STLCC Police Captain Talley explains campus alert systems, statistics
BY: JACOB POLITTE
Managing Editor
Saint Louis Community College (STLCC) recently published its 2023 Security and Fire Safety Report. This report, published in accordance with the Clery Act of 1990, details the statistics of all crimes and incidents reported that are associated with the college over the previous three years. The 168-page report has crime and incident statistics that cover every single STLCC campus; specific data relating to the Meramec Campus can be found on pages 121-132 of the report.
The Montage spoke with STLCC Police Captain Benjamin Talley, a veteran officer primarily based out of the Florissant Valley campus, and briefly spoke with Lieutenant Adis Becirovic, a veteran officer based out of the Meramec campus.
One specific statistic stands out
Clery Data shows that the campus was largely crime-free in 2022, with one notable exception: an on-campus rape was listed in the statistics for the year.
Research through the last 22 months of the STLCC newswire and email alerts shows that at no point did the college send out an alert or inform the student and faculty bodies of the incident. When asked why that was, Captain Talley said, “There was no threat to the campus community.”
He continued, “We knew who the suspect was. We knew there was no threat to the community, if that makes sense. And ultimately, that’s why that did not go out as a timely warning, because there was nothing to warn anybody about because there was no ongoing threat to the community.”
Talley, who at the time of the interview was visiting the Meramec Police Station located along Couch Avenue, said that he couldn’t reveal specific details of the incident, but did show a database that logged the crime, known as the Clery Act Public Crime Log. Based on that log entry, it can be determined that the assault occurred on Nov. 22, 2022 between 11:20am and 11:30am within Parking Lot G, which is the lot between the police substation and the end of the cafeteria atrium. The assault was not reported until the afternoon of Dec. 2, 2022, at which point STLCC began investigating and quickly located the assailant.
“What I can tell you on this was the victim knew the alleged suspect,” Talley said. “And we were able to identify the alleged suspect. Quickly.”
Talley said that some investigations take time, but that this one did not.
““Our investigation is completed,” Talley said.
The department then turned its report over to the St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney on Jan. 12, 2023, and had not received an update on the matter since then until Talley’s staff contacted their office last week. At that time, Talley said he was informed that “the Prosecuting Attorney’s Office has refused to issue charges for this alleged incident for unknown reasons.”
One department, more than one campus
Both Talley and Becirovic stressed that while STLCC has multiple campuses, the college’s police department does not necessarily view them separate entities.
“All of the lieutenants, the command staff, [they] have worked on every campus,” Talley said. “So they’re well aware of issues for the entire district. And that’s a good thing. […] They’re not Meramec, they’re STLCC. So what happens here, or Flo Valley or whatnot, we are deep. We are connected to all of that.”
“It’s one department,” Becirovic said.
Talley and Becirovic both work under Director Of Police Alfred Adkins, with Talley calling himself Adkins’ “right hand man.”
“He sets policy,” Talley said. “And I’m the Captain. I’m his right hand person. Like [with] operations, if that makes sense.”
While Becirovic is assigned to Meramec and has been for many years, Talley said that Becirovic serves as sort of a “watch commander for the district” in addition to Meramec-specific duties where he serves in a sort of precinct commander role.
The department itself has gone through numerous changes over the years.
“Everything we do, report wise, statistic wise, all that stuff is actually district wide,” Talley said. “So the report system we have is not Meramec. It’s everything. So we know when we see trends, and all if that makes sense. If we need to put more people here because we’re having something happen… we see that and we change and adjust on the fly just like any other agency would need to do on that.”
“You know, back a long time ago, we did not operate like that, Talley said. “We kind of operated independently. This has been years ago, this agency operates as a single entity, so we know what’s going on in the district and we can adjust to trends and what’s going on.”
A brief history on the Clery Act
Talley explained the Clery Act of 1990 as a consumer protection law for students to know what’s happening on college campuses. It was enacted following the murder of Jeanne Clery in April 1986 in Stoughton Hall at Lehigh University in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania.
“Unfortunately, a very tragic, tragic event happened at Lehigh University, many years ago. Ultimately, she died,” Talley said. “And what ends up happening is out of that, her parents sue, they want people to know that things happen [at college campuses].”
Clery’s parents won the suit, and were awarded $2 million. They also later founded a non-profit group known today as “The Clery Center for Security On Campus.”
“If you’re a college or university that takes Title IV funds, which is financial aid, you are required to comply with the Clery Act,” Talley said. “So if the college or this place or another place doesn’t comply with it, they can be fined. And they’re large fines.”
Notable schools that have been fined in the past include: Penn State University, Eastern Michigan University, Michigan State University and Virginia Tech among others.
Clery Reportable Crimes and Active/Inactive Cases
“These are the things that we have to report on,” Talley said. “There is homicide, sexual assault, rape, fondling, incest, statutory rape, robbery, aggravated assault, aggravated assault means more than first aid for I mean, it’s a big injury, okay, more than a simple fight. A burglary, motor vehicle theft and arson. Those are the only criminal offenses that we are required to report out in the Clery Act.”
Talley spoke about the difference between crimes marked as active and inactive on the Public Crime Log.
“A good example is there’s nothing more for us to investigate on it. […] This might be a, maybe you left your wallet in the hallway,” Talley said. “We went back, and maybe we don’t have any witnesses. Maybe we don’t have any video evidence, whatnot. And we don’t have anything more to investigate upon. Because of that, we still take the statistics. But we don’t have anywhere further to go with that, if that makes sense. We don’t have any further to go on what that case was.”
He said that some cases may still be marked active even after an investigation is completed.
“So what I mean by active […], when we get a disposition back from the prosecuting attorney, and they say whatever their charging stuff is, we will go back in here and change that to whatever that case may be.”
A look behind the curtain at STLCC’s Emergency Notification System
Talley said that the circumstances surrounding the incident did not necessitate an alert or what he calls a “timely warning” through the college’s mass notification system. When asked for examples of what may constitute an alert through that system, Talley said a major weather-related danger such as a tornado would be an example, as well as an active shooter situation.
Talley also recounted a recent example of the college’s alert system in action, mentioning an incident near the Forest Park campus on Oct. 24, 2022 that occurred at the same time as the active shooter incident at the nearby Central Visual and Performing Arts High School (CPVA).
“We had an incident, [and] it was not on the college campus, [but] it was at the same time [but] not connected was over at CVPA, they had their major incident happening with their active shooter,” he said. “Not connected to that, we actually had an issue in our Forest Park campus, that we had a call that allegedly a man with a gun. I can’t remember [the exact details of] that. But allegedly, a person with a weapon was on the campus outdoors.”
He continued, “We had to be very careful when we put those out because we need to have some confirmation. This one we had some confirmation on the last thing down there from her from the witness. [So] that would be a good example of the emergency notification system.”
Talley said that a “timely warning” is slightly different, saying that those are alerts concerning a Clery Reportable Crime or a crime adjacent to it that poses a serious and/or ongoing threat to the campus community. He offered an example surrounding one particular motor vehicle crime.
“Okay, good example, how about catalytic converter thefts,” he said. “It’s not a Clery Reportable Crime. But say we have it happening all over the campus. And we want to let you know, if we see a trend here, and stuff like that. That’s something that the campus community, even though it doesn’t, it’s not here, we’ll put something out. I’ll call it a campus crime alert if that makes sense.”
Talley said that even if an incident is related to a specific campus, those alerts are sent to students and faculty across all colleges in an effort to keep students safe.
“We’re not thinking about just a Meramec campus,” he said. “We’re thinking about online students. We’re thinking holistically about anybody who is connected to St. Louis Community College.”
More than Clery
Talley acknowledges the importance of the Clery Report, but says that it may not always give the full picture when it comes to analyzing crime across the college as a whole.
“The crimes that we have to put in there are a very minut amount compared to what we have to do [when reporting other statistics],” Talley said. “What you really see out of the Clery Act is that […] it can be different than what you see in Incident Based reporting, because they really do not align correctly all the time.”
He recommends checking out real-time statistics posted on showmecrime.mo.gov to help see trends in action.
“[Anyone] can go in here and use this at any time you want,” he said. “And you come in here and this is what the public can see. And this is in real time.”
He later continued, “This personally, is a better way for you to see what’s kind of going on truly at the college.”
Unreported Crimes
Professor Ruth Eilerman has worked at the college as a Criminal Justice instructor since 2007. She believes that Meramec is a safe campus, but also says in many of the courses that she teaches that just because there is little crime reported in a given area, it doesn’t mean that there is no crime taking place.
When asked why some people may not report a crime at this particular campus, she said, “If we’re talking about crime on campus, it’s going to be because it’s not serious. It’s considered too petty to be taken seriously.”
“Most of the crime that we see here is low-stakes,” she said. “It’s petty crime, and it’s just kinda not worth reporting. We don’t think that there’s gonna be enough follow-through there to get a resolution.”
Talley, however, encourages anyone that “if you see something, say something.”
He continued, “We want people to know that we’re here for you. Right? We want to know what’s going on. Because if things aren’t reported to us, we can’t properly take a statistic right? To let you know. And we can’t possibly investigate something [that may need to be investigated].”
Flushing Out The Other Statistics
Two other crimes were listed under the 2022 year on page 132: one instance of domestic violence on campus, and another incident of stalking.
The full report is available for download on the STLCC website. You can also request a paper copy from STLCC’s Security Department located at the Corporate Campus in Bridgeton, or by calling (314) 539-5199. In addition, Captain Talley said, “I want you, the students, faculty and staff to understand that we properly report statistics, and I don’t take this as a bad thing. I take this as a positive thing,” he said. “We truly care about making sure that you feel safe at St. Louis Community College. […] We can only help. Our goal is to solve problems here.”
