School of Social Work (Urbana, Illinois)

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On October 31, 1995, a tragedy occured on these campus grounds. A woman, a research programmer for the Department of Chemistry, was raped and murdered at this location. The perpetrator, a university grad student, committed suicide later that night, though it took some time to connect the two events together.

After the incident, the University took steps to improve campus security, reevaluating building entry policies, and improving lighting along streets and walkways. Once it was known that the victim knew her murderer, policies were instituted to inform the students and staff on date rape prevention, what to do if the victim of stalking, and other forms of harassment.

Some student and staff groups claimed that UIUC wasn't doing enough for campus safety, while other claimed that the event was overblown since the crime was not random. As time passed, the crime started to fade from campus memory, and some believe that the University is trying to white-wash the incident away to protect its reputation.

While not attempting to glorify the event, it is something that both the University and student body should acknowledge. Policies can only do so much before one should take steps for their own personal safety. Whether it's recognizing potential stalkers, avoiding deserted areas at night, or worse, walking alone at night, while drunk, people do have to step up and take some responsibility for themselves.

As an alumnus who was an undergrad on campus in 1995, I hope that nothing like this ever happens again, but without reminding people of what can happen, events have an unfortunate tendency to repeat over time.

Here are two links with more information. The first is about victim, the second is an archived news story.

www.scs.uiuc.edu/~skypen/Pia/index.html

www.illinimedia.com/di/archives/1995/November/13/p1-rad...