For about the first eight months of 2019, the Department of Public Safety did not log any reports of bias-related incidents at Syracuse University.

DPS documented 23 reported incidents in 2019, according to department crime logs. The first bias incident logged in 2019 was reported Aug. 30.

At least 29 racist, anti-Semitic, homophobic and bias-related incidents have occurred at or near SU since early November, with at least nine occurring after January, according to The Daily Orange’s count. DPS documented 19 bias-related incidents at SU from November to the end of December, crime logs show.

The department has not released an official number of bias incidents that have occurred since November. The D.O. is unable to match its count of bias incidents with the crime logs due to the lack of information included in the logs.

Though the department did not log any bias incident reports for about eight months, DPS did not change how it classifies cases as bias-related amid the November incidents, DPS Chief Bobby Maldonado said.

“If it’s hateful or bias-related graffiti, or if it’s a verbal assault where somebody yells out of a car, and it’s behavior that’s hostile towards an individual because of their race, then that’s what we consider a bias-related incident,” Maldonado said.

SU classifies bias-related incidents as behaviors expressing hostility against an individual or their property because of their race, religion, age, ethnicity, sexual orientation or gender identity, among other things, according to the university’s website.

DPS has classified incidents as bias-related long before the department established its Bias Incidents Reports webpage in November, Maldonado said.

The webpage was created to deter copycats, Maldonado announced in a campus-wide email in November.

“The bias incident page was really a commitment that the chancellor made to the community that we would note bias incidents within a specific period of time provided that posting that information didn’t compromise the investigation in any way,” Maldonado said in an interview.

Bias incidents are not legally required to be announced within 48 hours under the Clery Act, Maldonado said. DPS agreed to #NotAgainSU’s demand that bias incidents be announced within 48 hours after they’re reported unless doing so compromises the integrity of the investigation.

Several student groups protested SU’s handling of hate crimes and bias incidents in 2019. #NotAgainSU, a Black student-led movement, formed after the university did not disclose information about racist graffiti found in Day Hall until five days after the incident occurred.

Students also criticized DPS’s failure to classify the February 2019 assault of three students of color on Ackerman Avenue as a hate crime. A white teenage girl was charged with assaulting two Black students and a Latino student with a handgun Feb. 9 on the 800 block of Ackerman Avenue.

The Ackerman Avenue assault fell under the jurisdiction of the Syracuse Police Department, said Sgt. Matthew Malinowski, a spokesperson for SPD, in a text message to The D.O. SPD did not conclude that the attack was racially motivated, Malinowski said.

Had the crime occurred on-campus, DPS would have classified it as a bias-related incident, Maldonado said.

An incident reported Feb. 9 on the 800 block of Ackerman Avenue is listed in DPS crime logs as an assault. The incident was transferred to SPD, crime logs show. The Ackerman Avenue assault should not have been classified in DPS crime logs at all, Maldonado said.

“We might submit reports, for instance if we supplemented them, if (DPS) assisted in some way. But it’s their case. They classify it,” he said.

The crime logs list 14 bias-related incidents from 2019 as still under investigation. Eight cases have been referred to the Office of Student Rights and Responsibilities.

Published on February 23, 2020 at 10:15 pm

Contact Sarah: scalessa@syr.edu | @sarahalessan