Police Beat

KATY BURNELL

Oct. 2- At 3:19 p.m., an officer on bike patrol reported activating his lights to pull over a 21-year-old male commuting student who had allegedly violated state one-way traffic code by exiting the inbound lane on double-drive on his bicycle.  The student told the officer that he was not familiar with Va. code 46.2-806, but the officer maintained that ignorance is not an excuse for breaking the law. Instead of ticketing the offender, the officer referred his case to the JRB.

Oct. 2- At 9:50 p.m., Residence Life officials summoned police to the second floor of Russell Hall, where they directed officers to search a room that the administrators believed would contain drug paraphernalia.  Officers confirmed these suspicions when they uncovered a Gatorade-bottle bong and trace amounts of marijuana.  The two 18-year-old female residents, who arrived home to find police digging through their belongings half-way through the search, were referred to Residence Life.

Oct. 2- At 10:50 p.m., a Simpson Library employee asked police to come process a would-be petty larcenist after finding $36-worth of stolen goods in his backpack.  The employee caught and detained the 20-year-old male Mason resident, who had tried to escape with a banner celebrating the U.S. Constitution, until police arrived. The Library reported that an identical U.S. Constitution banner had been stolen later last week. That investigation remains on-going.

Oct. 4- At 10:50 p.m., a Residence Life employee asked an officer to supervise ten 18-year-old Russell Hall males as they returned a ping-pong table to Randolph Hall that police believe they had removed from Randolph earlier that night.  The investigating officer referred all ten students to the JRB.

Oct. 4- At 11:40 p.m., an officer was dispatched to the Campanile after a student tipped the dispatcher that a drunken man was urinating in the vicinity. The officer found the offender, 18-year-old Russell Hall resident Morganl Cohen, severely intoxicated in front of Randolph Hall. Cohen was arrested on two counts after police say he repeatedly verbally assaulted the officer.

Oct. 6- At 12:15 a.m. Fredericksburg Police repeatedly responded to reports of a loud party at an off-campus residence on Deerwood Dr behind Central Park.Officers arrested four 21-year-old male commuter students for allegeedly violating the noise ordinance. UMW Seniors Eric Schneider, Brian Stenger, Andrew Federspiel and Stanley Kennedy were released on summons.

Oct. 6- At 9:06 p.m., police discovered a man listed as a Missing Person in Manassas on the third floor of Woodard Campus Center after responding to a concerned student’s report of a middle-aged stranger brandishing a knife.  The knife in question was a one-inch blade that police found in the trespasser’s pocket. Police were alarmed when the suspect told them why he was on campus.  According to the officer’s report, the offender, an unshaven white male with black hair wearing a checkered shirt and jeans said “he and some guy had hooked up and were kind of seeing each other, but he was supposed to meet another guy in a dorm later on.”  After entering the man’s name in a police database officers learned that he was in his mid-thirties, and had no prior criminal history. They issued him with a trespass warning, and escorted him off-campus.