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ETSU to boost security after reported robbery

By Rex Barber and Brian Bishop
Press Staff Writers
rbarber@johnsoncitypress.com, bbsihop@johnsoncitypress.com

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Security will increase at East Tennessee State University following two separate alleged robbery and assault incidents on campus this week.

Public safety at ETSU said Thursday morning that a robbery had been reported overnight on campus near a dormitory. An alleged assault occurred on campus early Monday morning. Both incidents prompted the university to send out alert messages via e-mail to the campus community.

Thursday morning’s robbery victim was ETSU freshman LaDarius Taylor, 18, who told campus police he was walking in the area of John Robert Bell Drive and South Dossett Drive to his dorm room in Dossett Hall early Thursday when two men with deep, raspy voices walked up behind him and told him not to make any sudden moves, according to a police report.

The men patted Taylor down and took his cell phone from around his neck, telling him not to turn around before they ran off. Taylor turned around to see the men’s feet as they ran into a campus parking lot, according to the police report. Taylor was not injured.

After Taylor reported the robbery, campus police interviewed a man who had been parked in the same lot and had seen two white men talking loudly with “distinctive deep voices” as they walked through the area of the incident and back along the same path around the time of the robbery. Zachary Davidson, Blountville, told police the men were around 20 years old and wore hooded jackets.

Campus officials issued a safety alert at 1:24 a.m. concerning the robbery.

Monday’s assault occurred near a railroad overpass on College Heights Road. No description of the assailant was available because the student never saw his attacker, according to a campus police report.

ETSU freshman Matthew Vick, 18, Oak Ridge, told campus police he left his residence in the Presbyterian Ministry house at 1412 College Heights Road to walk to Governors Hall, a campus dormitory, and when he reached the overpass, he heard what sounded like a skateboard behind him.

The next thing Vick knew, he went to the ground and was knocked unconscious, campus police said in the report.

Police estimated that the assault took place between 12:30 a.m. and 1:19 a.m. Monday.

Vick told police he did not see anyone and was unsure whether he was struck in the head or shoved head first into the ground.

According to a Johnson City police report on that incident, none of Vick’s property was missing from his person and it did not appear that anyone had been in his pockets.

ETSU spokesman Joe Smith said Thursday the university’s Public Safety Department was stepping up security in the wake of the two incidents, particularly in the area where the robbery and the Monday assault occurred. He also said campus police were checking video surveillance from cameras in the area recorded around the time of the robbery.

Smith said it was not absolutely clear if the two incidents were related.

“What we do know is similar is these events happened within a close proximity and they happened within a couple of days of each other,” Smith said. “Where they differ is one of the victim’s was physically harmed, the other one wasn’t. Robbery was involved in one case and was not involved in the other. In one of the situations, the victim heard the voice of the suspect and in the other one, that didn’t happen.

“We are going on a very limited description of any kind of a suspect in both cases. It’s hard to say yet if they could be related but we are investigating them both for that possibility.”