A Vermont State Police trooper has been accused of dragging a woman with whom he was in a relationship out of her young son’s bed and down a hallway — among other allegations of domestic abuse.
Nicholas Cianci, a detective trooper at the St. Johnsbury barracks, was put on paid leave in early December. This month, the 25-year-old officer was suspended without pay after he was cited for misdemeanor domestic assault.
The incident at the heart of that charge was detailed in police records released after his arraignment last week. The records describe other allegations involving Cianci and the woman — including that at different times he allegedly grabbed her, threatened to knock her teeth out and have her child taken away by state authorities.
The woman was not named in court documents, and VTDigger generally does not identify alleged victims of domestic violence.
According to the documents, the woman informed several law enforcement officers about the incidents, and some said they witnessed the events.
When the alleged dragging incident occurred is unclear. Witnesses described it as having happened either in June or September 2020 at a home in Bradford. The charge against Cianci cites a June 12 date.
The woman told Vermont State Police investigators that she went to her young son’s room to get away from Cianci. But he “tried to grab my feet,” the woman said in a sworn statement, “and so I pulled my feet up and he grabbed my arms and he dragged me off the bed.”
Cianci dragged her “all the way through the hallway” before dropping her to the floor, she told investigators.
When she threatened to call the police, Cianci grabbed her phone, screamed at her and blocked a doorway, she said. Her spine hit part of a doorframe during the dragging incident, she said, hurting her.
In text messages between Cianci and the woman sent in the early hours of June 13, 2020, she wrote, “You left marks on me tonight. You dragged me from (the child’s) bed to our room. You took a phone from my hand and refused to give it back.”
Cianci’s response was to “apologize, offer to leave, and persistently ask (the woman) if he can talk to her, or can she come lay with him,” according to an affidavit.
According to police records, the next day the woman texted Cianci, “I really am scared of you and don’t trust you. You promised you’d never do it again and you got so much worse.”
The woman and her mother both describe speaking by phone immediately after the alleged dragging incident, records show. But again, the timeline isn’t clear. The mother told investigators that her daughter called in tears around 11 p.m. on a night in September 2020. The woman told her mother that Cianci had grabbed her.
The woman was speaking quietly until Cianci apparently came close and began yelling, her mother told police. She said, “Nick, no,” and then the call ended.
When the mother called back a few minutes later, Cianci answered and was “deceivingly calm,” the mother told investigators. Her daughter was yelling in the background about being dragged out of her son’s bed, she said.
The mother described another incident that allegedly occurred shortly before Thanksgiving in 2020. The mother was at her daughter’s house, watching over her daughter’s son, when Cianci and the daughter returned arguing.
The mother said she walked into the room where Cianci and her daughter were and saw Cianci “had (the woman) around the neck in a manner that (the mother) likened to a police-style takedown,” according to an affidavit. Then, he told the woman to “get the f— out of my house,” the mother said.
Cianci said he was trying to hug the woman, her mother said. Seemingly unprompted, he then “said that he has forced (the woman) to have sex with him, saying that intimacy is way for them to fix everything.”
The woman responded by saying she never wanted him to touch her again, her mother told investigators.
Several witness accounts concern an incident that allegedly occurred Dec. 5, 2020, at an “ugly sweater” party. During that event, the woman went to a room upstairs to confide in two friends who were involved in law enforcement about the incidents, records show.
Cianci tried to enter the room and was restrained by one of the friends, who was or is a police cadet, records show. Meanwhile, the other friend unloaded two handguns nearby, fearing the weapons might be grabbed during the incident, records show.
At the party, Cianci admitted to the attendee who unloaded the guns that he had grabbed the woman four times and had dragged her off a bed, witnesses said.
Another attendee, a South Burlington police officer, overheard the admission, according to records, and the woman’s description of bruises from the Thanksgiving incident.
The South Burlington officer told police he saw yellow, faded bruising on the woman’s arm, records show.
The woman later told the South Burlington officer that “she did not call 911 because Cianci is a state trooper and his coverage area includes where these incidents were occurring,” according to an affidavit. “She felt that the responding troopers may be friends and co-workers of Cianci, and they would believe him over her.”
Several witnesses who attended the party described an earlier incident during which Cianci allegedly threatened to call child protective services on the woman to have her child taken away.
A day after the party, Cianci allegedly called a state police sergeant and detailed his situation. He said he had put the woman in a “bear hug” four times over the past several months to calm her down and because she often made suicidal statements, records show.
Cianci maintained that position in a January interview with investigators. He appeared to describe the incident in which he was accused of dragging the woman out of her son’s bed. He said he pulled her from her son’s room because he didn’t know if she was going to kill herself. He said he held her upper body and walked out into the hallway, with her legs dragging along as she thrashed, records show.
He also repeatedly said the woman had hit and pushed him several times.
Questioned about text messages in which he appeared to apologize and admit wrongdoing, Cianci said the texts referred to his preventing the woman from killing herself.
The woman, in a subsequent interview with police, said Cianci had not restrained her from killing herself and that she had not abused him.
In his arraignment last week, Cianci was ordered to have no contact with the woman. The next hearing in the case is scheduled for May 26.
The case is the latest in a series of domestic assault charges involving Vermont police officers.
Roel Y. Diaz, of the Westminster and Brattleboro barracks, pleaded not guilty to domestic assault and stalking in July 2019.
Winooski officer Christopher Matott denied domestic abuse charges in February 2020.
Also that month, Sean Wilson, a former Brattleboro police officer, pleaded not guilty to charges filed after his girlfriend alleged Wilson had subjected her to more than 100 incidents of physical abuse.
Essex officer Matthew Walker pleaded not guilty to domestic assault charges in May 2020.
