Mirror - Vol. 24, No. 08 - November 19, 1998

              Volume 24 Number 8 The Image of Fairfield Thursday, November 19, 1998
Security is watching...
Cameras on the dorms are monitoring parking lots at all times
By Terence Chang
CONTRIBUTING WRITER
In an attempt to stop crime, the
Fairfield University security department
is starting to use advanced technology that
can videotape intruders and students, as
they walk around campus.
Director of security, Todd
Pelazza, said that closed circuit televi-sions
are the latest addition to the depart-ment,
which this past summer also ap-proved
a new mobile dispatch center The
closed circuit television start up cost is
approximately $24,000 with minimal
maintaining fee, Pelazza said.
"The cameras will assist our de-partment
in an attempt to monitor the ac-tivity
in the parking lots," Pelazza said.
Three mounted cameras are now
in place on top of buildings, to monitor
the adjacent parking lots they face. One
camera is on the northeast corner of Cam-pion
Hall to survey the Jogues parking
lot. The second camera is on the south-east
corner of Jogues Hall and will cover
the Regis parking lot. The third camera
is on top ofAlumni Hall in the southwest
corner to monitor the commuter parking
lots behind the gym.
The cameras will relay images
24 hours a day to a single monitor at the
dispatch center, where the images are re-corded,
Pelazza said. Then, if an acci-dent
or auto theft occurs, the tapes will
be reviewed. The cameras come equipped
with high speed zoom lenses that allow
for extreme close-ups of people or cars
in the lots.
"The cameras are only good to
deter vandalism in the parking lots and to
prevent people from getting away from
hit-and-runs but it seems as though they
may be infringing on our rights," said
Greg Mullen'01.
"It seems as though the initial
benefit is for the students, despite the high
cost," said FUSA President Mike
Piagentini. "This is a step in the right di-rection
to alleviate these problems. Se-curity
has been working hard to fix these
problems by such measures as increased
bike patrols".
Cameras were put in place,
Pelazza said, because in the 1997 calen-dar
year there were six auto thefts and
two more in the spring of 1998. From
1994 to 1996 there were only a total of
four auto thefts.
Since the 1995 calendar year,
overall reported crime has risen on
Fairfield's campus by 32 percent, from
112 incidents in 1995 to 148 incidents
in 1997. The incidents include larceny,
theft, burglary, substance abuse, and one
rape, which occurred in 1995.
Pelazza said that last spring the
security department worked with a Con-necticut
State Police SpecialTask Force
after the University's rising trend of auto
thefts and they found that there are two
auto theft groups working independently
out of Bridgeport and Norwalk.
The two groups have hit the
Fairfield County region hard and a similar
rise in auto thefts has been seen at nearby
Sacred Heart University and Fairfield train
station.
The Special Task Force surveyed
the campus for several days and found that
these groups are not working at any set time
of the day or week. This makes it extremely
difficult to predict or plan a trap, said Pelazza.
Two major incidents last year in-volved
car chases and the ramming of secu-rity
cars was the result of both of them. One
chase was at 5 a.m. and the culprit rammed
a security car seven times before escaping.
The other chase took place during
the day, behind Alumni Hall, and resulted in
a neck sprain for one of the security officers.
"The motive is not to focus on stu-dents
but to help secure their cars on cam-pus,"
Piagentini said.
As a result of the new closed cir-cuit
system and other technical advances,
continued on pg. 3
photo: Nick Ouimet
The camera on top of Campion Hall
surveys the Jogues parking lot.
photo: Nick Ouimet
Several students attended the meeting, but few eceived useful answers. While various points of law were
discussed, the ambiguities of individual situations stood out moe than anything else. See pg. 4 fordetails.
Inside this edition...
FU receives
$10 million to
renovate
residence halls,
see p. 4 for details
Reduce, reuse,
recycle,
Campus Life gives you
the environmental
know-how, see p. 6
Student reacts
to slogan on
rape lecture,
See p. 8, for one male's
perspective
I Still Know
What You Did
Last Summer
creeps into
theaters, ^e P.n
Fairfield
bedeviled by
Duke,
Get the play by play
on p. 14