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Becoming Stalker Savvy
Becoming Stalker Savvy, A Campus Seminar
“Becoming Stalker Savvy: Confronting the Trends,” cosponsored by George Mason University Sexual Assault Services and the University Police, will offer insight into current stalking trends 9 a.m.-3 p.m. March 10 in Enterprise Hall Room 178. Featured speakers Tracy Bahm and Jayne Hitchcock are experts in stalking prevention and response. Bahm is the director of the Stalking Resource Center. Before joining the center, she served as a senior attorney at the American Prosecutors Research Institute, educating prosecutors about crimes against women. Hitchcock is an author who has helped to pass anti-cyberstalking laws in many states. She has also served as an expert media consultant for coverage of stalking issues with a number of media outlets, including Time and “48 Hours.”
Mason last offered a seminar on stalking in 2001. With the advent of new hi-tech tools, Connie Kirkland, Director of Sexual Assault Services, said, “It is important to revisit this issue. Stalkers are getting smarter all the time. Now they are tech-oriented.” Resources available to today’s stalker include the ability to hack computers, steal identities and track movements via global positioning devices.
Mason’s treatment of their first online stalking case in 1998 earned the school praise in Hitchcock’s book “Net Crimes & Misdemeanors.” The incident involved an overzealous student creating an unauthorized Web site dedicated to a classmate. Kirkland took steps to have the site removed and got the would-be stalker to attend the university’s counseling center.
Kirkland said that many organizations are not prepared to handle stalking issues and that there is a need for both prevention and response training. Registrants for the seminar are a diverse group, including CIA agents, police officers, students and faculty.
Junior Jessamine Caravaca-Soto, an administration of justice major, said she is attending the seminar because stalking “is a huge problem within our society, and one of the ways to combat it is through educating people.”
Sexual Assault Services receives an average of 30 stalking reports annually, but Kirkland believes that the actual number of incidents is higher.
“Many people do not realize something can be done. Others minimize it or see it as flattery in the beginning,” Kirkland said. The National Institute of Justice reported that nationally only 17 percent of on-campus victims report stalking incidents. Kirkland advised those affected by stalking to seek support through Sexual Assault Services or other counseling and to keep written documentation of all incidents.
Registration for the seminar continues through Friday. To learn more, e-mail Sexual Assault Services at…