I forgot to mention that this weekend we had a riot in Dinkytown, the legal fraternity’s neighborhood.1 This is from the UMN student newspaper’s website:
People jumped on cars, rode in shopping carts and chanted around the fires as the evening progressed. Partygoers attempted to flip cars sporadically through the evening and harassed drivers attempting to navigate through the area.
…
About 70 officers, many clad in riot gear, were at the scene over the course of the night, Garcia said. They used various chemical irritants, including gas and spray — commonly known as tear gas and mace — as well as riot sticks and projectiles, such as foam and marking rounds, for crowd control.
Some partygoers almost immediately submitted to the officers, but many resisted, launching bottles and debris at officers and onto the fires and shooting fireworks toward police.
Full story is here. There are slideshows here and here.
Cops were apparently slow to respond, which wasn’t a surprise. A few weeks ago the sorority across the street from the Gamma house had a sprawling party. Think drunk, screaming undergrads… Krawall & Remmidemmi. The kids blocked the street, causing drivers to blare their horns at 3am…
I heard the party coming closer to the house, so I went outside to check on my car. As I opened the door two guys popped up from the side of my car, shouted “shit!” and took off running.
I called the cops.
The cops took a long time to respond and didn’t even shut down the party. Right after the police left, a train of undergrads crept from behind the sorority house and re-entered the front door. A few minutes later they left the sorority house and stood in front of the Gamma house and howled.
The party restarted, and they continued to keep our entire house awake, so I called the cops again. They never showed up the second time.
This weekend’s riots were obviously more serious than the sorority party. One of my former housemates had his windshield smashed. I wish the police would shut parties down before things like that happen.
Oh, and apparently the president of the university is very disappointed: