City Government

Monkey Business Trumps Sexual Assault When It Comes To Outrage

THREE OF THE “OUT OF ORDER” BSU EMERGENCY PHONES

PERSPECTIVE! We need to get things in Perspective.

When a woman was assaulted near the BSU campus Sunday night, it drew only a couple paragraphs in the DAILY PAPER. There was no outrage among citizens, no call for extra security (while several security phones are out of order covered by plastic), no calls to alert the public and students about the dangerous environment at the University.

But a drunken attack on a MONKEY puts Boise in the national limelight–even international notoriety. We don’t defend the monkey escapade, but it probably would be fair to say more police resources, media attention and public outrage was focused on the monkey business than the alleged sexual assault. Why?

For one thing, we have become accustomed to assaults on women. There is so much risk BSU has placed security phones with flashing blue lights around the campus, but never mind if some of them are “out of order.” Meanwhile Zoo Boise struggles to maintain its national accreditation with security cameras, better locks, and patrols.

Amazing there is no call for similar measures to insure safety of BSU coeds.

Comments & Discussion

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  1. Grumpy ole guy
    Nov 23, 2012, 1:30 pm

    I think that BSU has a long-standing policy of trying to suppress “bad news”, for fear the public will form a negative opinion of the institution.

    That said, it is an unfortunate condition of our lives that attacks on individuals are much more common that those on our simian brothers and sisters, so the man bites dog mentality rules the news media.

    Yes, there should be outrage, yes there should be education and prevention. No, there probably will not be.

  2. It’s because, ultimately, our society blames women for being assaulted. Go read the comments to the story in the Statesman and see how many are along the lines of, “What was she doing out there at that time of night by herself?”

  3. Whereabouts was the assault? Does anyone know if they have very many security cameras on the campus? Security phones are great and everything, but I kinda wonder how critical they are when it seems like everyone has a cell phone.

    EDITOR NOTE–The alleged assault was at University and Manitou.

  4. To be fair Guardian; are any of the out of service phones in the area of the attack?

    Emergency phones should be on a priority for getting back on line. With all of the construction going on at the campus recently, I wonder if these shutdowns are a result and their return to service has fallen through the cracks. One would hope that in light of the recent attack that getting all of the emergency phones back online should be, well, an emergency for BSU.

  5. I have lived as the “rich person” in tough hoods. The appearance of vulnerability attracts the criminal to loot or booty. It is something we all kinda expect unfortunately. We are in one of the few places in the US where the news is not 10 minutes of violent crime before the weather man, then 10 minutes more follow up on violent crime. The monkey thing is just nuts and not part of the expected.

    Those blue light thingies are to make the parents feel better when choosing a school for Johnny and Janie, but give a false sense of security to the pedestrian. As does the cell phone. One must remember the cops almost never get there in time. However, if BSU had allowed the alleged victim to defend herself with deadly force would it have changed things? Probably not unless she had training, and time act. If BSU had more roving guards? vulnerability is reduced but so is some budget item elsewhere. Expensive cameras on posts don’t reduce crime much, they just make detective work more complex and easier only IF there is an image. So BSU leadership points at statistics and says “we are nearly the safest” and hopes the blue light illusion continues.

    There was a recent change from ADA county to Boise police protection on campus, has this made any changes to feet on the ground security coverage. How about recent budget adjustments and changes to the idea men in the campus safety department?

  6. Brian Vermillion
    Nov 23, 2012, 9:49 pm

    Maybe the previously reported attacks that have been proven to be false had something to do with it. You know crying wolf?

  7. Referring to the killing of a caged, helpless animal as “Monkey Business” shows how seriously juvenile our attitudes concerning animal protection are.Get those phones. We are outraged about rape. Well, some of us are. As recently as the election a certain faction did their level best to marginalize rape and rape victims. Let me see…who was that? Oh! That’s right, it was the Republicans. Saw very little outrage coming from conservative Idaho then.

  8. modern columbo
    Nov 24, 2012, 2:15 pm

    Idaho is the only state in the nation that has more rapes than robberies. The Boise Police Department’s solve rate on rapes over the past several years has been around 10 percent. That is absolutely absurd and what its cause is I don’t know. Coming from working rape cases in Los Angeles for 2 decades we were under immense pressure to solve these cases. Apparently it is condoned up here.

  9. All the news, all the time and now we have a dead monkey that will dominate the news until the drugged up drunk kid goes to prison for life over this.

    Here’s a quick solution to all this.. the kid buys the zoo a new monkey and serves some time cleaning up POO in the monkey cages.

    Quick note to Columbo.. it’s hard for realatives to rat one another out on the “unsolved rapes” here in Idaho. Sometimes the family trees are a straight line.

  10. @modern columbo: That’s cuz the Boise rob rate is so low.

    Question? Did that “immense pressure” ever lead to a frame job on someone who it might have could have been? But was not.

    Question? What is the rape solve rate down in LA? or in Seattle? What would you change in little Boise to make it better?

  11. How do we know the kid wasn’t trying to rape the monkey? I totally agree with M. Flinn. Idaho tolerates violence and rape. Many of the rape cases are never reported because of the police treatment of the victim.
    Same reason the hookers are prosecuted but not the customer. Idaho has a serious suicide rate. Makes one wonder why.

  12. modern columbo
    Nov 26, 2012, 12:03 pm

    Without boring anybody with mind numbing statistics I will provide you a synopsis of my findings. All data is from 2010.
    Statistics are in offenses per 100K population
    Seattle Washington Population 605,000. Rape: 96 15.5/100K
    Robbery: 1429 230.4/100K
    Portland Oregon population 583,000
    Rape: 230 40.8/100K
    Robbery: 1005 178.1/100k

    Santa Ana California population 325,000
    Rape: 88 25.9/100K
    Robbery: 719 211.3/100K

    Boise Idaho population 205,000
    Rape: 89 43.2/100K
    Robbery: 58 28.2/100K

    The national average for cities of 100,000 to 250,000 population for rape is 33.1/100K and Robbery 170/100K. The average solve rate for Rape is 52% and Robbery 30%.

    The 5 year average solve rate for Boise for Rape is 19.1% and Robbery 24%.
    Both statistics well below national averages and should be points of concern for all residents. Clearance of these crimes does not always indicate an arrest. It is cleared when a suspect is named, the case is submitted to the prosecutor. In the past 5 years Boise has had over 500 reported foricible rapes with less than 100 cleared. That leaves 400 rapists free in just 5 years.
    Using statistics can sometimes be a bit difficult, but in this case they are quite consistant across the board and deserve some inquiry.

  13. You posted some statistics. But did not answer all the questions. Sounds like “clearing” a crime is not the same as solving it. Do people ever get framed just to clear a crime due to the immense pressure you mentioned? I’ve heard so much about manipulation and suppression of evidence over the years.

    What is this “89 43.2/100K” Is that 8943.2 ?? Please clear up the format issue if that what it is and can you provide ref to source documents.

  14. modern columbo
    Nov 27, 2012, 10:06 am

    Zippo what is your problem with police framing people? It is hard enough to convict guilty people at trial let alone making stuff up. We used this fancy new thing called DNA testing! which apparently is too complicated to be used up here. Blogs are a terrible format for placing numbers. Put it this way, Boise is one of the statistically most dangerous cities in America to be a woman. Santa Ana California is an absolute third world crap hole city that is nearly twice the size of Boise and they have the same number of rapes. 89 cases in Boise in 2010 which works out to being a rate of 43.2 per 100,000 population.

    What is clearance?

    In the UCR Program, a law enforcement agency reports that an offense is cleared by arrest, or solved for crime reporting purposes, when three specific conditions have been met. The three conditions are that at least one person has been:

    ■Arrested.
    ■Charged with the commission of the offense.
    ■Turned over to the court for prosecution (whether following arrest, court summons, or police notice).
    In its clearance calculations, the UCR Program counts the number of offenses that are cleared, not the number of persons arrested.

    So Boise PD only achieves this level in 19.2 % of their cases.

  15. @mc: You seem to know a lot about police work so I’m asking about the darker side of it. You used the words “immense pressure” like it will improve things here, but I know this leads poor quality and often law breaking in every other types of work. We already know that cops have lots more social problems and are often seen speeding etc. It is not a reach to wonder what else happens. And we can read and view about what else happens all the time. We need police, no doubt about that. I’m just happy we have a fairly clean police department that shows respect to the typical citizen. Some of these places you mention with better solve stats do not have as clean of department and I don’t want that model brought in here. Also the elected prosecutors have generated many reports and books about doing whatever is needed to convict. A whole new industry has developed from these over-zealous prosecutions of the wrong person.

    In my view the entire system has the wrong motivations and therefore is very expensive while not accomplishing the desired outcome. You seem to think cleared cases is the holy grail. No it is not!

    I will not refute your stats and have told my female friends and relatives of the dangers of Boise for many years so I know you are not wrong. I’m looking for a credible source of these stats. I just could not figure the figures you posted because the format. If you can post an address to the website or something that would be helpful.

    The high number/low solve rate may be because of the nearby campus demographic and may be similar to other in-the-city college towns. So be sure you compare apples to apples.

  16. @mc: Also, what would you do different in Boise? How will you pay for it?

    BTW: Many cities are going broke in part because of the overly costly police and fire. Just look at the list of bankrupted US cities. We will not tax our way out of this one.

    EDITOR NOTE–How wrong you can be Zip! Boise has raised the levy 6.5% for 2012 over 2011. Coppers and firefighters also got one time bonuses because they have been so good to work with. More to come on this topic.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chapter_9,_Title_11,_United_States_Code

    Pssst: check out the one for harrisberg pa. Something about a trash burner.

  17. @mc, aren’t those reported rapes? How many are found to be false? So, your solve rate is probably higher if based on the amount of rapes found to be factual and amount solved then.

  18. Thanks Editor. I am wrong in stimulating ways… effective for bringing forth more facts. I think Boise is on track to go bust because the big industrial engines are sputtering or dead. Sevice jobs only play with the money for a few years before the lights go out.

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