Cops and Robbers
First we were informed by a front-page headline in the local paper that Hanover needed another detective - in addition to the one we have now - to help combat a rising crime wave. According to the chief of police, "The days of not locking your home and your car in Hanover are gone - gone forever." The department's present detective cited a 40 per cent increase in thefts over last year, and declared that "high-caliber people are involved in the crimes. . . . We've tracked the stuff all the way down to New Haven, Connecticut." The chief said he could no longer use patrol officers to assist the detective because of an increase in their traffic control duties. The chief knows what he's talking about. A front-page story in the next day's paper reported a "chain reaction crash" on Elm Street in Hanover. It seems a Massachusetts woman panicked while parking her car, hit the gas pedal, and crunched seven parked cars together.
Even with all these warnings and goings on, we still were not prepared for the events that transpired the following day outside of Baker Library. Someone glanced out the window of Crosby Hall and noticed a policeman striding up Tuck Mall with a rifle in hand. Another officer, similarly equipped, guarded a corner near Kiewit, and armed officers milled around several patrol cars near the library entrance. A troop of town police, Lebanon and state police, and eight campus police surrounded the library. Dean Manuel, looking a little worried, also was there.
The explanation? A library employee, seeing a man with a rifle enter the building, called the campus police dispatcher. The armed man, it turned out, was a hunter visiting his girl friend. He carried his rifle because his car wouldn't lock and he didn't want the gun stolen. He left the library before the police arrived. One Crosby observer commented, "Ten years ago nobody would have blinked when that guy walked in there. Students going hunting walked around with guns all the time." He remembered, however, that a few years ago an elderly gentleman was held up somewhere near Rip Road - at the point of a hockey stick.
