A rape was reported at Otterbein last week. The incident was reported on Oct. 25. No crime alert was issued to campus, Otterbein police said, because the suspect was in custody and was not a threat to the campus community.
The investigation was later closed and marked unfounded.
Otterbein360 staff members requested the incident report from OPD but were denied. This comes on the heels of another reported on-campus crime.
In May 2013, theater professor Ed Vaughan was accused of sexual imposition. The story broke on two local professional news networks before Otterbein360 ran a similar story on Oct. 3.
The second paragraph from Otterbein360’s story reads as follows:
“Following an alleged incident with a female student during a performance last spring, Vaughan, 64, was accused of a third-degree misdemeanor according to court records.”
Vaughan was put on leave before retiring over the summer following the accusation.
This story, however, scratches the surface of another ongoing conflict at Otterbein. In a September 2012 editorial published in the Tan & Cardinal newspaper, the staff commented on a change in campus police records policy. In short, the Otterbein Police Department refuses to give police reports to Otterbein360 or any other party making a request.
All incidents have been reduced to a daily crime log entry. Without access to full incident reports it is impossible to inform the campus community about crimes or give updates about ongoing situations.
Notice in the excerpt from Otterbein360’s story about the May incident involving Vaughan: “according to court records.” Our story was written based on an incident report received from Franklin County Municipal Court, not Otterbein Police — although OPD has the original incident report.
Otterbein’s crime log reported that a sexual imposition occurred on May 11 and was reported the next day. The court records show that charges were filed on Aug. 26.
But with a three-month delay in information — and no notice or update from OPD — there would be no way of knowing about this, or any, incident except through a one-line crime log or court records.
It’s time to change the way the campus community receives information about on-campus crime. If Westerville police respond to a crime, the records produced are public and subject to inspection by anybody. Why isn’t the same true for the Otterbein Police Department?
