Once a year, UH is required to release a report of the University’s crime statistics for the past year known as the Clery Report. UH released this report in October, allowing current and prospective students, faculty and staff to see whether or not crime increased within the past year.
The 2013 report also compares the statistics for 2011 and 2012, allowing the reader to be aware of the main criminal issues that have worsened or improved over the past few years.
UH Police Department Chief Ceaser Moore Jr. met with students recently to explain the report and answer questions students had about the report.
“Accuracy plays a huge part in why the report is released so late in the year,” Moore said. “The department takes the extra time from the end of the report year to their due date for the report to make sure that their statistics are correct.”
Burglary crimes stood out among the statistics. There were 39 burglary cases in 2013, a major decrease from the 87 cases from 2012. Nevertheless, it is still a number that causes concern. Moore said the high number of burglary cases in the report are misleading.
Moore also said burglary cases are counted for every forced entry reported. For example, if a campus apartment is broken into and if it has four tenants and each tenant’s room is broken into, that would count as five offenses.
One of the other concerns students had was the rise in forcible sex offenses. The report shows the number increased to ten in 2013, eight more than from the two offenses in 2012.
Moore said one of the reasons for the rise in sexual offenses was due in part to UHPD’s encouragement for survivors to come forward. He spoke of UHPD’s various resources for survivors of these crimes as well as prevention programs. Additionally, the department provides programs such as the Sexual Assault Awareness and Rape Aggression Defense program, as mentioned in the report.
Instead of waiting until the Clery Report is released to act on the trouble areas and the crimes that need the most attention, UHPD is constantly looking at crime statistics throughout the year.
As for how prevention programs were worked on, Moore said, “Prevention planning is done throughout the year rather than just looking at the report.”
