafe. When Aisha Paz ’26 was a freshman, a masked individual nearly pulled her into his car with an open trunk. After campus safety did not investigate the situation further, Paz began dealing with severe PTSD that resulted in years of therapy.

Just a couple of weeks ago, a group of men, claiming they were at a party in Severance Hall, entered into other students’ rooms without permission, according to Paz. 

“When this trespasser came, I was one of the people who said that we needed to be more serious about it,” Paz said. “This is not about creating a state of fear, but truly about recognizing our position of vulnerability as a small women’s college that is very poorly lit, that has very little amount of blue lights, and that … does not have a police department that has a history of being supportive [in] cases like this.”

Both of Ferguson’s emails encouraged students to take precautions, including not allowing “piggybacking” into campus buildings, escorting guests in accordance with the guest policy, not propping open doors and reporting suspicious individuals to public safety.

According to Wellesley’s guest policy, students must escort their guests at all times and are responsible for the behavior of their guests.

If students see Zentner on campus, Ferguson instructed students to immediately call public safety and to “not approach or engage.”

Paz believes that this situation should serve as a catalyst for conversations with administration. 

“I think that on this story, a lot of people were trying to point fingers [at] the person who first let this person visit the campus. That is not the way to go. I feel that right now we should be having more conversations with administration about what systems on campus can be used to prevent that,” Paz said.

Contact the editor responsible for this article: Lyanne Wang