Police investigate whether latest attack is related to others
CHAMPAIGN — Champaign police are investigating another attack on a woman in the University of Illinois campus area early Friday.
Sgt. Jim Rein said the 21-year-old woman was walking home from a campus bar with friends about 2:15 a.m. when she separated from them about two blocks before arriving at her apartment in the 400 block of East Healey Street.
“She opens the door and is attacked from behind and is immediately hit by an individual. She falls to her knees in a fetal position and he continues to beat her,” Rein said.
“Fortunately, the victim’s roommate and her boyfriend were home and heard the commotion. They come out and see a black male beating the victim.”
Rein said the woman sustained facial injuries for which she was treated at Carle Foundation Hospital.
Rein said the witnesses chased the man but lost sight of him and several Champaign and UI police officers scoured the area but could not find him, either.
He was described as black with short hair and a scruffy beard, about 5 feet 10 inches tall, 170 pounds. He had a large kitchen knife, Rein said.
He was wearing a tan baseball hat, a dark shirt, blue jeans and a dark jacket and was believed to be 30 to 35 years old.
Although they don’t have definitive clues, Rein said officers are checking to see if this attack could be related to a rape in the 1200 block of West Nevada Street in Urbana last Friday at 3 a.m., an attempted sexual assault on a woman in her apartment in the 700 block of South Randolph Street in Champaign about 10 p.m. last Friday, and an attack in the Music Building in the 1100 block of West Nevada Street about 11:30 p.m. Saturday.
I wonder if this will be aggressively prosecuted as a "hate crime?" I have seen how many articles like this are structured. The race of the attacker is given, but the race of the victim is not. A pretty fair assumption could be made, in this case, regarding the victim's race. That's not playing the "race card" btw. It seems that if the race of the attacker is relevant, so should the race of the victim. Black on black violence gets little attention because of its commonplace nature. The rare instances of white on black violence are "hate crimes." Black on white violence...the victim's race is nowhere to be found.
It is protocol not to disclose information regarding indentifying information of sexual assault victims. Odds are the victims in these cases are the same races as the perpetrators, which is the case in most crimes. The reason suspect identifying information is being released is in hopes that a witness of the crime or a person who knows the identity of the perpetrator will come forward. These are the same reasons that the location of the assault is being disclosed--they are hoping for possible leads in the investigation. When the identity of the perpetrator is known, race is not identified in the paper or court proceedings. It is only used for unknown identities.
Logicalpositivist....I don't see anything logical in what you said. The race of the victim makes absolutely no difference whatsoever as anyone regardless of race or sex can become a victim. The race of the attacker is of the utmost importance if police are going to catch this person. Shame on you for thinking otherwise!
Let's hope that some of these same people who are demanding respect from the police turn in the one 170-lb. person they know who hits the streets with a tan hat, scruffy beard and a kitchen knife at 2 a.m. Good grief every time something like this happens we get so many descriptions that we could practically paint a portrait of the guy and yet nobody knows nothing.
16LFG26_07--Ok. For the sake of argument, let's just say the flip side of the coin occurred. (Of course according to Rape-Advocacy-Counseling-Ed. "Odds are the victims in these cases are the same races as the perpetrators, which is the case in most crimes."--I'll get to that in a minute)
What if the perp was a white male and the victim was a black woman. Do you think for a moment that there wouldn't be "community activists" out screaming "racism" and "hate crime?" Somehow, someway that information would be made public. Just like the case of the Duke Lacrosse players...remember the reports? How many times did you read about the victim being black and the accused were white. No name was assigned the victim till later, but you knew darn well she was black b/c it was all over the media. It is the double standard I'm talking about.
Rape-Advocacy-Counseling-Ed stated that "Odds are the victims in these cases are the same races as the perpetrators, which is the case in most crimes."
Perhaps, but I think regarding the microcosm of the U of I that most are crimes of opportunity. Criminals, thugs, what have you come to campus b/c they know there are easy targets, drunk targets, rich targets. Why do you think property crimes spike during breaks when students are gone? Who do you think is to blame...foreign doctoral students in materials science? Your theory may work when speaking of specific demographic communities. However, the university is viewed by criminals as easy pickings. It doesn't matter whether those pickings are burgled or assaulted. It is the incredibly violent nature of this attack which leads one to suspect that there was deeper, more malevolent intent involved. Robbing a drunk girl is one thing. Brandishing a butcher knife and trying to kill her is hate. What if that girl's roommate and boyfriend weren't there? It's difficult to think about that.
Logicalpositivist, I wholeheartedly agree with you in that if the perp was white and the victim black, there would most definitely be people screaming racism. I was not attacking you and based on your response may have misunderstood your original point. I was only saying that race should not be disclosed by the press for the victim, but should be for the perp as part of their description. Unfortunately we will always have those that scream racism in any situation where there are multiple races involved. The press generally adds fuel to that fire, but that is another story. I am very thankful that the roommate and the boyfriend were home, but am sorry that this animal got away.
Now, imagine you are a perp & you see a young woman walking alone on a dark night. You know this is a perfect opportunity to commit your crime, but wait a minute... What if the woman is legally carrying a concealed weapon?? She could retaliate & I could be the one to end up in the hospital or worse yet the morgue. I don't think I want to take that chance.
If only Illinois would adopt carry permits, I believe we would all be more safe. "Bad people" are going to have the guns wether it's legal or not. Citizens should have the right to be able to defend themselves. In this case, the woman could have rolled over from her position w/ a gun pointing at the perp & he would have fled like a scared little puppy dog & would think twice about a repeat performace on another victim. Just a thought...
I was the victim in this attack. I wanted to clarify a few things. This was not a hate crime nor an attempted robbery (seeing as my purse was on me the whole time and he made no attempt to grab it) I am pretty sure this was an attempted sexual assault. I do not think the race of this guy versus the race of me matters at all. He was not targeting me because of my race. He saw an opportunity and took it. I am pretty sure he was already in my apartment complex before I came home.
I never got a look at him the only thing I saw was his hand. My roommates boyfriend did see his face though. I was not in the fetal position on the ground, I was kicking and screaming as hard as I could. When I unlocked my door he reached his hand around and shoved me inside. I ducked to the ground to get out of his grasp, that is when he punched me in the face, I believe I blacked out maybe for a second. I think he expected me to go unconscious, when I started to kick and scream he proceed to punch me repeatedly. That is when my roommates heard me and came out and he ran. This whole thing don't not last more than a couple minutes.
The fact that this man was black only matters in respect to identifying him. I do not believe this report was racist. Some of the facts about the actual attack are a little off, but that is what happens when information is passed from one person to another. I wanted to write this so some things could be clarified.
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