Student arrests during Homecoming decline
There were no incidents at this year’s Homecoming bonfire for the first time in recent history.
By Conrad Scoville, The Dartmouth Staff
Published on Monday, October 26, 2009
Dartmouth Safety and Security responded to 10 Good Samaritan calls over Homecoming weekend, four of which resulted in students being transported to Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center and charges of criminal possession of alcohol, according to interim director of Safety and Security Keiselim Montas. In a buck of tradition, no students touched the Homecoming bonfire on Friday or rushed the field at Saturday’s football game.
There were also three arrests for non-alcohol related charges — two for simple assault and one for using false identification — according to Hanover Police.
“We did not have a single incident of any kind during the bonfire or during the game,” Montas said. “And that is a first.”
Hanover Police Chief Nicholas Giaccone said he could not recall a bonfire when there were no arrests.
Six students were arrested at last years’s bonfire. Two students were also treated for burn injuries last year after falling in the dying embers of the fire.
Giaccone said that he could not attribute the low number of incidents at the bonfire and football game to any particular factor, although he noted that the size of the crowd at the bonfire “seemed a little smaller.”
It also rained during both events.
There were 29 officers with the power of arrest at the bonfire, fewer than in previous years, Giaccone said.
Montas said that the intensity of this year’s bonfire, along with consistent warnings against touching the fire and rushing the field, may have contributed to a lack of incidents.
“I think the fire got really, really hot, and [students] saw that it was very, very hot,” he said.
There were a total of seven arrests over this year’s Homecoming weekend. There were 11 arrests in 2008, and 12 students were arrested in 2007.
The number of Good Sam calls, however, has been growing. There were six or seven last year, but only one Good Sam call in 2007, Safety and Security director Harry Kinne, who is currently interim associate Dean of the College, previously told The Dartmouth.
Despite the decline in arrests, the four-hour period between 12 a.m. and 4 a.m. on Saturday saw more police activity than at any point in recent years, Giaccone said.
“It was busier than we’ve been used to at any particular time,” he said, referring to previous years’ Homecoming weekends.
There were five charges issued during that four-hour period, including two calls to police about fights, according to the police log.
Montas praised the Class of 2013, describing the low incidence rate as “a challenge for classes to come.”