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This Just In

When in doubt, blame the victim

Although the BU campus is patrolled by MBTA police, the Boston Police Department, the Brookline Police Department, and the Boston University Police Department (BUPD), the school has seen an overwhelming number of accidents and crimes over the past year.

So it was this past Monday that Boston University embarked on its first-ever Safety Week, a well-intentioned five-day initiative designed to make students more aware of their urban surroundings. Volunteers handed out mock “walking violations” to confused Comm Ave pedestrians, female students beat down cops in workshops teaching rape-defense techniques, and a model dorm room was torched in the name of fire safety.

• Boston Police Department
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• Boston University
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• Colin Riley
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Yet, over the course of those five days, three cyclists (at least one of whom is a BU student) were hit by cars on campus. Additionally, the BUPD reported that two female students had been sexually assaulted and that there was an attempted break-in on Bay State Road.

There are limits, cautions BU spokesman Colin Riley, to what administrators and officers can do.

“There are risks and dangers in an urban area,” he says. “There’s a lot of personal responsibility involved.”

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