University police are investigating two reports of rape that happened during the first week of April, according to a police report.

University police Lt. Chuck Miner said both rapes are part of one incident that involves three people.

The two 19-year-old women involved are University students, Miner said.

Both incidents were an acquaintance-type-of assault, he said, which means the women knew the suspect.

“(The rapes) reported at this police department and on this campus are generally acquaintance-type-of assaults,” Miner said.

The University police have handled six reported cases of rape since Sept. 1, he said.

Stolen LCD projectors
Two liquid crystal display projectors, commonly known as LCD projectors, were stolen from the University’s School of Public Health, according to a police report.

Peg Brown, Academic Health Center classroom services coordinator, said each LCD projector costs approximately $1,600.

“They are fancier than the overhead projectors that use transparencies,” she said.

The doors were supposed to be locked, Brown said, but a custodian found the classrooms unlocked in the morning.

Miner said there have been more LCD projectors stolen in the last few weeks.

“It is a fairly common theft problem on the University campus,” he said. “They are fairly valuable and there is a kind of market for them.”

University police enter stolen projectors’ serial numbers into a statewide database that tracks property, which later might be pawned, Miner said.

He added the police department has been successful identifying stolen property that way in the past.

Tire slashing
Someone punched holes into four tires of a forest resources department’s vehicle, according to a police report.

Paul Bolstad, a professor in the forestry resources department, wrote in an e-mail that the University vehicle was used for forestry research.

The vehicle was parked in a University lot by the St. Paul Gym, he wrote, when the incident happened two weekends ago.

Miner said tire slashing is a new incident for the St. Paul campus, although the University has had some spread-out tire-slashing incidents in the past.

Some of those tire slashings took place on the East Bank and at property on University Avenue, he said.

Wading vs. swimming
A University police officer issued trespass warnings Saturday to three people outside the McNamara Alumni Center, according to a police report.

The three individuals were wading in the alumni center’s fountain pool.

The officer questioned the waders’ purpose for being in the water.

” ‘Cause it’s a nice night out,” they told the police officer.

Miner said disorderly conduct is the closest statute that might be used to cite people for wading in fountains.

But it would be a poor use of the statute, he said.

“It’s not like they were swimming laps,” Miner said.