Following the events of last Wednesday—which I assume we will continue to discuss until the fundamentalists return this week—the campus was struck by wave upon wave of rumor: Who threw the coffee? It was a white girl who got away. Then the police tackled a black student? Two? No, he was staff. Three? The protestors tripped someone?
The DePauw did an excellent job of taking the time to get the facts for their Friday issue, and we too should employ careful restraint and patience before we act on any one version of the many stories from that and future days. One privileged point of view expressed in the days following Wednesday—we really need a good name for it; I’m partial to the easy Protestgate or the more obscure Jedghazi—was the footage from the Greencastle Police Department’s body cameras. While not privy to the material itself, I can confirm that city and school officials did view the footage to gain a better understanding of what exactly transpired.
Following the murders of Walter Scott, Freddie Gray and especially Michael Brown, police body cameras have become a hot topic amongst not only police departments but also the public. Police favor body cameras in order to show “their” side of the story, while the public feels safer knowing that officers can be held accountable for their actions. It should be noted that the Greencastle Police Department has had body cameras since before the devices’ recent stint in the limelight.
In an address to the school, President Casey stated that he has made available funds for the installation of more security cameras around campus. This move increases both the real and perceived safety of students. I believe that these funds should also go towards purchasing body cameras for our on-duty Public Safety officers. Public Safety does an excellent job of protecting the campus already, but one never can have too much transparency. These devices are not cheap—and storing the video in the newfangled “cloud” is even more expensive—but a change in how safe students feel on campus will not come about through good intentions alone. In fact, change is usually expensive
Additionally, the school should advocate in the strongest terms possible for the Putnam County Sherriff’s Department to purchase body cameras. The department should have invested in these last year following the sentencing of deputy T.J. Smith for two counts of deprivation of civil rights, but that is another, loosely-related matter. President Obama has ordered the Justice Department to provide $75 million worth of grants over the next three years to police departments which seek to equip themselves with body cameras. Hopefully, the Sherriff’s Department will take the federal government up on its offer to increase the security felt by county residents.
The conversation regarding campus climate and safety will continue to evolve in the next few weeks. As we learned after last year’s Day of Inclusion, figuring out what concrete actions to take is one of the many challenges facing a Balkanized campus. Hopefully, I have identified one that all DePauw stakeholders can get behind.
-McMurtry is a senior English literature and computer science major from Fort Wright, Kentucky.