YALE University hopes to solve a case of whodungit by identifying the stinker who has been soiling students' laundry by sticking human faeces inside clothes dryers.

The culprit has been dubbed the "poopetrator" and is being blamed for at least four incidents in the past month in the laundry room at Saybrook College.

"We have asked our students not to leave their laundry unattended, the affected machines have been thoroughly disinfected and we are actively seeking information about who the perpetrator might be," Saybrook Master Paul Hudak told the Yale Daily News. "That's about all we can do."

Mr Hudak said Yale police are investigating. Officials at the elite Ivy League school also are considering changes to laundry room access.

Yale police declined to comment on the investigation.

Lucy Fleming was one of the first victims. She opened a dryer in the Saybrook College laundry room on September 7 and found her clothes soiled by human faeces. Someone also had urinated on them. She tried to rewash them, but they were ruined.

"I simultaneously wanted to throw up, cry and punch someone," Ms Fleming told the Daily News.

The suspect apparently struck again on Friday by hanging up a clothesline with soiled clothes in a courtyard of Berkeley College. A person claiming to be the culprit alerted students and the Daily News about it.

"Some people think the whole thing is funny; some think it is scary; and everyone thinks it is gross," Yale sophomore David Steiner told the New Haven Register.

Steiner received two emails on Friday that apparently were from the culprit, the Register reported. The name on the emails was "Copro Philiac." Coprophilia is an abnormal interest in faecal matter.

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