UC Santa Cruz students concerned after police says a woman was raped on campus

SANTA CRUZ, Calif. (KION-TV)- On Tuesday afternoon, Students at UC Santa Cruz attended classes as usual.

However, some students are concerned after UC Santa Cruz Police said a woman was raped on campus over the weekend.

A student who did not want to go on camera shared that she would change how she does things on campus.

"So mainly just terrified about things like that, like what could happen in the future if that happened at a rate that we've been at. Stuff like that," said the unanimous student.

Students are uncomfortable walking to class or back to their dorms with this incident happening so close to the main campus.

According to the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network, among undergraduate students, 26.4% of females and 6.8% of males experience rape or sexual assault through physical force, violence, or incapacitation.

UC Santa Cruz reported for the 2017-2018 school year, in accordance with Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972, the Violence Against Women Act, that they received "352 reports regarding gender discrimination and gender-based harm." Of those complaints, 24% were for sexual assault and 31% for sexual harassment.

71% of those cases were closed due to "Insufficient Information, No Response, Non-Affiliate, and/or Complainant Declines Further Action," and 20% were closed due to finding an "alternative solution." Only 9% of any complaints made to the university during the 2017-2018 school year were formally investigated.

Of those complaints, 63% were made by undergraduate students, and 13% were made anonymously.

So overall, less than two percent of students reported gender discrimination and gender-based harm.

"I definitely get scared, and like a lot of the time, especially if it's a night I won't like, I walk with my group of friends and like I have my pepper spray and everything, and I have things know even like since I was young, like not even on this campus, my mom taught me like put your keys in between your knuckles and, like, be ready to, like, fight."

Police said the incident early Friday morning around midnight occurred in the Upper Campus Forest Area on the Residential campus. Officers said that friends of the victim found her passed out. The friends brought her to a fire station when she said she had been sexually assaulted.

UC Santa Cruz Police said that they had increased campus patrols since the incident occurred.