A combination of warm weather and St. Patrick’s Day falling on a Saturday created the perfect storm of crime-related activities during the weekend, police officials said.
Data on the number of arrests and citations given Saturday was not available as of Sunday evening, but East Lansing and MSU police sergeants said final numbers might prove this holiday weekend was busier than previous years.
Final statistics will not be determined until early this week, they said.
“All I know is that (we) were really busy,” East Lansing police Sgt. Tresha Neff said. “We always have stepped up patrols around major events, like for this past weekend.”
At the intersection of Grand River and M.A.C. avenues, a traffic post crashed down around 1:20 a.m. Sunday after a college-aged male pulled on it. The post crashed onto the street as several pedestrians walked by, but no one was injured.
Neff could not provide further details on the incident, and the post still was absent as of Sunday evening.
Collingwood Drive was the scene of one of the larger-scale celebrations with several house parties.
Photos posted on Twitter on Saturday afternoon reveal numerous debris in the road including broken glass bottles, plastic furniture and other garbage.
“It was really busy, but it wasn’t out of control or anything,” said engineering sophomore Claire Veit, who spent the day with friends on the lawn of Haslett Arms Apartments, 135 Collingwood Drive.
Psychology sophomore Kimberly Cooper said she did not notice a large police presence in the area, and the partying didn’t seem too bad.
Others in the neighborhood felt the celebrations turned into something much more than
just civil.
“(Saturday’s) events sort of became a free-for-all and kind of went on all day and all night,” said Suchitra Webster, chairwoman of the Bailey Neighborhood Association. “I don’t know if that was respectable behavior, respecting the rights of all residents.”
Webster did not want to place blame only on students causing disorder, as she said people typically frequent the city during major events.
But because the holiday fell on a Saturday, and temperatures were warm, she likened this weekend’s activities to larger disturbances of the community’s past.
“(Saturday) was definitely the perfect storm. … There were shades of yesteryear during (Saturday’s) activity,” she said.
MSU police Sgt. Shaun Mills said unlike the activity in East Lansing, nothing major occurred on campus other than at least eight minor in possession charges given across campus Saturday evening.
“It was like a normal Saturday evening,” he said, noting there also were drunken driving arrests, but did not have statistics.
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