AMHERST — No new arrests were made Tuesday in connection with a violent home invasion that injured at least three men on South East Street early Sunday, according to the Northwestern District Attorney’s Office.

And while 25-year-old Patrick M. Bemben, of Hadley, is being held without bail pending a dangerousness hearing on charges of armed robbery and assault and battery with a dangerous weapon, at least three other suspects remain at large, according to authorities.

Amherst Police Chief Scott Livingstone said the investigation is ongoing as police continue to interview people.

“The investigation is expanding pretty rapidly,” Livingstone said. “We are pretty confident we are going to get to the bottom of all the parties involved.”

Meantime, officials at Worcester Polytechnic Institute, where Bemben is enrolled as a student, issued a statement Tuesday.

“The reported behavior of WPI student Patrick Bemben in the October 30 home invasion in Amherst, Mass., is shocking, deeply disturbing, and violates many of the values held by the WPI campus community,” Philip Clay, vice president of student affairs at WPI, said in a statement. “This case is being managed by local police and the courts. As more details become known to us, WPI will also initiate our own campus judicial processes.”

Amherst Police responded to a report of an armed robbery at 943 South East St. at around 1 a.m. Sunday. Officers found two residents injured and handcuffed with plastic “flex-cuffs,” according to an arrest report by Amherst Sgt. Richard MacLean.

A 23-year-old man suffered a severe laceration to his upper right arm that will require surgery to repair, according to police. The man told officers he believed that a hatchet was used to inflict his injury. Another 24-year-old resident was pistol-whipped and beaten by “multiple aggressors,” according to police.

Bemben also suffered injuries as the residents tried to defend themselves from the attack, MacLean wrote. He was taken to Cooley Dickinson Hospital for treatment.

At the home Tuesday afternoon, curtains were drawn in many windows on the ground floor. Outside a door under a second story deck, there was what appeared to be blood stains.

A young man who answered the door declined to comment about the incident. The home is about 0.2 miles north of the Amherst Pelham Regional High School South East Campus. According to the DA’s office, the home appeared to be targeted and the public is not at risk.

When police arrested Bemben Sunday, he was found with a tactical hatchet, a double edged boot knife, a folding knife, pepper spray and a billy club, MacLean wrote. He was wearing a “ski-type mask,” goggles, a headlamp, communication/radio equipment, a tactical bulletproof vest and carrier, battle dress uniform pants and flex-cuffs, according to the police report.

Police found a Glock .40-caliber magazine loaded with ball ammunition, gun parts and “significant blood evidence in front of the home,” MacLean wrote.

In a wooded area behind the home, police recovered numerous items relating to the growing and production of marijuana, according to the arrest report. A large plastic container with more than a pound of “fresh marijuana bud” was found just off the retaining wall on the driveway, according to police.

Police were able to question Bemben at the hospital and he allegedly admitted “that three to four men had preplanned specifically to rob the residents … of marijuana, molly (derivative of MDMA), marijuana resin/wax equipment to cultivate and manufacture the same as well as cash,” MacLean wrote.

Meanwhile, neighbors directly across the street from the residence declined to comment Tuesday. A few doors down, David Dunn and his wife Mary were doing yardwork. David Dunn said he didn’t hear the incident early Sunday and didn’t know it was that close to his home until talking with a Gazette reporter. He said the incident was “certainly not typical for the neighborhood.”

“It’s a great neighborhood,” he said. “It’s still a very pleasant place to live.”

According to town property records, the home is owned by Kenn Tirrell of Marco Island, Florida, and managed locally, as required by the town’s residential rental property bylaw, by Chad O’Rourke of Pipeline Properties, 6 University Drive. Tirrell and O’Rourke could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

Bemben is scheduled to appear back in Eastern Hampshire District Court in Belchertown on Nov. 25.

Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com. Emily Cutts can be reached at ecutts@gazettenet.com.

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