EDITORIAL: Significant differences

The rules now governingThe rules now governingwhat incidents are enteredThe rules now governingwhat incidents are enteredinto the campus crime logThe rules now governingwhat incidents are enteredinto the campus crime logkeep crucial informationThe rules now governingwhat incidents are enteredinto the campus crime logkeep crucial informationfrom the campus community.The rules now governingwhat incidents are enteredinto the campus crime logkeep crucial informationfrom the campus community._____________________________ Gaines will not face charges in the incident. And while we are disturbed that these items would be discovered in an unlocked automobile belonging to one of Rodin's staff assistants, accessible to almost anyone in the University garage, we are even more incensed that this entire escapade was not recorded in the Incident Journal, the official public crime log maintained by University Police. According to police administrators, the Department of Public Safety does not legally have to enter all incident reports taken by its officers into the log book. Instead, under a policy developed by former University Police Commissioner John Kuprevich, officers and their supervisors need only enter "crimes and significant incidents responded to and documented by University Police." We understand that it's easier to know definitively that a crime has been committed when a piece of property is missing or a person is injured. Finding contraband in someone's car does not automatically indicate possession. But when the crime log has historically included items like "investigation of person" when someone calls in about a suspicious character walking outside his house and "harassment by communication" when someone receives threatening telephone calls, we must question who defines significant -- and how flexible that definition is. Administrators claim the Gaines incident is not significant because it did not raise general campus security issues. Again, we beg to differ. The discovery of a loaded weapon in an unlocked car in a University parking facility -- where anyone could have found it and stolen it -- is absolutely a matter of general campus safety. For this reason, it is most undoubtedly significant. The regulations now governing what incidents are entered into the campus crime log are only weakly articulated, leaving too much room for judgement calls by individual officers and resulting in depictions of crime on campus and the security situation at the University that are not full, clear and accurate. University Police owe it to current students, faculty and staff, as well as prospective students and parents, to record and log incidents more consistently. In the wake of the Gaines case, altering the rules that dictate how crimes are logged, so that there is increased accountability for and reason behind what does and does not appear, is a change that's immediately warranted.