‘This is not safe:’ Students want more security after car break-ins at Edward Waters University
Several students from Edward Waters University are calling for more security after their cars were broken into early this morning.
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“You should have been here at four o’clock in the morning when somebody was busting in windows,” the student who called 911 said. “You should have been here at four o’clock in the morning when I was by myself when I had to run.”
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The student didn’t want to show her face on camera or share her name out of fear for her safety.
She, along with several other students say they are pretty shaken up about it.
The student said the parking lot on Steele Street is a designated lot for one of the women’s dorms on campus. And she said this is where she saw the suspect breaking into the vehicles.
“At first I didn’t know whether it was a gunshot or whether it was anything,” the student said. “I know it was a bang. So simply I just walked off. I’m not gonna look, I’m not gonna see you. I’m not a witness to nothing.”
Early Friday morning around 4 a.m., she says she was heading to work, when she saw a suspicious man wearing a long-sleeved black hoodie.
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“I called the cops because I’m outside by myself, no one else is here,” she said. “No security, no nothing, just me.”
The student says JSO arrived within 10 minutes and an officer drove her back to the parking lot to find broken glass and several vehicles burglarized.
The JSO incident report says there were eight victims, and only one of them had property taken from them.
“They rummaged through my stuff,” the student said. “Somebody was in my vehicle. That’s somewhere I should be safe at. I sleep here. This is supposed to be home when you’re not home.”
While Action News Jax Annette Gutierrez was interviewing the student, the campus security told the student to stop talking to the news.
The security man told her the student needed to meet him at the public safety area on campus.
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And she responded saying, “We’re tired of it. People are tired of their cars, people are tired of y’all not being there. Where were you this morning, but you want to come now that somebody is talking. Where were you all at 4 am when I was by myself?”
The student said she feels so unsafe that she doesn’t want to be at EWU campus right now, so she left for the weekend.
In response to the car break-ins, the Student Government Association and the university’s Vice President of Student Success and Engagement put out messages to students.
SGA said they are working with campus security to “explore possible solutions to assist affected students” and help “prevent further incidents.”
VP Dr. Jame’l Hodges said this was a “senseless act” and the university is working to add more safety on campus.
The letter says there is more exterior lighting and over the next few weeks, students will see the current fencing enclosed, nine new solar-powered emergency towers with sirens, lights and speakers. Plus, they plan to have enhanced surveillance cameras completed by May 1st.
Last year in August, after the racially motivated mass shooting that happened in Jacksonville, the state donated a million dollars to the school to help enhance campus safety.
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As for the suspect involved in this incident, JSO said they found him, but he got away.
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