The university is low on crime for the size of its population and space, said Ball State officials after looking at numbers from the annual campus crime report.
“The numbers reflect that we are relatively free of serious crime,” said Michael Gillilan, director of student rights and community standards. “Most of the crimes that do occur involve students using alcohol or drugs illegally, or in rare cases, committing crimes against one another.”
The annual Campus Crime Statistics report was released Tuesday, providing data on criminal offense reports, arrests and disciplinary referrals for 2012.
This report is put together by the Office of Student Rights and Community Standards in compliance with the Higher Education Act and also includes campus policies regarding alcohol and drugs and emergency response procedures.
University Police Department, Office of Housing and Residence Life and Office of Victim Services, along with 10 other offices and persons report the statistics used to compile the report.
Safety, Gillilan said, is always the first priority and the university prepares to respond quickly and effectively to deal with emergencies of all types.
“We continue to encourage students to be aware of their surroundings, to travel with others and to stay in well-lighted areas at night,” he said. “Crime follows ease and availability of targets, and students that are alone, out late and impaired with alcohol are especially vulnerable.”
Ball State has the first accredited university police force in Indiana and has earned reaccreditation.
Liquor law violations in 2012 on campus were at its lowest since 2010 — and less than half the total violations of 2011.
Total arrests due to liquor law violations on campus decreased from 285 in 2011 to 123 in 2012, but disciplinary referrals due to liquor law violations stayed relatively stable and decreased by 28 to a total of 1,145 in 2012.
Gillilan said he does not consider this decrease substantial and it is not unusual to have changes in numbers from year to year for any kind of geographic location.
“A change can disappear as quickly as it appeared,” he said. “We would consider most of these statistics fairly stable. What would be significant is a notable change that was sustained over several years, and the numbers here do not reflect such a trend.”
Aggravated assault increased from zero offenses in 2011 to a total of 7 offenses on campus in 2012. Off campus, there were 14 offenses in 2012.
Gillilan said these assaults occurred just off campus, when students were alone at night, and it is hard to know just by one year if this is a substantial increase from 2011’s six off-campus aggravated assaults.
The report also includes statistics on hate crimes. No hate crimes in any category have been reported for 2010, 2011 or 2012.
Gillilan said the federal reporting requirements for hate crimes must show evidence of bias and be accompanied by hate crime in the categories of race, gender, ethnicity, religion, disability or sexual orientation.
“No crimes reported meet this definition,” he said.
Gillilan said the Campus Crime Statistics is based on statistics from reported crimes.
“We do all we can to make reporting easy for witnesses and victims, but there is no way to know about crimes that are not reported,” he said. “For those crimes that are reported, we are confident that these numbers are accurate.”
