Ka Leo O Hawaii

Issue date: 10/11/07 Section: News

Media Credit: Matthew Ing UH Mānoa Campus Security officers stand guard in preparation of the UARC protest at Bachman Hall last month. Such events, according to Chief Neal Sakamoto, have kept security too busy to comply with federal law.

Sakamoto

The University of Hawai‘i at Mānoa Campus Security's failure to update its public crime log violates a federal law, may make UH liable for fines, endangers students' safety and has been ongoing since May, when Ka Leo O Hawai‘i first notified the department.

"Failing to properly disclose this information can be a deadly mistake," said S. Daniel Carter, senior vice president of Security on Campus, Inc., a national nonprofit campus safety and victims' rights organization based in Pennsylvania.
"Corrective action needs to be taken by (UH Mānoa) immediately if they are continuing to withhold information improperly," he said.

The federal government's Jeanne Clery Act, which Carter helped amend, requires college security authorities to make information on a crime reported to them available to the public within two business days of its occurrence. An online version of the log at UH Mānoa is usually updated "every Thursday or Friday, depending on how busy security is," said UH Mānoa's security chief, Neal Sakamoto.

The most recent online update, as of yesterday, Oct. 10, included crimes reported from Sept. 20 to 26.

The log is required to include any crime that occurs on campus or in a building or on public property within the jurisdiction of the university's security. The nature, date, time, general location and disposition of the complaint must be recorded.

"We are looking into (updating the log more frequently) and will go into that eventually," Sakamoto said. While the log is one of many projects he's working on, Sakamoto said, events such as the Toyota Motor Co. Aerosmith concert and last month's protest against the UH Applied Research Laboratory have taken up much of security's time.

Campus Security has 30 officers, but Sakamoto said some are part-time hires that still need to be trained before working full time.

Facing federal fines

Violators of the Clery Act may be fined up to $27,500 by the U.S. Department of Education for each violation and could lose their eligibility to participate in federal student aid programs.

Several universities, including Virginia Tech, The Ohio State University, Northern Illinois University, University of California and Eastern Michigan University, have violated the Clery Act. Virginia Tech did not accurately compile crime statistics for its annual security reports, according to a U.S. DOE program review in 1997. This year, the DOE notified Eastern Michigan University that the school had not been providing timely warnings and had failed to properly disclose crime statistics. Salem International University in Washington was fined $200,000 in 2005 for three years of violations.

Putting students at risk

The online version of the UH Mānoa crime log conforms to the federal standard of required information, but because it is not available to the public within two business days of an initial report, students have raised concerns.

"My scooter was stolen on the first week of school," said junior Thien Ho, a Hale Wainani resident. "If I had known the day before that someone's scooter was stolen there, then I wouldn't have parked in that lot. Learning a week later doesn't help me."

Campus Security receives about 15 to 20 crime reports per day, but "sometimes the officer doesn't finish (the reports) before they leave," Sakamoto said.

"The crime logs are especially important for female students," said fifth-year student Melanie Kosaka. "I still see girls walking late at night, even when there are lots of weirdos on campus."

Before going online, the log included an identification number of the security guard who reported to a crime. While the federal law does not require this, some students say it is just as important.

"The logs are public, and students need to have access to all the public information, and if that used to include the ID numbers of Campus Security, then it should still include it," said Christina Stidman, president of the Associated Students of the University of Hawai‘i.

Last spring, about the same time security temporarily closed the crime log, a female student claimed that several officers used excessive force to restrain her.

Reporting through Ka Leo

Prior to Sakamoto's hiring last spring, Ka Leo reporters could check the crime log once a week and get more information from Campus Security officers for its Campus Beat column, which was one of the most popular items in the newspaper.

In April, the crime log was closed and then put online the first week of May without explanation or evidence that reporting by Ka Leo did any harm. Reporters can no longer speak to officers but must instead contact Sakamoto, who sometimes takes up to a week or longer to provide the requested information.

Sakamoto said he has been working on an "expanded version of the log," which would be available primarily to the media and also to the public.

When Ka Leo called Sakamoto last Wednesday, he did not have a specific time frame for when the "expanded version" would be completed, nor did he say when the crime log would be in compliance with federal law. But during a follow-up call to him on Monday, Sakamoto said he plans to have a more timely and descriptive system implemented by the end of this month.

"Basically, (the online version) is useless," said Ka Leo reporter Michelle White, who has been writing the Campus Beat column since 2005. "I could copy what is online, but a lot of it is so vague that it is like writing nothing. I don't really have much to work with."

Previous Campus Beat columns listed crimes reported by students during the previous week and, according to White, reunited people with their stolen items. Ka Leo has not printed a Campus Beat column since last spring because the information from security is usually weeks old.

According to Sakamoto, the public may review a printed copy of the crime log. However, when a Ka Leo reporter went to the security office as a student requesting to see the crime log, the on-duty officer refused to show it.

Student members of the Society of Professional Journalists, UH Mānoa Chapter will be advocating for security to comply with federal law.

"Unfortunately we don't live in a world where you can simply trust state institutions like the university (to) follow Freedom of Information laws," said SPJ adviser and journalism professor Jonathan Lillie. "When this happens, groups like SPJ are here to try to get people who work for the state to abide by the law."

In 1990, Congress established the Clery Act after a Lehigh University student, Jeanne Clery, was murdered on campus in 1986. The act requires colleges and universities to disclose certain timely and annual information about campus crime and security policies. Jeanne Clery's parents also founded the nonprofit Security On Campus, Inc., http://www.securityoncampus.org.

Under the federal law, schools have to publish an annual report by Oct. 1 that contains three years' worth of campus crime statistics. Certain security policy statements - including sexual assault policies that assure basic victims' rights, the law enforcement authority of campus police and where students should go to report crimes - must also be included.

Administration reacts to security's federal crime log violation

The Jeanne Clery Act
Public or private universities that receive federal student aid funding and have a campus police or security department must abide by the following:

• Maintain a public crime log and update it within two business days of the reported crime


• Provide timely warnings of crimes posing a threat to students or employees (via e-mail or flyer)


• Publish an annual report on Oct. 1 that contains three years' worth of campus crime statistics

The UH Mānoa public crime log can be found at: http://www.hawaii.edu/security/crimelogs.html.

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