The Wake

We were all told during orientation that the campus is safe and it’s rare to feel unsafe when walking through the mall or Dinkytown at night. With the recent assaults that have sprung up during the first few weeks of the school year in the surrounding University neighborhoods, everyone is having second thoughts about our so-called “safe” campus.

After the first month of the school year, seven assaults had happened in the Southeast Como, Marcy-Holmes and Cedar-Riverside neighborhoods, all surrounding the University’s East and West Banks, mostly occupied by students. With the year starting, “we have more people on the streets,” says James DeSota, neighborhood coordinator for the Southeast Como Improvement Association. There are a lot of factors adding up to the additional crime, DeSota says. (what factors?)

Three assaults happened on Friday, Sept. 9, the first weekend of school where traditionally the State Patrol is brought in to assist area police with the busy weekend. Two of these assaults were within one mile and 15 minutes of each other around 12th Avenue Southeast and Como Avenue. These three separate assaults started off a month filled with attacks and crime throughout Dinkytown and the Como area. The first attack was at 12:30 a.m. at 16th and University Avenue. The next two were within one block of each other, one at 2 a.m. at 12th and Como Avenue and the other at 2:15 a.m. at 12th and Talmadge Avenue.

Aaron Smith, a journalism junior, lives on 12th Avenue and saw an undercover police vehicle parked on 12th Avenue before 2 a.m. “I thought it was just a car parked in the middle of the street, but I got closer and realized it was an undercover cop car,” he says. This was before 2 a.m., because Smith’s parents were helping him move and had left by 2 a.m. along with the police car. “It wasn’t on the street at 2 a.m…obviously,” he says. “The attacks had to be related, they were too similar, too close to one another to not be,” Smith says.

These first three attacks resulted in the UMPD sending out a crime alert to all students via e-mail. The alert gave information on all three assaults including that in two of the incidents “the victim was assaulted with either a baseball bat or a stick,” and “two of the victims were hospitalized due to the extent of their injuries.”

As of press time, Lt. Chuck Miner of the University of Minnesota Police Department said the Minneapolis Police are close to solving two of the three assaults that they sent an alert out on.

Sept. 16 saw three assaults; one each in the Southeast Como, Cedar-Riverside and Dinkytown neighborhoods, where a man was punched in the face after refusing to give another man money.

An assault on Sept. 17 in Dinkytown resulted in a trip to the emergency room (by who? Should we delete?) due to a concussion. On that day a Chi Psi fraternity member was also attacked after telling people not to walk through the house’s yard.

Miner says that there seems to be no motives in any of the assaults or attacks, adding to the suspicion that the attackers were college-aged people just moving from party to party. “The three separate assaults [that happened the weekend of Sept. 9] did not appear to involve a motive…and were very unusual for this area,” he says.

The last attack of the month, on Sept. 23, was the only one with an apparent motive; two Augsburg students were assaulted after leaving a party in Dinkytown for being homosexual.

According to the University of Minnesota Police Department crime statistics, in September 2005 there was one case of simple assault and one case of aggravated assault. This number had tripled by the first two weeks of September 2006.

The Como attacks have been in the northwestern portion of the Como neighborhood because, DeSota says, this area is more concentrated with students. “There’s a high concentration of larger houses in this area, which results in more students and more house parties,” he says. “People are walking from party to party here, and therefore leave themselves open to the vulnerabilities of robbery and assault,” DeSota says.

One important factor to consider according to DeSota is that there has been an increase in house parties in these areas and therefore the police resources are going toward that rather than to patrolling the street. “Because of drinking and loud partying, a lot of resources are being directed toward that,” he says. All of these things are adding up to what DeSota calls, “a bad environment.”

With partying in mind: “Be aware that you are more likely to be a crime victim when you are under the influence of alcohol,” Miner says.

An important factor that many say is adding to the crime is that before this year most of the crime in the area only used to come from outsiders, those who did not live in the surrounding neighborhoods. DeSota suggests that these people would come to the U’s community because the law was being strictly enforced in other areas due to the recent murders in downtown Minneapolis, but now residents of these neighborhoods are adding to the crime as well. “People feel it’s OK now to just take things and use force,” DeSota says. “There definitely seems to be a more vicious feel to what’s going on,” he says, adding that there has also been an increase in vandalism in the area. “The majority of people committing these assaults seem to be residents of the area. This is being done by college aged students, the 18- to 24-year-old crowd,” DeSota says.

Miner seconds DeSota’s ideas about non-students coming into the university area. “As more student-orientated apartment complexes are being built off campus, non-University-affiliated individuals are moving into the older complexes in the neighborhoods that are less desirable to students,” Miner says.

The UMPD is increasing its weekend patrolling to deal with the increase in crime around the University. “Since the beginning of the school year and continuing throughout the semester, we have teamed up with the Minneapolis Police, the Minnesota State Patrol and the Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office to have more officers on patrol on weekend evenings in and around the University,” Miner says, but adds that the additional officers are focusing on combating underage alcohol abuse rather than the recent assaults. The department is hoping that this increased presence of about 20 officers will indirectly have an affect on other crimes as well.

On a normal shift, there is one sergeant and three to four officers from the UMPD patrolling the area, and the only increase in patrol on the weekends is the addition of the officers from surrounding departments mentioned above. Unfortunately though, the addition of 20 officers most likely does not make up for the thousands of students that are out and about on the weekends.

During the second week of school, the UMPD did receive permission to add two officers to the force. In addition to this, “we are requesting to add up to eight additional officers prior to the 2009 opening of the TCF Bank Stadium,” Miner says. This is due to the fact that, with the opening of the stadium, the campus will be more of a “home base” for partying before and after football games, which will require additional police force and resources.

But, the UMPD only patrols property “owned, leased, or operated by the University of Minnesota,” Miner says. This includes the dorm areas, but not the neighborhoods experiencing the crime. “The off-campus areas of Dinkytown, Como, Marcy-Holmes, Cedar-Riverside are the primary jurisdiction of the Minneapolis Police Department,” he says. “However, we assist them as needed and try to ensure that the area around the University is safe as well.”

The UMPD and the Minneapolis Police are in constant radio communications with one another, and either or both departments may respond to calls, the UMPD website says.

As a resource to those concerned about protecting themselves from the crime, a free workshop was held Oct. 2 at the Van Cleve Community Center, and was open to both students and residents. The event was planned before the recent spike in crime, DeSota says, but the Minneapolis Police have been holding workshops such as this for years around the city of Minneapolis, says Rick Maas, SAFE crime prevention specialist in the Minneapolis 2nd Precinct Safe Unit.

The workshop was led by Mary Brandl, a self-defense instructor. She ran workshops on defending yourself against threats and violence and how to manage confrontation. This community event taught students to avoid situations where assault or crime could happen and how to be aware of your surroundings to protect yourself, Maas says. There were also demonstrations by Brandl and participants about how to get away from attackers if there is an altercation. “This is one of the best self-defense courses we offer,” Maas says.

The Southeast Como Improvement Association holds community meetings on the first Monday of every month, DeSota says. “These meetings are open to anyone and crime and assault in the area is usually discussed because citizens are concerned,” he says. At these meetings community members may bring their concerns about crime in the area and SECIA takes these concerns to create community programming and communicate with police about the concerns.

The assaults on campus were not linked to robberies, but students and others in the community worry about the increased frequency of robberies in other parts of the city.

On Sept. 17, three robberies occurred in the university area. All of these incidents happened within four hours of one another. 2005 saw only two robberies, while 2004 had zero.

This recent crime and overall viciousness is giving an eerie feeling to the weekend nightlife that is such an integral part of the university community. So you don’t have to stay in and get ahead on your homework, keep this in mind: “Do not walk alone at night. Use the free campus escort service,” Miner says.

As the UMPD urges, “Do not hesitate to call 911 on or off campus if you observe suspicious circumstances or are in fear.” Hopefully October will bring us friendlier news.