The SGA is organizing an effort this year to educate students on basic rights, focusing on an approach to dealing with resident assistants and police.
Part of the effort, Student Government Association officials said, would train students to act as “legal observers,” – volunteers that would by foot or by car, search for students in trouble who may be at risk of their rights being violated.
SGA President Emma Simson said the plan could prove particularly useful during sporting events or concerts, when police tend to crack down on underage drinking or activities they deem unsafe. As neutral observers, Simson said, trained volunteers would seek out and report whether police actions violated student rights.
Although SGA officials have repeatedly said an incident at Leonardtown in November involving the arrest of two students led to the idea of legal observers, complaints from students at other events has also heightened concern, Simson has said. The Leonardtown incident sparked an internal police investigation that concluded in July that policy was breached as a party there was broken up.
“The Leonardtown thing really helped to make it clear that there were issues with how students were interacting with police,” Simson said.
The legal significance of the trained observers is unclear, however. University Police spokeswoman Maj. Cathy Atwell said she couldn’t think of any reason why police would yield any special privileges to legal observers or unfettered access to areas such as apartments or dorm rooms where enforcement is taking place.
While Simson and Carson said while they feel police do their job well the majority of the time. Students unfamiliar with dealing with the police should know their rights to improve the legal consequences that may arise in the aftermath of a police encounter.
“I want to make sure students are being protected by the police and not attacked – not that that’s a common police practice,” said Carson. “I don’t want anyone to think I’m on the police, I just want to make sure they’re following their policy.”
Carson admits the plan’s goals may be too lofty, and expressed doubt over whether students would want to give up a night out to go on patrol. The outcome of the proposal, he said, will center on providing students with pamphlets of information on what rights and responsibilities they have when confronted with police or RAs.
Simson hopes a program will be available by spring.
“This year we’re going to push students to bring incidents when they feel their rights were violated to us,” Simson said.
Contact reporter Alan J. McCombs at mccombsdbk@gmail.com
