By Andrew Izzo
This year’s Annual Security Report was released on Oct. 1, 2017. This report contains information and statistics about crime and fire reports on and around campus for the last three calendar years, starting in January of 2014 and ending in December of 2016.
This report is required by law through the Jeanne Clery Disclosure of Campus Security Policy and Campus Crime Statistics Act of 1990. This essentially requires colleges to outline information on crimes and other incidents that happen on campus.
“It was an effort to make sure campuses fully disclose what their practices are and what their crime statistics are,” Director of Security Todd Badham said. The record can be accessed through Campus Security’s page on the University’s website. The main body of the report is policy on reporting and contains links to codes of conduct as they relate to various sections of the text. Reports from previous years are archived.
If an incident was reported, but then later determined to be unfounded, the number of reported incidents would be adjusted. If the incident was determined to be unfounded after the calendar year was up, the statistic would be unchanged. However, a footnote would be added clarifying that one incident was unfounded, according to Badham.
All incidents are added to the appropriate statistic by the date they were reported. All of the following statistical information was taken from the published report.
There were no reports of murder, manslaughter, domestic violence (this is separate from dating violence), incest/statutory rape or weapons possession on or around campus for the last three years.
There was only one drug arrest reported, but it was on city property, not on campus.
There have been three reports of fires in residential buildings in the last three years, one each year. There are two reports of arson, both in 2016. One count of arson lines up with a fire report from 2016.
There have been seven reports of motor vehicle thefts in the last three years. Two of those happened in areas near to campus, and the other five on campus.
The Bias-Hate Education Response Team (BHERT) has received three reports of vandalism that contained bias or hate messaging.
There was a spike in referrals for discipline for drug use/possession on campus this last year, from 30 in 2015 to 76 in 2016. A drug referral is not an arrest, and the Tacoma Police Department is not called. This means that the person is reported and then goes through the University’s internal conduct process.
Badham said that there does seem to be more use of marijuana on campus, but is unsure of the exact cause. “I don’t know if it’s more popular now that it’s legal,” Badham said. “I think there’re lots of hypotheses as to why.”
While use of marijuana is legal in Washington State for persons over 21, since Puget Sound receives federal funding, the federal guidelines for the Drug Free Schools Act must be enforced. This means that no drugs may be used or possessed on campus.
Alcohol referrals, however, have gone down over the last reporting year, from 270 in 2015 to 188 in 2016. There was one reported alcohol arrest in 2016.
There has only been one report of aggravated assault in the last three years, and it did not happen on campus. There have been five reports of intimidation on campus and one report off campus. A footnote was made that the intimidation report in 2016 was “believed to motivated by the sexual preference of the reportee.”
Over the last three years there have been two cases of dating violence on campus.
There have been 25 reported incidents of rape/forcible fondling in the last three years. The report defines this as “any sexual act directed against another person, forcibly and/or against that person’s will; or not forcibly or against the person’s will where the victim is incapable of giving consent.”
“The sexual assault and dating violence cases we all know are the most underreported,” Badham said. There has been a push as a campus to address this issue so that Security can know what’s happening.
“We’ve really worked hard as a campus over the last several years to address that,” Badham said, “by increasing reporting options and giving people who do report options as to what happens.”
Badham said that there are probably a few other crimes that are underreported, such as having a car broken into, but the statistics for crimes other than rape/forcible fondling and dating violence are likely accurate.
Several students said that they had not heard of the Annual Security Report, and the few that had heard of it have not read it. Students are encouraged to read this report and know what has been happening in our community.
The Trail also provides updates from security every week for current incidents, and Campus Security keeps a daily log that any student can ask to see. It is important to know your reporting options so that if anything does happen, help can be given as soon as possible.