Hear radio transmissions on MIT and Harvard University police channels, rebroadcast live from the club’s scanner in streaming MP3 format.  [ Listen. ]
Cit.: Harvard Univ. & MIT Police Radio Broadcasts, http://radio.mitcrimeclub.org:8000/listen.pls.

The club’s database of incidents reported to MIT Police (01/18/2006 on) can be accessed at http://scripts.mit.edu/~crimeclub/search/mitlogs/index.php.

Which residence hall won the club’s 2008 Sparky the Fire Dog Award for Not Setting Off As Many Fire Alarms as Last Year?  Listen to the interview by House Mgr. JoeG on Droppin’ Knowledge: Wayout Report at 08:25–13:00, 25:40–29:00 (Tech. Broad. Corp. radio broadcast Apr. 30, 2009).

Club president Marjan Rafat ’06 (Harvard PhD ’11) served as the 2005–06 Police Log Compiler at The Tech and went on to become the first Police Log Compiler for MIT & Harvard at the Cambridge Chronicle.  Note: Professional police-log ‘compilers’ actually rewrite most of the original log entries, drawing on additional sources and known facts.

See, e.g., M. Rafat with other MIT Crime Club members, Police Log, Tech, Apr. 28, 2006, at 13; M. Rafat & J. Herms with other MIT Crime Club members, Police Log, Tech, July 7, 2006, at 10; D. Witlin & M. Rafat, Crime Watch, Cambridge Chron., Sept. 13, 2006.  The Chronicle is the newspaper designated by the City to contain all legal and municipal notices of public concern. 

The club’s distribution of a saliva-alcohol screening test strip on campus is mentioned at Admissions, Life & Community at MIT (Nov. 1, 2005).  “As an ASA person he allocated money to the crime club, so he appreciated that the money was actually being put to good use.”

MIT Assn. of Student Activities, Group Funding: “Student groups are given the autonomy … to spend their funds as the group sees fit (provided they do not break Institute policy [or] State or Federal law).”

The club was invited to nominate a candidate for the 2007 Dru Scholarship Award.  Assoc. member Brittan Smith (Harvard ’09) ultimately shared half of the $1,500 award, for her work in introducing a reliable drink-testing kit to Harvard College administrators and students.

Harvard’s and MIT’s administrators have historically demonstrated unwillingness to countenance or conceal any attempt to drug-rape one of their students.  Only at Boston University have students (sorority members) spoken to club representatives about a persisting problem (centering on one specific fraternity’s using ketamine to spike women’s drinks).

Jessica Fargen, MIT Kids Send Spies to Harvard: Slaying Prompts Closer Study of Campus Security, Boston Herald, June 3, 2009, at 2 (Internet vers.) (print vers.).

The judge has granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss.  The complainant gave her no reasonable basis to believe that the defendants had committed trespass.

     Defendants … move to dismiss the complaint on the grounds that the [prosecutors] cannot establish essential elements of the charged offenses.…  There is no merit to the charge that Defendants were trespassing.…  (Defs.’ Mot. to Dismiss 1.)
     7/28/09. Motion to Dismiss is Allowed.  Roanne Sragow, J.

Judgment of Dismissal, Commonwealth v. Cadillic, No. 0952-1267 (Mass. Dist. Ct. July 28, 2009).

The legal reasoning:
     1. An occupant (Kathleen B. ’09) had given the Cadillics her consent to enter the premises (plus a guided tour of the crime scene).
     2. Further, Judge Sragow evidently did not believe that the owner of the premises (or its General Counsel and Vice President for Police and Security, Robert Iuliano) could have been acting to benefit the occupants concerned.

The investigator’s photographs and the resident’s narrative, in conjunction with the University’s thoughtful decision not to appeal, lend support to the scenario that ‘JCos’ Cosby was intentionally shot (possibly for acting as an informant to the GC?).

Note that the government is indicating that the killer did not intend to just “rob Cosby” and call it a day.  (“Correction: … Copney … does not face the armed robbery charge.”)  (“Copney … has been charged [in addition] with … attempt to commit a crime.”)

But what type of crime?  Intimidating a witness?  Cf. noire posting of MIT Crime Club; Fargen para. 10.

The Campus Crimestoppers have been trying to find a personal-safety device that actually works.  We determined that chemical sprays are not a good idea if you’re facing upwind; that whistles and shriek alarms are universally ignored; and that the disorienting “tactical flashlights” are almost effective — meaning, useless.

Eventually we gave up and designed our own device, a synchronized optoacoustic “sonic” flashlight.  The Venture Mentoring Service’s business developer and the director of the Entrepreneurs Club recommended that the inventors file a provisional application.  The club was invited to serve as the Fall 2007 study case for SEM.089/095, Starting Up New Technology-Based Business Enterprises at MIT.

A basic device description appears in our Venture Information Form, on file with VMS.  Any intrepid Sloan entrepreneurs interested in taking over?

The club has discovered a case of criminal domain-name infringement apparently committed by or for the Republic of Sudan.  SPLMToday.com, “The Official Website of the SPLM,” is a counterfeit site meant to discredit the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement, the governing party of Southern Sudan.  View an archival copy of the site as it appeared Dec. 10, 2007 and see how many clues you can find.  (Note that the banner logo reads “Sudan People Liberation Movement.”)

Relevant correspondence from U.S. Dept. of State to MIT Crime Club (2008) provided upon request.

After DOS forwarded the information to SPLM, the site’s owner deleted its active identity-phishing content.  The site remained passive for about a year.  But the newest version is again a felony violation of the federal Wire Fraud Act. 

IAP 2006
Campus Safety Workshop
Marjan Rafat and Laura Sutton — coordinators

The MIT Crime Club is a group of MIT students interested in campus safety.  Along with publishing weekly excerpts from the MIT police logs in The Tech, the Crime Club seeks to improve campus life by proposing and implementing projects and programs designed to reduce students’ risks of being victimized.

Features of the workshop:

• Throughout the afternoon, we will be providing safety devices such as personal safety alarms and Drink Detective test kits (which test beverages for the presence of common date-rape drugs).
• Daniel Carter, senior vice president of Security On Campus, will be speaking.  He has gotten more campus safety bills enacted than any other individual in the country.
• We will also be presenting new data on the property theft rates at local schools.  (Which Boston area campus has the highest reported theft rate?  Is it getting better or worse?)
• We have recently mapped patterns of crimes around local campuses, and we will be making these maps available to students.

The Crime Club was organized by Margeaux Randolph ’05, Adora Asala ’05, and Shavonne Nyoka Hylton ’05 with assistance from Daniel McAnulty ’05 and Marjan Rafat ’06.  It was approved by the Association of Student Activities as a recognized student group on April 19, 2005.  ASA Student Group Detail.

Questions about the club or its projects?  Wire  crimeclub@mit.edu .