Most people first heard about this incident though an event posted by the Student Government Association to the computer system Thursday evening. SGA subsequently expressed concern at the lack of information regarding this incident; the Association sent a letter to Vice President Stephen Hebert, carbon copied to other school officials, questioning the delay in information. In October, a similar crime, followed by a long delay before the campus was made aware of the incident, prompted SGA to request that information and crime alerts be made available to students in a timely manner. In that incident, the student body was notified a week after the crime occured. Referring to the October crime, the SGA letter states "Now, four months later, we are outraged with the lack of an efficient alert system on campus."
On the Tuesday following the crime, Philip Clay, Director of Residential Services, sent an email notice to resident advisors. According to SGA, this was the only formal notification of which the Association was aware. On Thursday, Campus Police sent out crime alerts, which students found in their mailboxes. WPI Police Chief John Hanlon sent a letter to Newspeak apologizing for the delay in notification, which he attributed to a "reporting system failure within the campus police department." In his apology, Chief Hanlon states that this problem will not recur, citing various ways in which community members will be made aware of serious crimes in a timely fashion.
SGA's letter to Vice President Hebert calls for quick notification of the student body: "On a campus as small and tightly knit as ours, there is no reason for students not to be aware within 24 hours of such a crime." It is Campus Police's intention to mail "crime alert" bulletins to every member of the community within 24 hours, if possible. This, coupled with other improvements in alerting the campus, would help get the word out as quickly and efficiently as possible.
Campus Police states that "several promising leads are being persued" in this incident. It is their view that a suspect might soon be identified.
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