DPS waited for days to issue crime alert

The Division of Public Safety issued an alert when a wave of juvenile crime hit on or near campus this month. But that alert didn't come until the evening of July 13, 10 days after the first assault and robbery were reported and six days after five of the eight recent crimes attributed to juveniles - including both robberies and three assaults - had occurred.

A college must issue a warning "when the institution believes there to be an ongoing threat," said Daniel Carter of Security on Campus, a nonprofit organization that advocates for increased awareness of safety issues on college campuses. Continuing crime or a suspect at large can constitute ongoing threats, he said.

Carter said universities should issue an alert about a crime or series of crimes "as soon as it's determined that it's an ongoing threat." An alert should be issued within a few hours, at most, of that determination, he said.

Vice President for Public Safety Maureen Rush said DPS did not see a pattern among the original incidents. She said collaboration with Philadelphia Police alerted DPS to a widespread pattern of juvenile crime in West Philadelphia.

DPS issued the alert, she said, "at the time when we knew there may be additional players" and when officials could "give clear and concise information" about the situation.

The alert marks the only University-wide safety notification issued by DPS this summer. University-wide alerts require "multiple layers of approval from various levels of the executive administration," DPS spokeswoman Karima Zedan said.

Rush said a recurring pattern of juvenile crime throughout West Philadelphia spurred the alert.

"As a couple more occurred, while they weren't the same perpetrators, we were seeing a pattern develop," she said. "We saw a continuing pattern of threat to the community."

That approach - scrutinizing patterns and collaborating with other authorities - appears to be consistent with the methods other universities employ in deciding whether to issue an alert.

"We go over crimes to see if a pattern is emerging, if the [method of operation] is the same in the cases, if the description matches other crimes in the area," Fred Carbonara, the interim head of Drexel University's Department of Public Safety, wrote in an e-mail. Carbonara added that area security officials meet regularly to analyze developing crime patterns.

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