According to Bob Roberts, chief of West Virginia University’s Department of Transportation and Public Safety, four sexual assault cases have been reported to the DPS since August 1.
Roberts said that in September there was an increase in the number of cases reported. The victims, however, didn’t always choose to prosecute.
The victim of a September 22 report of sexual assault chose not to prosecute, as did the victim of an abuse case reported on September 28.
Earlier this year, as a 19-year-old WVU sophomore was jogging on the rail trail in Morgantown, she experienced an indecent exposure incident. The victim said that as she ran by him, the perpetrator yelled, “Hey you.” As she turned around to look at him, he was exposing himself, she said.
She added that the man asked her to have sex with him, and out of fear, she started to run back in the direction she came.
“I had to run past him again,” she stated. “I knew that I had to run back that way because that’s where I had seen other people.”
When she ran past him for the second time, the perpetrator pulled out a knife.
She said that she screamed and a man about 100 yards away came to her. The perpetrator got scared and drove off in his car. She called the police when she got home.
In an April incident, a female WVU student was forced into a car at the intersection of University Avenue and Campus Drive. Three black males pulled up to the sidewalk, forced her into the car and drove her to an overlook on St. Clair Hill Road.
En route, the male in the back seat sat on his knees in front of her and held her down. Once at St. Clair Hill Road, the victim said the male stripped her of her clothes and hit her in her face when she refused to open her legs.
As she put up a fight with the male in the back seat, the two males in the front seat watched. Finally, the victim said they threw her and her clothes out of the car.
The victim went to a nearby house and called the police, who picked her up there.
The student said that she was too intoxicated to remember the car or the three men.
Deb Strauss, a sexual assault prevention educator at WVU, said that alcohol is often related to sexual assaults.
“I’ve only known of one case (at WVU) where alcohol and drugs weren’t a factor,” she said. 
Alcohol was also a factor in an April 7 incident by the Boreman loading dock area downtown. As a sophomore WVU student was walking by that area, two males approached her. According to the victim, the first male grabbed the back of her right quad muscle and pulled her toward him. When she pulled away, he grabbed her cheeks and jaw with his left hand and held a liquor bottle next to her face with his right hand. 
“I was afraid to move because I thought he was going to hit me with the bottle,” she said.
The second male, which had watched the incident, convinced the first male to release his hold on the girl. She then ran to Nick’s Canteen and called the WVU Department of Public Safety.
The victim said she felt less safe because of the lack of lighting in that area.
As part of the Student Government Association Safety Committee’s 2001 spring safety audit, SGA members teamed up with the DPS to find potential safety hazards on campus. A big issue in the safety audit was campus lighting.
“Generally speaking, the lighting on campus is in good shape,” stated Roberts.
According to Strauss, there is no way to know for sure how many sexual assaults have occurred on campus.
“The present reporting system is (ineffective),” she stated.
She said that there is no central reporting system to keep track of how many assaults occur.
A system called the Universal Anonymous Reporting System is effective for students reporting incidents, according to Strauss. She said she hopes WVU will engage in this program. With this method, the students’ identities are not released, and the number of assaults can be recorded.
Strauss said she hopes that with better statistics the program can get more funding.