Crime on campus

The number of felonies and arrests on American college campuses, as reported to the U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION under the terms of the CLERY CAMPUS SECURITY ACT. In 2003, the 6,412 campuses reporting acknowledged 7 murders, 10 cases of negligent manslaughter, 2,379 forcible sex offenses, 55 nonforcible sex offenses, 1,420 robberies, 2,218 aggravated assaults, 23,260 burglaries, 6,426 motor-vehicle thefts, 1,046 cases of arson and 71 hate crimes. American colleges reported 30,677 arrests for liquor-law violations, 12,456 arrests for drug-law violations and 1,116 arrests for weapons-law violations. Clery Act reports give no indication of which crimes are committed by college students and which by campus intruders. Of the more than 35,500 crimes reported on American college campuses, nearly 75% occurred at public two-and four-year colleges. Colleges are not, however, required to report the outcomes of on-campus, collegesponsored investigations of each crime, and there is no way of knowing how many reports of crimes were dismissed outright or how many crimes reported as lesser violations were, in fact, more serious. Not included in the tabulation of crimes is high-tech electronic cheating, or e-cheating, which is, at least technically, a crime falling under a wide variety of categories—all of them difficult to pursue in court. (See also SCHOOL SECURITY.)