Police, Pitt outline SempleFest punishments

Some Semple Street residents woke up on Thursday morning and found a letter from the city… Some Semple Street residents woke up on Thursday morning and found a letter from the city police taped to their doors.

‘Previous experience has shown that the residents of Semple Street will quickly abdicate their responsibilities during SempleFest. This will no longer occur,’ read the letter, which was written by Commander Kathryn Degler, who works in the Zone 4 police station. Zone 4 covers Central and South Oakland.

Others Semple Street residents found that their neighbors had already torn down their notices.

Degler wasn’t available to comment on the letter on Thursday — whether the police had done this before, what their rationale was — because she was busy planning for SempleFest, said officers in Zone 4.

But Degler wasn’t the only person warning students about the potential consequences of participating in SempleFest, which isn’t legally sanctioned because the organizers don’t have a permit.

The University’s Office of Residence Life delivered letters about SempleFest to students living on campus.

Students who are cited or arrested will have to answer not only to the state and federal court systems, but to their university’s judicial board, as well, both letters said.

Pitt students found guilty of violating the University’s Student Code of Conduct could receive fines or disciplinary probation, have to pay restitution for any damages they cause, go on disciplinary suspension or be expelled, said a the letter written by Residence Life Director and Associate Dean of Students Shawn Brooks.

Brooks said that he hasn’t ‘paid a lot of attention’ to SempleFest in the past. His decision to write a letter to students this year was directly related to February’s post-Super Bowl riots.

‘One of the pieces of feedback that we got from students was that they didn’t realize the ramifications of engaging in any type of behavior that the University deemed inappropriate,’ said Brooks. ‘I don’t think that my letter was in any way an effort to reduce the number of people who show up there. I really want to let them know what the consequences could be. I didn’t want them saying, ‘I didn’t know.”

Semple Street resident and Pitt sophomore Chloe Forker said the warning ‘kinda gives you the idea that it’s not gonna be the ridiculousness it was last year.’

During last year’s SempleFest, 64 people, 18 of whom were Pitt students, were arrested. That’s 20 more arrests than occurred during February’s post-Super Bowl riots.

But Forker still said she didn’t think the notices would affect how people behave.

Pitt sophomore Danielle Lofurno, who lives a block up the street from Forker, agreed.

‘I think everything’s gonna happen anyway,’ she said. ‘I think it’s all in good fun.’

But, she did say that she’d be a little more careful when she attends the event today.

Degler warned in her letter that ‘Officers WILL NOT make repeated requests to clear Semple Street.’ Students who don’t leave the streets when officers ask them to will be arrested for failure of disorderly persons to disperse upon lawful order.

She also wrote that students will not be allowed to congregate on porch roofs or fire escapes because they aren’t strong enough to support them. Students, provided that they aren’t on their own property, could be arrested for criminal trespass if they gather on porch roofs or fire escapes after the police ask them to leave.

Semple Street residents will be held responsible for anything that occurs on their property. Underage drinkers could be arrested. Supplying underage students with alcohol is a misdemeanor crime.