When a government and politics major angrily yelled out “F— this” to his female political philosophy teaching assistant as he threw a blank quiz to the floor, he never expected it would lead police officers to follow him to class the next week.
But that’s exactly what happened. A week after the incident, his professor, Fred Alfrord, sent him an e-mail telling him the zero on the quiz was the least of the trouble he was in. He and the department had reported the incident to University Police, which began to investigate the student as a possible threat.
The next time the student went to class, classmates told him police officers wearing plain clothes were sitting in the classroom.
“It’s just amazing to have people look at you as if you’re the kid from Virginia Tech,” said the student, whose case has not yet been examined by the Office of Student Conduct. “This reminds me of the ’50s, when people were calling each other Communists.”
He was so embarrassed that he stopped going to class, he said. The student told his story and provided The Diamondback with the e-mail he received from his professor on the condition that his name not be revealed.
Students such as this one who are suspected by police of being threats to the community say police and faculty are not treating them fairly because they never ask for their sides of the stories or even inform them that they are being investigated. Though legal experts say police and faculty aren’t violating any laws, the issue raises questions about the amount of power police have over students’ daily lives.
Police say threat referrals rarely stem from classroom experiences and usually come from students who say they are being stalked. But at least two classroom cases at this university have been documented since the Virginia Tech shootings. After Virginia Tech, reports of threats to police have spiked, and they are taking more care to scrutinize each report of peculiar behavior by students.
“After Virginia Tech, any angry acting-out is taken very seriously,” Alford wrote to the student in a reprimanding e-mail.
University Police say they only use undercover police work in extreme cases, but would not disclose if there have been any cases recently.
“We do not have time to watch specific students,” said University Police Lt. Bob Mueck. “But if we felt it was dangerous, we would send someone to follow them.” Mueck would not go in to detail about what those situations would be.
But students who told The Diamondback they were followed by undercover police officers did not classify their own cases as “extreme.” Being tailed by police made them afraid that even the slightest false move could get them kicked out of the university or even arrested.
Another student said police officers in plain clothes met him outside his classroom after a number of reports of his peculiar behavior in class, including photographing his classmates and performing martial arts moves in the hallway, according to a summons from the Office of Student Conduct. He said Office of Student Conduct officials treated him “like crap” and believes officers violated his civil rights by following him. He was never told who reported him as a threat.
But civil rights advocates agreed with police that placing undercover officers in threat assessment cases is not illegal. Fritz Mulhauser, a staff attorney at the American Civil Liberties Union, said that while the undercover officers might be violating university values of free speech by sitting in on class sessions designed for uninhibited exchange, making the students themselves uncomfortable, there is no real violation of the accused student’s or the rest of the class’ civil liberties.
“What’s important is the ethical point, that university police should have very clear guidelines for when they take the unusual step of disguising themselves as they do their work,” Mulhauser said in an e-mail.
Mueck said police typically question the professor and other students in the class in such incidents, but never the person who is accused, before deciding whether to send in undercover officers. He argued it is actually good for the suspected student to keep knowledge of the report secret from him.
“If the student is already going through stress, and I invite police, it will make the student more stressed,” he said.
Kathy Beardsley, assistant dean of the behavorial and social sciences college, said protecting other students and professors is a higher priority than informing the suspected student of the report against him. The student’s side of the story comes out during hearings with the Office of Student Conduct, she said.
“I’m sure for the student it’s upsetting, but it’s a process the campus has,” Beardsley said.
Mueck denied that police clock the times and locations of ID swipes or keep track of books checked out from McKeldin Library to keep tabs on all students, saying they are more likely to examine criminal backgrounds and driving records.
Contact reporter Nathan Cohen at cohendbk@gmail.com.
