NEWS > 10 November 2005

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Cambridge Chronicle - Sommervi
10 November 2005

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Crimson takes crime report cas

Campus security advocates are siding with a Harvard University student paper in a legal battle over whether college police are required to publicly release arrest reports.

On Monday, the two-year-old case went before the state's Supreme Judicial Court, with lawyers for The Crimson, a student-run paper, arguing that the Harvard University Police Department should be held to the same public records laws as state police, since the state gives those officers "special state police powers," according to the Associated Press.

Harvard University Police are allowed to make arrests and issue search warrants.

Harvard officials, however, said that because they are a private entity, they aren't subject to public access laws and that their legal responsibility to protect student privacy trumps other considerations.

"A campus police officer in a community like Harvard is very different than a municipal or state police officer," the AP quoted Harvard attorney Jeffrey Swope as saying. Swope also argued that arrest reports were available through the court system.

The SJC is now deliberating on the issue.

Last year, a judge dismissed The Crimson's case, saying that it was a legislative issue. Now, some eyes are on a bill sponsored by state Sen. Jarrett Barrios, D-Cambridge, and state Rep. Tim Toomey, D-Cambridge, which was referred to the Senate Committee on Rules and Ethics on Nov. 3. That bill, if passed, would force all campus police officers to release crime records.

One national group to support The Crimson is Security on Campus, an organization that advocates for students' and parents' right to know about crime on campuses.

On Sept, 15, attorney Adam Rowe of Crowe & Dunn submitted an amicus brief on behalf of SOC and the Cambridge-based Student-Alumni Committee on Institutional Security Policy, which argues, among other things, that although campus officers are Harvard employees, they are also authorized as "officers" by the state and should be held to that definition.

S. Daniel Carter, a senior vice president for SOC who is based in Knoxville, Tenn., attended the hearing Monday and said he felt the judges had a "narrow interpretation" of to whom public access laws apply.

Carter said The Crimson case is now at the "forefront" of a larger national issue of access to university crime records. "It's an equal protection issue," he said. "Community members need this [crime] information to stay safe."

In recent crime news, Harvard University Police arrested a Level III sex offender in a dormitory on Oct. 15, according to a Crimson article.

On Oct. 27, responding to reports from the Cambridge Police Department, HUPD put out an advisory warning students that a woman had been indecently assaulted by a man at Garden Street and Appian Way three days after the woman reported the incident to CPD.

Frank Pasquarello, CPD spokesman, said the man exposed himself to the woman and that no physical contact was made.

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Article sourced from

Cambridge Chronicle - Sommervi10 November 2005

Crimson takes crime report cas

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Cambridge Chronicle - Sommervi
10 November 2005