[bold on]Robert Koch[bold off]
Staff Reporter
Arrests for alcohol violations and drug use at the University rose between 1997 and 1998, but not as sharply as at other large schools nationwide. Reported incidents of robbery, aggravated assault and burglaries, by contrast, decreased during the period.
In its annual survey of campus crime released Sunday, The Chronicle of Higher Education ranked the University’s Twin Cities campus third in alcohol-related arrests with 606 arrests made in 1998 – up 9 percent from the 555 arrests made in 1997. Drug arrests rose from 72 to 105 – a 45 percent increase.
Although the numbers reflect increases, their usefulness in gauging campus-crime trends is open to debate. Increased enforcement and the inclusion of nonstudents in arrest counts might give an inaccurate picture of crime at the University. And a new federal law passed in 1998 requiring campuses to report crimes on adjacent public property might further distort the picture.
“The number of alcohol and drug arrests on campus does not reflect the behavior of our students,” said University Police Chief George Aylward in a press release. “Fully two-thirds of the 606 alcohol arrests and 80 percent of the 105 drug arrests on campus in 1998 were of nonstudents.”
Aggressive enforcement, including full-time student monitors on each floor of student-residence halls and saturation patrols to catch drunken drivers, also have resulted in higher arrest counts.
“There’s a lot more people living in the dorms that are a lot less tolerant of people that are drinking,” said University Police Sgt. Brad Herberg.
Campus-area bars and restaurants appear to be stopping underage drinking at their doors.
University sophomore Jeremy Rubin, a bartender at Stub and Herbs, said the establishment pays close attention to stopping underage drinking.
“On Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights, we’ve started carding at the door at 9 p.m.,” Rubin said. “There’s been as many as 20 people a night without valid state IDs.”
University junior Amber Templin, who works as a manager at nearby Sally’s Saloon and Eatery, said the restaurant checks IDs at the door nightly and keeps a refusal-of-service log.