Students were burglarized and assaulted in two separate incidents off campus over the break.
According to Huntsville Police Department Lieutenant Jim Barnes, HPD was dispatched to the Forum at 10:21 a.m. on March 15 for an assault. The victim of the assault was a female Sam Houston State University student.
“It was an assault with family violence,” Barnes said. “It was a boyfriend and a girlfriend and the girlfriend was assaulted. I don’t know if he is a student or not and I won’t have that information until he is arrested, but he is known. The victim called. We got there and apparently the boyfriend had hit his girlfriend in the right side of her face.”
The suspect is known, however the investigation is still underway and a warrant for the suspect may be released.
“Obviously, we don’t like domestic violence,” Barnes said. “The best thing is that I applaud this young lady for calling us. I would tell anyone who is a victim of domestic violence to seek help. Get out of that relationship because it’s not right, it’s not normal and there are good people out there that will treat you correctly, treat you right. And there are people out there who are willing to help you so if you’re in that type of relationship, seek help and get out of it.”
In another incident March 14, HPD was dispatched to Montgomery Village at 6:08 p.m. in response to a suspected burglary.
“Basically the individuals who lived there who appeared to be students, said that when they returned home they noticed that their patio window was slightly ajar,” Barnes said. “When they went inside they noticed that his HP Pavilion laptop was missing, as well as approximately $200 cash taken from a box in his room and a Sony 1500 amplifier.”
Although no arrest has been made yet, Barnes said that several photos and fingerprint samples were taken from crime scene and will go under further investigation.
“We investigated the scene and all of that has been turned over to our detectives here and they are in the process of investigating,” Barnes said. “The items that are missing—once we get the serial numbers from the owners, we’ll enter those into the statewide computer so if they end up being pawned in Dallas or Houston, we have a good chance of recovering them and finding out who did it from that aspect.”
Barnes advised students to always secure their valuables whether they are leaving to go to the store for five minutes or leaving for a week during spring break vacation.
“It appears that they forced entrance into the apartment and the apartment was locked—I always tell people to always lock their stuff up and it appeared that they were doing that in this particular case,” Barnes said. “But make sure you always lock your stuff, put your valuables up, especially during spring break at a time that I know a lot of students will leave to go home and they’ll actually leave their computers and laptops and stuff at their apartments. If they can take them with them and/or secure or lock them up in a closet that’s always the best route that I could recommend.”