Last Tuesday evening, March 20, a female student was grabbed from behind by an unknown male while walking between Lake Marion and the baseball field.
The incident was reported to public safety and email and text message alerts were sent out to the Saint Xavier community to make them aware of the situation.
In 2017, SXU was named a runner-up for the safest private or non-profit four-year college. With such recognition, it kind of makes you question why and how this situation could have happened. The Xavierite staff believes that some more action can be taken to ensure that something like this will never happen again.
One of the main issues at hand is the lack of lighting around Lake Marion. It is a very poorly lit area and for those who desire to take an evening stroll around the lake, you have to be weary of your surroundings.
It is an unsettling feeling that this person could have been hiding in the bushes or roaming around where they could not be seen. The way to solve this problem could be to place more light posts around the Lake Marion area.
This would allow those to be able to see where they are going as well as to feel safer knowing that they can see what is around them. Another thing that can be done is to have public safety drive around the area of the lake to make sure there is no suspicious activity going on or people walking around that should not be there.
Usually no matter where you are on campus, you see a public safety vehicle parked or driving around keeping watch of what is going on. They are typically very quick to respond to requests or problems that people have.
They are even nice enough sometimes to give you a ride to where you need to go if the weather is bad or if you have to walk a little further. However, there are some occasions when you see them chatting with one another from their vehicles not really paying attention to what is going on.
Could this situation have been avoided if they kept a more watchful eye on what was going on around them? Possibly. Long story short, public safety should maybe be a little more attentive to their surroundings.
Overall, this campus feels like a safe environment but when incidents like this occur, it is a little unsettling to know that they happened and can happen at any time. If the proper precautions are taken, situations like this will not happen again.
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