ALLENDALE, Mich.– Authorities are investigating a reported sexual assault that happened last week on Grand Valley State University’s Allendale campus.
The assault is said to have happened outside of the Robinson Living Center. Campus police were notified about the incident on Monday.
Authorities say the investigation is a top priority, as is the safety of every student on campus.
GVSU Police wouldn’t get into much detail on this latest case, only saying the attack happened outside Robinson and they are still looking for a suspect as of Tuesday night.
Authorities are asking students to remain vigilant, and report any suspicious activity. Meanwhile, other staffers are encouraging anyone that may be a victim of this kind of crime to report it, and seek help from the resources available on campus.
They are putting more of an emphasis on disciplining suspects, rather than asking students to do more to keep themselves safe.
“Our focus is less on what a potential victim can do to reduce a risk rather than creating an environment where we are preventing the actual assault. What we don’t want is the situation that makes the victim say ‘if I had only had my key out or if I had done whatever.’ We don’t want them in some way to assume responsibility for what happened, we reject that. The person who bares sole responsibility in these assaults is the person that committed the crime,” said Dwight Hamilton, the Title 9 officer for GVSU.
Hamilton says there are statistics that show most people think victims are lying when they report sexual assaults, but in fact the opposite is true. Only 6 percent of reports they get are false, and they take every single one seriously.
