When Ball State senior Amanda Pfenninger began her internship in Washington, D.C., this semester, she said she felt nervous about moving from campus to a big city but never felt unsafe.
Since a sniper began terrorizing the Washington area on Oct. 2, Pfenninger said her feelings of safety have changed.
"I've definitely become way more cautious about where I go," said Pfenninger, an intern at People for the American Way, a non-profit organization in the capital. "I feel like I have a false sense of security because you never know where (a shooting) will happen."
While most students have likely seen the images and effects of the sniper attacks on television, Pfenninger has lived through them. Because the sniper has seemed to target mostly the suburban areas around Washington, she said she has seen an increase of drivers using inner-city gas stations.
"You see people crouching in their cars at gas stations and sitting in them," Pfenninger said.
She also said she -- along with many other workers in the nation's capital -- has begun taking the Metro, the city's subway train, instead of driving to work.
But on Columbus Day, Pfenninger experienced first-hand the effects the sniper has had on life in Washington. After the Oct. 14 killing of Linda Franklin, Pfenninger was on Interstate 495 (which circles around Washington) when police shut it down to search for the sniper.
"They had police officers with assault rifles walking up and down the interstate searching the cars," Pfenninger said.
Although her vehicle was nothing like the white van police suspect the sniper drives, Pfenninger said officers made her roll down her windows and check her front and back seats.
"That's when it got personal," she said.
While police combing the interstate might seem an inconvenience to some, Ball State criminal justice professor and criminologist Bryan Byers said such "drag nets" are the most effective method police currently have to catch the unknown killer.
"(Serial killers) are very difficult people to catch," Byers said.
Because the nation has never been under attack by a serial killer who is a sniper, Byers said efforts to profile the assassin may not be the best way to capture him.
Beside searching car after car on shut-down interstates, the next best method police have to catch the sniper comes from eyewitness accounts, Byers said.
"Obviously (police) are doing all the things they need to be doing," he said.
But some have said they get the feeling police are not doing enough. Ball State sophomore Israel Adetunji of Silver Spring, Md., where one of the shootings has taken place, said he feels like the search for the sniper has been moving too slowly.
When a witness said he had seen the sniper but was later found to be lying to police, Adetunji said the hope he had in police solving the case took a blow. On Monday, when police took two men into custody, Adetunji said he again felt police were finally getting somewhere.
"Hearing that (police) have taken people into custody lets me know the investigation is going somewhere," Adetunji said Monday. "They're trying to control this chaos."
The chaos Adetunji referred to has affected the way his parents live their lives, he said. Even before police revealed a message apparently from the sniper, which said "your children are not safe," Adetunji said his parents had already stopped letting his 13-year-old brother and 16-year-old sister walk to their nearby school.
When Adetunji goes home during fall break, he said he plans to support his family in dealing with the fear incited by the sniper attacks.
"I don't get an idea of what my family is feeling until I see them," Adetunji said.
Freshman Metages Belachew of Arlington, Va., where two of the sniper's victims lived, said she was also concerned for her family's welfare.
"I'm scared about my family," she said. "I'm afraid my family will get hurt."
While Pfenninger admitted she felt unsafe in Washington because of the sniper attacks, she said she wasn't in any hurry to get home and would gladly work in Washington after her internship.
"I wouldn't jeopardize my life or my career because of (the sniper)," Pfenninger said. "That's exactly what he's trying to do."332/<-¼++*FSniper - BSU respondsDNEditorial332SORTZ+â-ä2AUDT
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