ECU rids campus of riots this Halloween

Destroyed vehicles and tear gas colored Greenville’s Halloween last year after a riot broke out at a student apartment complex, but this year the city attracted less destructive crowds.

Immediately following the incident, with damages estimated at $40,000, the Greenville police and city council members, along with local apartment management and East Carolina University staff, collaborated to ensure the disturbances wouldn’t recur.

“Our police department and the landlords were involved to begin to have communication and create a culture that would provide for a safe Halloween this year,” said Greenville Mayor Pro-Tem Calvin Mercer.

Greenville city council member Marion Blackburn, said this Halloween was a major improvement, partly due to better police deployment.

“We had roughly the same amount of officers as we did last year, it’s just that we deployed them differently this year so we had more officers in the areas outside of downtown versus last year we had more downtown,” said Kristen Hunter, spokesperson for the Greenville Police Department.

She said officers were better prepared and property management companies played a key role by sending out zero tolerance messages and aiding in crowd control.

“Some of the property managers even allowed us to block the entrances to the complexes when too many were in there,” Hunter said.

ECU Student Body President Mark Matulewicz said the University also helped.

“We had articles go out through the East Carolinian...we sent out emails, and we also had a lot of sober and non-alcoholic alternatives for students this year,” he said.

He said non-alcoholic programs saw an increase in student participation, which he attributed to concerns over safety in downtown Greenville.

Conor Hoffman, a junior at ECU, said the atmosphere was much calmer this year.

“There was more of a police presence around campus, and everyone understood why certain things were in effect just to keep people safe,” he said. “This year was more fun instead of just going absolutely crazy like last year’s incident.”

Hunter said there were arrests made for disorderly conduct and underage drinking, but the incidents were not caused by students.

“So that’s one of the things we’ll be looking at moving forward for future years — how to prevent people from outside this area from coming in and creating disturbances,” she said.

Blackburn said she commends the collaborative work achieved over the past year.

“We had a Halloween celebration that allowed folks to visit our downtown and community without a large incident and to have overall a positive experience.”

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