UNM campus still on edge after attacks

ALBUQUERQUE (KRQE) - The UNM campus is still on edge after three separate attacks on women in the last few weeks.

On Tuesday night, UNM asked students to walk the campus and give their suggestions for how to make the campus safer.

The campus safety walk is usually held later in the year, but the attacks prompted the university to move it up earlier.

A woman says she was jogging near Johnson Field at the end of January when she was groped by two men.

A week later, there was a separate attack, a woman says she was groped near Central and Yale.

Just last week, officers say they saw this man attacking an education professor near Simpson Hall.

Tuesday night, students walked in groups looking for safety issues, everything from light bulbs that are out to furniture students could trip over.

It’s the latest effort to address safety concerns on the sprawling, sometimes dark campus – where students often walk alone.

“I have a girlfriend and I have to walk her from her dorm to my dorm at night because she's afraid from all the campus alerts she's getting,” said junior Kenny Weil. “It's seems like a monthly thing now.”

UNM senior and resident advisor Bo Jaffer says he’s happy with the university’s response to the recent attacks.

“The cops are definitely walking around more. They have student security walking around more too, which definitely makes me feel better, just having more people out - more of the good people out.”

UNM police is also reminded students to sign up for Lobo Alerts. That will send a text message directly to a student’s phone any time there’s an immediate public safety issue.

After the recent attacks, campus police also set up an online tip-line [ policetips@unm.edu ] and set up a webpage to educate students on campus safety [ campussafety.unm.edu ]. They also hired extra security guards to patrol campus.