Rumors percolated around campus Monday evening that the University Police officers inspected Ivory Tower, Potomac House, Thurston, Fulbright, Munson and Madison halls, Townhouse Row and The West End.
But that didn't happen. At least not in its entirety.
The truth is, UPD only conducted inspections in two residence halls. In the Alpha Epsilon Pi townhouse on 22nd Street, a drug bust resulted from a routine health and safety inspection. And in Thurston, officers responded to the odor of marijuana in the hallway.
The record has been set straight – but it took two days after the events took place. The University did not release any communications to address students' concerns regarding what types of searches were happening across campus. And when a small piece of information was released, it was unclear and failed to answer major questions.
It’s standard practice for health and safety inspectors to examine campus housing twice in the fall, once in the spring and once in the summer.
For the most part, students know the drill: A health and safety representative does a visual check to see that smoke detectors are intact, prohibited items such as extension cords are not present and that students haven't snuck pets inside. Officials leave a tag on the door to indicate that an inspection occurred if the resident isn't there.
University spokeswoman Michelle Sherrard said Tuesday that the inspections Monday night were routine.
For nearly two days, the most tangible piece of information available to students came from the campus crime log which indicates that Monday evening, UPD busted students for drug law violations at 605 22nd St. and in Thurston Hall. UPD Chief Kevin Hay eventually responded for comment, but it took nearly two days.
That means for two days, students were left largely in the dark, left only with questions that circulated on Twitter, Facebook and across listservs about whether UPD officers would enter their rooms as part of alleged "raids."
Some suspected that the University had broken room inspection protocol while conducting sweeps in fraternity housing. And while officials say that was false, the widespread panic among the student body should have been quelled earlier. It is unacceptable that the administration did not release information earlier to calm the barrage of rumors.
If the University had been up front with students and stated that there were only two busts in specifically targeted areas, tension would have quickly dissipated. It is the University’s job to dispel rumors and tell students what is going on.
UPD itself is not a transparent institution. Records are closed. Officers wield the authority to arrest and enforce the rule of law – but there is little room for public oversight. Though commissioned by the Metropolitan Police Department, UPD operates at a standard of secrecy.
In such circumstances, it becomes even more critical to maintain an open dialogue with the community and provide information.
UPD blatantly failed in that duty this week.
Campus police exist to create a sense of safety and security. But in this case, UPD did more to incite panic and concern than mitigate it.
The days-long silence that followed only perpetuated a feeling of distrust.
Why do you believe GW? Why not look into what started the rumors. They are very persistent.
It is believable that the rumors are true, and if they are, GW would lie about.
How about you do some investigating and ask questions rather than just be a mouthpiece for the University.
And you guys wonder why all the students hate the Hatchet and rarely read it?!!?
Almost everyone involved with the raids, student-wise, who know anything about the true circumstances behind them have been the ones spreading rumors and misinformation to avoid public incrimination. The school has a vested interest in not coming clean because of their desire to protect their image. The same goes for the offending frats/students. No one is telling the truth and i doubt we’ll read it here anytime soon. Unless you’re good friends with greek leadership you’ll probably never know what happened.
Dear Hatchet,
Look in the mirror. Your blog article promoted this sense of confusion and panic.
This is typical hatchet nonsense trying to place the blame for their own mistakes somewhere else.
BREAKING NEWS: You’re a tabloid, not a newspaper.
This isn’t true. For starters, these were not your standard health and safety checks. Standards heath and safety checks are not performed by UPD wearing gloves. They are just a sweep done by your (insert whatever silly RA name) to determine if you have extension cords, a goldfish, a toaster, whatever. Also, these raids occured in more areas than this article reports. While maybe not in all of those dorms, raids occured in many greek life residences. That’s because a drug dealer, who is a member of the greek community and who’s customers were mostly greek life members, got busted.
Perhaps the Hatchet should make sure they have the facts before continuing to report the news. It’s sad when the readers trust the commenters more than the actual writers.
“It is the University’s job to dispel rumors and tell students what is going on.”
One may argue that it is the GW Hatchet’s responsibility NOT to perpetuate rumors without ANY clear facts. If the university responded to every rumor posted on twitter or GW secrets, it would make us students appear dumber than our peers spreading the rumors already do.
The GW Hatchet blog post was a joke and all the idiots that threw all their things away because of the impending “raids” deserve to have lost it all for reading this juicycampus rag
students see cops taking evidence out of a frat house. hour later a couple students see cops at room during an administrative search in thurston. students tweet that it’s a raid. hilarity ensues.
these searches happen every day. my next door neighbor got busted smoking in his bathroom earlier this year. that didn’t make the hatchet. why? because i wasn’t a dumbass and tweeting at the hatchet about a “raid”. the students who have been hyping this BS make us all look like idiots. keep your shit out of sight, dont smoke in your room, and nobody will bother you. trust me, 4 years and no problems. still had a great time, just smart about it.
on an unrelated note, the university should consider the rumors a success in ridding the dumbest of the dumb of their contraband. perhaps they started the rumor.
your facts are WRONG. UPD conducted searches in the many other greek houses during that time as well. Both on the row and off.
Oh dear… Where to start?
1. Room “raids” or “searches” aren’t conducted by UPD. They’re done by representatives from housing. UPD identifies the problem by sniffing doors and calls out a RA or Area Coordinator who does the search. UPD just collects evidence. To call that business a “raid” is just plain idiotic. They don’t bust in a door and go in guns (or pepper spray) blazing. They still have to work under the pretenses of “law”. Think about the contract students sign that allows any representative from Housing to enter your room at any time. If you (the student) are just renting the space, then by contract a “Housing Representative” is your landlord and allows UPD to come in to your room to take the evidence they find. It sucks but that’s the price you pay for education.
2. Health and Safety inspections are done by the Office of Health and Safety, not UPD. They (like Area Coordinators) are representatives of Housing who have the authority to come in to your room at any time to check to see if there are things in violation of safety codes (i.e. extension cords, certain lamps, covered smoke detectors). Idiots who leave their stuff sitting out on tables, keep their drawers open on their desks stuffed full of weed or weapons are the idiots who get caught. Health and Safety inspectors see the violation (drugs), call out UPD who in turn calls an Area Coordinator out who searches your room. These violations probably make up a very small portion of drug activity on campus considering there’s over 7000 rooms on campus with each room having an average of 3 bedrooms per suite. There’s probably only like 4 Health and Safety inspectors (the GW website lists 4 under the directory) who do the Health and Safety checks. They don’t pull open cabinets and stuff. They do quick peeks in plain view areas: kitchen, behind the sofa where you got 3 power strips plugged in, check all the smoke detectors, check the fire extinguisher, make sure all the exhaust ports are clean and clear, no holes in the walls or anything is falling apart, take a mold sample, and bam, done. Like one guy mentioned, stop leaving your shit out if you don’t want to get caught!
3. Don’t you think if there was a dealer busted that UPD would have called in the DC Police to help them? Back when I went to school at GW, DC Police would pull a wagon up to the frat houses on G Street and 21st and F and just hook all the kids up in the house. Then they’d commence the utter and complete decimation of everything in the house to find the drugs. The way the University conducts room searches is so lackadaisical and inefficient that I’m positive drugs were probably overlooked many many many times during these “raids”. Also the way the Hatchet is, if a big time “drug dealer” was busted then their names would have been published and the “list” would have come out already. UPD does arrests in conjunction with DCMPD so I haven’t seen anything in their (DCMPD) CIC reports online stating any students were arrested for drugs recently.
4. About UPD not releasing info: if anything, they’re doing a fantastic job of protecting people’s identities in these situations. Yeah, it sucks when you see a students name pop up on public records but UPD can’t control that, especially if the student was arrested. DCMPD doesn’t have to follow the same privacy laws or the Cleary Act like UPD does. That’s what media is for! They dig the info up and provide it because the police won’t. Give me one example where UPD provided information on anyone where that information was published in a forum like the GW Hatchet (the exception being non-GW affiliated people or former students). You can’t.
5. What, do you propose, should UPD do to quell these rumors? What if they were doing raids? Why would I tell people that I’m doing raids? Isn’t that the total opposite of what the police do? I’m sure Chief Hay was just laughing his ass off at this turn of events. I would. UPD’s main goal is to help provide a safe environment to assist people with the education process. The nitty gritty of the whole thing is drugs are illegal. Stop being stupid and getting caught. You think they want to bust everyone for a roach or a bong? I think they have their hands full with the burglaries and robberies. It’s college. You’re gonna smoke and drink. I think they of all people understand that. It’s more important when you go out at night to a buddies house and get robbed at gunpoint.
Also haha to all the dumb asses who flushed their stashes or dropped them out windows because of this mess. Shame on all of you thinking UPD are real Narc SWAT squads going around tearing up the whole campus.
I am finding “Off Campus’” point number 3 a bit troublesome. First, until relatively recently most GWU frat houses were private property. The UPD had very limited, if any, control or power to regulate what transpired in those buildings. Now, however, most greek-letter groups have on-campus facilities falling under the jurisdiction of the University’s housing policies as do all other types/forms/places of university owned student housing.
I cannot imagine the MPD officer’s “hooking” (I guess that means “handcuffing”) residents of the old G-Street “frat row” homes unless they were executing a search warrant. The DC police need to first submit their application for a search warrant to an Assistant US Attorney who then decides whether to ask a judge to sign it.
Further, the word “decimate” correctly means to “reduce by one tenth” although it is commonly used to mean “destroy.” The purpose of a search warrant is to find evidence of a crime, not to destroy property. MPD officers who unnecessarily destroy private property during the execution of a search warrant subject themselves and the DC government to financial claims by the property owners.
And, the officers who engage in such conduct are subject to Trial Boards and other forms of internal investigations which can lead to their termination, suspension without pay, or other sanctions. In some situations they can be prosecuted themselves.
In short, executing a search warrant is serious business and not taken lightly. If the actions “Off Campus” alleges really took place at some point in the past at a then-GW frat house, they occurred only because the police convinced a federal prosecutor who in turn convinced a judge that “probable cause” existed that evidence of a crime would be found via a search of the premises.
While executing a search warrant the police can take reasonable steps to protect themselves and to avoid having the items for which they are searching concealed or destroyed. But, a search warrant is not a license to damage property or to engage in lawless conduct.
Hatchet, you state that the University needs to dispel rumors. If you read the Crime Log, http://www.gwhatchet.com/2013/03/07/crime-log-299/, the last entry clearly reports what had happened. Maybe you guys should just read your paper and stop inciting rumors.
Is the Hatchet and Fox News related? They both spew out a lot of misleading info yo!
Alright, alright…I’ll settle the issue here and now. Some student broke into my house last Monday and stole my cherished bong! Had to set my UPD loose to go and find it. I’ve had that laddy since my college days back at Buckminster! Enjoy spring breaks ya fools!
The Hatchet is and always will be a slanderous publication until it’s actually partnered with the University or establishes some sort basis for judging what is credible news and what isn’t. Until then, enjoy the rumors, criticisms,conjecture, and hearsay. What happened to news sources being investigative?
THIS IS NOT TRUE. I know of multiple other greek townhouses that were inspected too.