Camp counselor charged with molesting girl at UC Berkeley dorm

A camp counselor from Oakland is facing child molestation and other charges, accused of committing several sex crimes against an 11-year-old camper staying in a UC Berkeley dorm.

On Tuesday the Alameda County District Attorney’s Office charged Quaylin Tyrell Wesley, 27, with two counts of burglary and six counts of lewd acts on a child, all felony allegations, according to court records. University officials said the camp program was not operated by the school, and has ended.

Sometime in the hours before 2 a.m., Wesley entered a dorm room where two girls were bunked and groped the 11-year-old with his hands and mouth, according to a University of California Police Department statement filed in Alameda County Superior Court. The girl pretended to be asleep out of fear of what her attacker “would do if he knew she was awake,” the statement read. Wesley fled when the girl’s roommate rolled over on her own bed, police said.

A few minutes later Wesley came back into the room and used his genitals to sexually assault the 11-year-old, again fleeing when the roommate moved in her own bed, police said.

The 11-year-old first tried to rouse her roommate, and when she could not, she ran to a bathroom before finding another camper and a counselor to tell what Wesley had done, police said.

Counselors “evacuated the children to a nearby room” and blocked the door to keep Wesley out, police said. One of them then contacted UCPD. Wesley was gone when officers arrived, police said, but they arrested him about 12 hours later, shortly after 2 p.m. Saturday.

Wesley has been in custody at the Santa Rita Jail in Dublin since his arrest Saturday. He is scheduled for arraignment Wednesday morning in Oakland.

In an emailed statement, a university spokesperson said that UC Berkeley was not identifying the camp program in question “because the matter involves a minor who is a sexual assault victim, in order to protect their identity, and because this is an ongoing police matter.”

“The third-party program that was involved has concluded its program at UC Berkeley,” university spokesperson Janet Gilmore wrote, declining to elaborate on whether the camp has been permanently ended.

Featured photo: Emilie Raguso

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