JMU Block Party Riot

[mr_smiles]

Drop one dumbass that's trying to assault you with a beer bottle and it's highly likely that the other 7,999 idiots will want to find somewhere else to be.

I don't know about that one. just gas'em, if you can't breathe you can't fight.

We need more riot control vehicles in this country, I know it's not popular after the 60's to spray people with water hoses, but if given the choice I'd take a hp hose to the chest over a bean bag. And it's safer for both sides.

[12oreo]

I always thought WWII type flamethrowers would be effective crowd/riot control tools.

[Boss Hogg]

Between this and the snowball/police car incident, JMU is going to start getting a reputation as the problem child of Virginia universities.

They do have hot women though.

[bundoc]

More force.
I would challenge the "small group" theory based on the presented evidence. It was a large group of idiots, including the people who didn't disperse when ordered to do so, the people cheering the idiots assaulting the cops and burning stuff, and the idiots who thought this whole thing was just cool.

What I meant by small group were the people that initiated the throwing of bottles and other projectiles. It started with those few individuals and led more idiots to follow. I was at ground zero when this all happened. As I was walking to the gas station there were six HPD officers trying to break the crowd up. They stated that the landlords were requesting that they shut it down. There was about a 50 foot gap between myself and the other side of the crowd and they were not letting anyone through. After the officer explained why they were breaking up block party, I shook his hand and thanked him for doing his job.

I will admit, that I was initially confused as to why they breaking up a peaceful even that I have attended for four years. So myself and my brothers began to leave when someone in the crowd started a chant. Next, another chant followed by beer cans being tossed at officers. About 10 minutes into the chanting there were approximately six beers thrown at the officers; luckily, none of the officers were hit. One officer instructed all six of them to leave while the crowd cheered and the Red Sea no longer was parted.

I assumed the officers gave up and let the party go on as they have done in the previous years. So I then walked to my intended destination to a friend's town house on that street. To my knowledge they have never tried to break up a block party that I have been to; however, they do write some citations if you step into the street or you're underage [I have never been carded as this was a rarity until last semester]. I enjoyed myself for about another hour until I saw more officers, this time with numbers and full riot gear. This alarmed me as I have never seen anyone in full riot gear with shields.

I knew it was time to leave so I asked the officers if they were going to break up the party. They confirmed my assumption if I should leave and I did. After I left and started walking home I could see beer bottles and tear gas being exchanged and was glad I was out of there. Did that tear gas do its job as swarms of people began to run away.

More force.

They are obviously not used to facing consequences for their actions. If my information is correct, earlier in the year there was a flash mob/rave/whatever at one of the libraries on that campus where thousands of kids packed into the place like sardines and then started jumping off different levels of the library into crowds, etc. Why the university did not immediately come down on that like the iron fist of stalin is beyond me, but it's clear that they set a bad precedent.

EDIT -- found what I was thinking about:

http://breezejmu.org/2009/12/07/rave...ampus-library/

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-iSum_wGpE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvGlv...eature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5O81T...eature=related

Once the police got word of the flash mob, they blocked all the entrances to Library and did not let any one else in. After about a half hour if I remember the DJ stopped the music and everyone peacefully dispersed. The idea was copied from UNC Chapel Hill as stated in the Facebook event.

Another scenario is when ODU tried the same thing; however, this time officers used force and sent tear gas into the library. The tear gas did its job, but rushing thousands of people out of a couple entrances suck.

The reason I believe the flash rave at our library did not become violent was because to my knowledge, everyone was not intoxicated. This is not an excuse to start a riot, but I believe this was a huge factor this past weekend.

Between this and the snowball/police car incident, JMU is going to start getting a reputation as the problem child of Virginia universities.

They do have hot women though.

Yes, this is not helping JMU's reputation at all; luckily, I have already committed to a job this summer. The bad thing is, JMU is such a friendly place to be, compared to growing up in Hampton Roads. I do not believe where I live is a bad area, but it is not as friendly compared to JMU. When I was a freshman and would see ipods, cell phones, credit cards, etc laying in open cupboards at the gym, I thought these people were crazy. Never in my life would I leave anything of value to me so open for anyone to take. I had my wallet in a locker during football practice and my own teammates broke the lock, stole my money and folded my clothes back up.

Another example, when you're at a party people people introduce themselves, offer you their beer and welcome you into their apartments. Countless times I have seen people spill beer on each other and laugh it off, whereas, back at home you step on someone's shoe and they want to take your head off. I don't want say that this place is perfect, I'm just pointing out that this is not a good representation of JMU on a daily basis.

On a good note, the women here are definitely hot with the best ratio I could have ever imagined.

[bundoc]

Dear Students:

Let me first acknowledge that many of you did not attend springfest on Saturday. To those of you who were involved, your collective behavior was an embarrassment to your university and a discredit to our reputation. No one is opposed to some fun on a beautiful spring weekend, but public drunkenness, destruction of property, and threats to personal safety are unacceptable outcomes. Yesterday's events reflect poorly on your character and were demonstrable evidence of less than sound judgment.

As a university community, we care about our neighbors. Unfortunately, the events of this weekend do not demonstrate that concern.

To mitigate the negative consequences of these types of situations in the future, we will be conferring with students, property owners, law enforcement, including the Virginia State Police, government officials and others.

Linwood H. Rose
President

This email was sent to us the next day and posted on our homepage.

[bundoc]

I have my opinion on this and it will run counter to what you may think, or others on this forum. But since my undergraduate degree was at UofO in Oregon, and I have seen the realities of this first hand, I would say no I don't think the police should have used more force then they did.

Here is what's going to happen next year:

A heavy police presence will be apparent prior to the party, and may actually shut the original party down forcing people to a new location. Meanwhile all of the people that enjoyed last years chaos will be planning to recreate the event. They will start "flashing" up in areas starting fires at parties, and messing things up trying to stoke the fire if you will. Police will respond in force.

The Next Year?

Increase the violence on both sides...

I realize this is pessimistic but I watched what was essentially a "cold" or a better term would be "non-lethal" war between college students and police that continued to increase in violence on both sides every year. I know that some officers on this site will disagree with me, but I have Riot Squad officers that have conceded this point to me, it is kind of like a game. A really intense version of rugby, where both sides kick the shit out of each other then hold back till the next year waiting.

My biggest suggestion to the officers is never allow parties to get this big to begin with. But with the politics of Universities this is a hard thing to do, as they contribute a lot of money to local communities. Notice in the above article that they state that the "trouble makers" weren't from the University itself. This is a calculated political move to insure that the University doesn't get a bad name, or suffer any sort of repercussions for the party.

College kids get drunk. They go insane and are very likely to go mob crazy in the presence of law enforcement. The key is breaking up any largish gathering as soon as possible, thus keeping the groups spread out in different locations not in a mob of 8,000 drunken hooligans.

Be happy there are no kids in emergency rooms with rubber bullet wounds to the skull, and hope that the police will start talking to the University tomorrow to insure that next year a party of this magnitude is not allowed to take place.

I don't know if its fair to say break these parties up. The block party is usually scheduled around alumni weekend and when you get alumni and current students in town it becomes a 1,000 - 2,000 person crowd which I do not see a problem with this the past couple of years. On the other hand, I do see the point that if a party does not get this big there is no way for it to get out of hand, as it did.

You are totally right about the students moving it last minute to another location. This is what happened during Spring Fest on Friday. The party was supposed to be in one location, but was changed last minute because the residents received notices earlier in the week that the party will not be tolerated. The party was basically moved across the street and everyone had a good time. Most of the people there were JMU students and when officers started to break the party up around 5:00PM everyone left, peacefully.
It will be interesting to see what happens when I come back during alumni weekend. I hope that there is a solution without totally getting rid of block party.

[RWK]

Why the university did not immediately come down on that like the iron fist of stalin is beyond me...

Poor metaphor there, JW...

[RWK]

The college degreed future of America.

...and future 2nd Lieutenants.

[Irish]

Video of a little different reaction to a kid at University of Maryland yesterday. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ajR6F...layer_embedded
http://www.wtop.com/?nid=708&sid=1933026
http://abcnews.go.com/WN/video-shows...ry?id=10362033
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...l?hpid=topnews

[twitch1706]

I recall hearing that the article about Springfest that made it into the Washington Post mentioned something about how the fact that Fox Hill didn't allow kegs (starting this year) could have contributed: In years past there were thousands of drunkards, with plastic Solo cups. This year, there were thousands of drunkards with beer bottles. I'm not trying to justify the mob's activities, but have you tried to throw a Solo cup? It doesn't work. With thousands of people present, people felt secure by a thin veil of anonymity... "If I throw this Bud at the cop over there, I can run away and never be caught!"

I've spoken with firemen who were present. From them, it sounded as if things started off with people randomly throwing empty beer bottles off of their decks when they were finished drinking them. This inevitably led to lacerations. Fire/EMT called in, but couldn't get to the injuries because the mob started heckling and pelting the servicemen. This led to the police being called in; the snowball started here.

I feel that HPD's actions were well warranted. 8,000 rowdy drunk college kids and 200 police? If things had gotten more out of hand and the police had not employed riot control we could have had severely wounded, if not dead, police on our hands. They were just doing what was necessary to stop the destruction of property and make it home safely to their families.

I'm embarrassed to be attending college here in Harrisonburg since I unfortunately get grouped in with JMUers; I'm tremendously glad I don't go to JMU.