A handful of recent robberies in Boston University residences — apparently enabled by faulty locks and doors installed on old buildings in South Campus and on Bay State Road — brings to light an avoidable, but dangerous, personal security issue: BU’s low-quality locks and doorknobs and the administration’s complacency with lax security in older dorms are leaving too many students unsafe on campus.
An alleged Saturday evening break-in and theft in South Campus raises many questions about where students are safest on campus, how reports of theft are handled by the administration and the BU Police Department and why BU simply hasn’t installed better locks in the decades-old brownstones and apartment buildings students live in. It is unacceptable for expensive housing — with the convenience of on-campus living but a string of problems from rodents to poor temperature control — to lack high-quality, secure locks.
Anecdotal evidence abounds of students who have had a bad lock, a tricky doorknob, a vestibule door that could be jimmied open or a lock that could be forced open with a credit card or hairpin. While only a small portion of residents with unsecured doors has fallen victim to criminal activity facilitated in part by easy access to residences and individual rooms and apartments, thefts and break-ins do occur.
The damages of a break-in are material and psychological. Students who have had items stolen from their rooms are not only down a laptop or other valuable item, but also lack a sense of security in their academic-year home. The situation introduces a series of disconcerting questions for the theft victim and the community. Are people with knowledge of dorm layouts and room capacities perpetrating crimes when they know residents are gone? How would a thief react if caught by a resident?
School administrators may want to ask themselves: Is BU ready to brush aside the outcome of any attempted burglary, with full knowledge that dormitories could — and should — be more secure than they are?
Like the alleged sexual assault in Warren Towers last weekend, recent reported break-ins — one attempted break-in and a separate break-in and theft on Bay State Road in the last two weeks and this incident in South Campus — leave students questioning where they are safe on campus, if not in their own rooms and residences. While increasingly reported thefts at the Fitness and Recreation Center worried some administrators, students may reasonably be challenged about leaving personal items in unsecured public areas like cubby holes. Dorm thefts from locked rooms are a greater cause for worry.
Replacement of pilfered electronics is an onerous cost for students, who are not covered by any sort of dorm insurance or assisted by BU in replacing lost items. Still, the worst-case scenario for unsecured rooms may be worse than missing iPods — and BU must make sure the security scenario on campus improves soon.
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