Level-2 sex offender fired at NEC spent college days at BU

The New England Conservatory fired videographer and former Boston University undergraduate Peter Benjamin last week after discovering he was a registered Level-2 sex offender.

NEC sent thousands of letters to the parents of its students on Jan. 12 regarding the incident as well as future preventative measures.

“Although there has never been any complaint about the conduct of this individual on our campus, NEC immediately took steps to ensure that this individual would no longer have access to our premises,” said NEC President Tony Woodcock and Dean of the Preparatory and Continuing Education Program Leslie Foley in the letter.

Benjamin Zander, conductor of the Youth Philharmonic Orchestra who had been with the conservatory for more than 40 years, left after it was discovered that he hired Benjamin with full knowledge of his past as a sex offender.

NEC discovered Benjamin’s record in December and currently has legal counsel to “investigate the extent of Mr. Benjamin’s assignments on our campus and to determine what, if anything, was known about his past,” according to the letter.

In 1994, Benjamin pleaded guilty to raping a male child, and was also convicted of other sexual abuse instances involving two teenagers at different times.

While imprisoned, Benjamin entered a four-year program that provides therapy for sex offenders who engaged with minors, according to a press release.

Benjamin brought multiple cameramen with him to his work, which was held in “group settings” and “under conditions where it would have been highly unlikely he would have had so much as a conversation with a student,” according to the release.

After his sentence, Benjamin worked for five years under supervised probation, during which time he had an adult with him while filming, according to the release.

The release states that Benjamin still “kept this precaution in place for years” after completing probation, and that he “never re-offended and deserves credit for this.”

In a letter Zander sent to his students in the Youth Philharmonic Orchestra, he said he had met Benjamin before he was convicted but “was not aware of any of the details surrounding charges,” according to Zander’s website.

“After his incarceration was over, I got to know him better and was persuaded, as were several other well-known figures in the arts community, that he was profoundly remorseful and determined to turn his life around,” Zander wrote.

But Zander also wrote that he believed the end of his employment with the conservatory was a premeditated priority, as he had been informed that his employment would end in June due to “succession planning.”

“But I believe that was not the real reason,” Zander wrote. “It is my opinion that the president had become upset with me during the complex discussions caused by disagreements between us about the tour.”