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Female student assaulted at 2 a.m. on north campus
A 19-year-old MSU student on Monday reported being assaulted, MSU police Sgt. Florene McGlothian-Taylor said.
MSU police issued a crime alert to students at about 2 p.m. Monday about a late-night assault on campus.
A female student reported being approached around 2 a.m. Monday by a 20 to 25-year-old male near Beaumont Tower and West Circle Drive. The suspect threatened her with a pocketknife before fleeing the area.
Two males were approaching the woman and suspect when he fled away, according to the crime alert.
The victim explained what happened to the two men and they called police from the Main Library. She did not suffer injuries from the assault.
The crime alert also included safety tips and a list of services, such as the Capital Area Transportation Authority Night Owl, that are available to students. Students can call (517) 432-8888 between 2-7 a.m. Monday through Friday for a ride on campus.
State Walk also is available from the Main Library. The service, which is located in room W-122, provides pairs of volunteers between dusk and 1 a.m. to walk students back to their on-campus residences.
“We just want to encourage people to utilize these services,” McGlothian-Taylor said.
Published on Monday, October 6, 2008
Comments
Bill Lumberg
10/06/08 @ 3:47pm
“described as a white man” holly crap does that mean the SN is no longer concerned with being PC and are willing to actually consider the safety of the students when publishing a description of a suspect?
I never thought I would see the day the PC police stop running the SN.
Benjy Compson
10/06/08 @ 3:49pm
The suspect is described as a white man between 20 and 25 years old. He is 5-foot-9, and weighs about 180 pounds, with brown eyes, reddish-brown hair and a beard.
Does this signal the end of the SN’s dangerous and self-imposed restriction against providing full suspect descriptions?
…
(side note: I hope this isn’t yet another false report.)
Ginny
10/06/08 @ 4:16pm
This is pretty scary. Hopefully, it doesn’t turn out to be fake like other recent reports.
lol
10/06/08 @ 5:13pm
wow, SN actually posted some description. finally.
But I wonder if this is true or just another “look at me” stunt.
Scary
10/06/08 @ 6:30pm
Well first of all, I am glad she’s okay. Second of all, I’m not so sure that SN has turned a new leaf, seeing as their report was written and posted some 20 minutes after I received a crime report from the campus police with the suspect’s description.
Toni Robbins
10/06/08 @ 6:48pm
Honestly, wouldn’t it be better if it were false?
Mike Jones
10/06/08 @ 7:27pm
It’s PC to describe “a white male” but not PC to say “a black male”….
Jason Van Dyke
10/07/08 @ 12:30am
And my prediction is that this trend will continue. Perhaps this kind of thing wouldn’t happen if students were allowed to carry SOME means of protection (like pepper spray – not a gun or a taser). Of course the definition of “weapon” used by MSU is so broad that nobody really knows what it means. One of these days, a robbery victim who knows how to fight it going to beat an assailant into a bloody pulp. When that inevitably does happen, I predict that the MSU Police and Ingham Prosecutors will be more interested in prosecuting her for using her hands and feet as “deadly weapons” than they will in punishing the newly-crippled would-be felon. Especially if the would-be felon is the one with a darker skin tone.
Poon Tang
10/07/08 @ 12:50am
Students aren’t allowed to carry pepper spray? That sucks.
Julius Holmes
10/07/08 @ 2:05am
Jason you made a whole lot of sense until that last sentence. GET A LIFE!!
Bill Lumberg
10/07/08 @ 7:25am
Looks like the SN corrected their error and removed the complete description. Good thing, now another criminal can walk freely around campus without fear of being identified. Political Correctness wins again!!
MSUAlum2001
10/07/08 @ 8:06am
Well Bill at least this thread survived to still give the description. Of course I wonder if Abby or the copy editor still has a job this morning.
Jason Van Dyke
10/07/08 @ 8:11am
The sad thing about that last sentence is that it’s true. And what I say about the MSU weapons policy absolutely is correct. Pull up the student handbook and read it yourself. It’s incredibly vague, and in my opinion, the vagueness is intentional. The fact is that nearly anything can be used as a “weapon” if you throw it hard enough (toasters, for instance). I certainly would not put it past MSU and local authorities to charge someone with possession of a dangerous and deadly toaster.
K-Rock
10/07/08 @ 9:33am
Responding to Jason, I was an RA a couple of years ago (AKA Mentor, or whatever ridiculous term they’re calling it now) and we had orientation with the campus PD at the beginning of the year. The campus PD told us that pepper spray “technically” qualifies as a weapon, but in the same breath encouraged females to carry it for self-defense.
We asked the officer whether or not that would hold up in court as an endorsement of carrying a weapon and he said “I don’t think the prosecutor would charge a woman for using pepper spray in self-defense”. While I agree with what he said, I have no idea why it is not clearly stated to the students that women absolutely should ALWAYS carry pepper spray. I remember walking out of that very area hundreds of times when I lived in West Circle or off-campus just across Grand River, so this hits close to home.
Why in the world the SN would remove the description after it’s already been relayed to the students in a message from the Police is beyond me. Their journalistic integrity just keeps getting worse every year and THAT is saying something.
Scary
10/07/08 @ 10:42am
Their journalistic integrity just keeps getting worse every year and THAT is saying something.
Amen to that K-Rock! Hooray for political correctness!
Philly
10/07/08 @ 11:20am
It’s no surprise that the obviously pro-crime State News would drop the race descriptor, but why in the hell would they drop “…man between 20 and 25 years old. He is 5-foot-9, and weighs about 180 pounds, with brown eyes, reddish-brown hair and a beard.”???
I suppose none of that information has any value at this point, since the suspect could have put on some stilts, ate 700 Big Macs, got colored contact lenses, dyed his hair and shaved off his beard since 2 AM. Blasted smart criminals.
Erin
10/07/08 @ 6:01pm
What is with everyone being so quick to think this is false? Does it really sound that likely to everyone here that some woman thought it would be fun to go out at 2am, wait around for two men to come near by and then go running to them claiming someone held a knife to her? This of course assumes the 2 men where not close enough to see a man with the woman and running off, though it sounds rather likely that they did see that.
Benjy Compson
10/07/08 @ 6:38pm
Erin,
No one has said they think it is a lie (except maybe lol, but their name is lol so…) People have said they hope it isn’t a false report because the fact is there already has been a false on-campus sexual assault report this semester. And crying wolf will increase skepticism, which could discourage true victims from coming forward. Settle down, these comments aren’t as sinister as you think.
Toni Robbins,
Yes, of course it would be better if the situation was false, but I hope the report is not false (for the reason stated above).