DeMalia’s House of Hope, a sober house in Plainfield, tried to remove a woman who allegedly threatened another patient with a knife. Responding officers declined to evict the woman, and now Director Andrew DeMalia is considering shutting down the operation.
On August 4, a woman who was addicted to alcohol and crack/cocaine checked herself into DeMalia’s House of Hope, according to a Facebook post from DeMalia’s House of Hope.
According to that Facebook post, the woman refused to comply with the program’s policies; she did not attend house meetings, refused to provide urine samples, was caught smoking in her room, and would verbally abuse staff members and other patients. DeMalia claims that she was also suffering from mania and had delusions, conditions that the center was not equipped to treat.
She was discharged from the program on August 13, but refused to leave the house, the post said.
Staff called police and asked them to take her to a facility that could offer intensive treatment, DeMalia told Inside Investigator. Instead, police officers allegedly told staff members to get a protective order from a court. DeMalia tried on the 14th, but his request was rejected. The man she threatened with a knife was also denied a protective order. Instead, the courts issued a no-contact order, which allowed the woman to remain in the center.
When the woman checked into DeMalia’s House of Hope, she signed an agreement agreeing that she did not have tenant rights and could be removed from the program if she did not follow the rules. But in the state of Connecticut, tenants have rights even if they do not sign leases, which can complicate evictions.
The woman’s behavior escalated after the first police response: she allegedly threw laundry bins at staff members and threatened another patient with a knife when he told her she needed to leave, the Facebook post said.
All of this had a detrimental impact on the other two people living in the sober house, both of whom are homeless men, according to DeMalia. One of them, the man who was threatened with a knife, almost left the center and returned to the streets because of the stress.
According to the Facebook post, police officers allegedly told staff members that whether or not the other patients left and relapsed was a personal decision, that they shouldn’t have moved her possessions, and that they could not charge the woman for allegedly threatening someone with a knife because there was no recording.
Although the police refused to take action to remove the woman, they charged the manager with “disorderly conduct” because he confiscated a pair of scissors from her when she checked into the house, DeMalia said. Plainfield police did not comment on DeMalia’s characterization.
Deputy Chief William Wolfburg confirmed that police arrived at the house at 3:55 p.m. on August 14, that two people were arrested and charged with disorderly conduct, and that no one was injured. He also said, “Based on the investigation, there is no evidence to support that there was probable cause for violation of any of the Connecticut state statutes.”
After six or seven police calls made by house staff to police, however, the woman left DeMalia’s House of Hope and went to an emergency room for treatment.
“The system is broken,” DeMalia said, speaking of addiction-recovery nonprofits and public resources in the country. “No matter what the response was from the post that we made online, whether it was negative, positive, (or insulting), the common denominator was that the system is broken.”
DeMalia was addicted to opioids for 20 years. During that time, he says he witnessed the mistreatment of “vulnerable populations” in treatment programs.
“There’s a lot of marginalization, a lot of minimizing symptoms and stress that these patients are experiencing,” he said, talking about what he witnessed at addiction recovery programs. “Patients would be left in agony without any support, just ignored by nursing staff, vulgarities including slurs, racial terms, insulting, diminishing terms.”
DeMalia’s House of Hope’s certification has been temporarily suspended while last week’s incidents are being investigated by the Connecticut Alliance of Recovery Residencies (CTARR). The house can still operate, but the Connecticut State Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services will no longer list it as a sober living home on its website.
DeMalia opened DeMalia’s House of Hope in December 2025 to provide better services to vulnerable people. He says this ordeal has caused him to rethink his operation. DeMalia said that if the facility continues to operate, it will only offer residential treatment for men to avoid these situations in the future.
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