HUPD Annual Report Indicates Doubling of Confidentially Reported Rapes

The number of confidential reports of rape at Harvard University almost doubled from 12 in 2011 to 23 in 2012, according to the annual crime report released by the Harvard University Police Department.

The report also highlighted a clear divide between the University’s Longwood and Cambridge campuses, with the Cambridge campus having over 10 times the number of crimes in the Longwood campus.

HUPD released its annual campus security report for the year 2012 this past Tuesday. The report, titled “Playing It Safe,” disclosed statistics about crimes on the University’s Cambridge and Longwood campuses.

The document highlighted that while crime in Longwood had remained low, both the number of confidentially reported rapes and burglaries have risen in Cambridge compared to 2011.

Confidential reports mean that the victim’s name, address, and any other identifying information are withheld. The number of formal rape reports remained one per year.

All of the 23 confidential reports for the year 2012 were cases of rape that happened on University property in Cambridge.

Cambridge Police Department spokesperson Daniel M. Riviello said that the majority of rape cases in Cambridge involved acquaintances. In regards to the general city safety, Riviello wrote in an email that “the number of stranger‐to-stranger rapes each year [in Cambridge], between one and five, remains extremely low.”

The number of burglaries on the Cambridge campus also increased, from 24 total cases in 2011 to 34 total cases in 2012. Overall, the total number of criminal offenses for the Cambridge campus increased from 118 crimes reported in 2011 to 136 in 2012, with 72 of those offenses occurring on campus compared to 56 in 2011.

Despite this rise in overall offenses, the number of offenses remained well below the 158 events reported for the year 2010.

On Harvard’s Longwood campus, only 12 total criminal offenses were reported, a decrease from 17 offenses in 2011 and 18 in 2010.

Of the crimes that occurred on or around the Cambridge campus, burglary, aggravated assault, and rape were the three most common offenses. The number of aggravated assaults dropped this year from 36 in 2011 to 28 in 2012, with all but 2 occurring on public property. All burglaries and reports of rapes occurred on campus property.

—Staff writer Antonio Coppola can be reached at antonio.coppola@thecrimson.com. Follow him on Twitter @AntonioCoppolaC.

—Staff writer John P. Finnegan can be reached at finnegan@thecrimson.com. Follow him on Twitter @finneganspake.