Coverage of Police Blotter Obscures HUPD's Successes

To the editors:

With its coverage of the weekend student robbery near the Barker Center (News, March 10), the Crimson continues its great HUPD Blotter Crusade. I agree that it is in the interest of the college community to be informed about most campus crimes, but lately it seems that Crimson articles about campus crimes focus less on the nature and circumstances of the criminal incidents and more on the supposed HUPD master plan to cover up these crimes.

The HUPD has a good track record of working with the college community in the areas of crime prevention and safety: their model mugging and Rape Aggression Defense (RAD) classes indicate their concern for the safety of students. Furthermore, they have acknowledged their recent communication and record-keeping lapses and have vowed to improve their notification systems.

For the Crimson to continue to focus obsessively on the blotter and downplay the substantive details of these crimes, is to do the HUPD--and students--a great disservice. ADAM R. KOVACEVICH '99   March 10, 1998