Residents of the Hillside area have been able to breathe easier following the May 4 arrest of 19-year-old Somerville resident Nicolas Chacon, who police officers say committed several of the sexual assaults that plagued the area from the end of March through much of April.
Suspected of being the first serial sexual assaulter near campus in the history of Tufts, Chacon is charged with crimes ranging from aggravated rape to kidnapping that were committed against five different victims.
He admitted to these crimes during questioning by the Medford Police Department (MPD), but still pleaded not guilty at his May 7 arraignment.
On Tuesday, Chacon was denied bail following a dangerousness hearing. His next court appearance will be at a probable cause hearing on June 5 at the Somerville District Court.
The five incidents with which police officers can definitively connect Chacon occurred over a two-week period, but they are investigating the possibility that he might be responsible for assaults against three other victims outside of that time frame, according to Somerville Police Department (SPD) Public Information Officer Paul Upton.
Two of these incidents' victims are Tufts students who reported being assaulted. One of them occurred on March 31 and the other on April 10.
According to the Boston Herald, Chacon lives with his two younger brothers and a younger sister in an apartment complex on Powderhouse Boulevard in Somerville.
His neighbor Helen Maloney, 38, described him as "a really nice kid" and "very quiet," according to the Somerville Journal. Though the officials involved in the case will not say whether Chacon had a criminal record prior to his recent arrest, the Medford Transcript reported that he has "no known prior record" and is not a registered sex offender.
Officials credit his arrest to the work of a task force with representatives from MPD, SPD and the Tufts University Police Department (TUPD) that was convened after a woman walking along Winthrop Street in Medford was threatened with a knife and sexually assaulted twice on April 20.
Members included Tufts Director of Public and Environmental Safety John King, TUPD Captain Mark Keith, who attended some of the task force meetings, and Upton, who was present at most of them. MPD Public Information Officer Lieutenant Paul Covino said that representation from the police departments was "pretty even across the board."
The first step of the task force was to "determine if there was a pattern developing, if the community was at risk," Upton said.
As the case progressed and a pattern was identified, task force members followed leads that arose after MPD released a video of the attacker taken from a surveillance camera at a convenience store, gathered registration numbers of cars fitting a description of the perpetrator's vehicle and collected information on registered sex offenders. This involved "countless hours of work," Upton said.
The involvement of the public was crucial, officials say. While Somerville and Medford residents were notified of the crimes via a "reverse-911" call to all homes, TUPD hung wanted posters and security alerts around campus and sent several campus-wide e-mails. Through these, students were provided with a description of the suspect and his vehicle.
Keith said that TUPD alone received "two to three dozen" phone calls from Tufts students and staff members who offered potential leads.
Finally, Upton said, the investigation zeroed in on Chacon, whose "appearance seemed to be similar" to that of the person in the video and to descriptions given by witnesses.
Chacon was then called into the Medford police station "to talk" - and he "did come voluntarily," Upton said.
"The DA, as a result of those conversations, was confident that this was the sole perpetrator of the crimes that we were looking at," he said.
The nature of the crimes with which Chacon is charged is rare for the area. Somerville has not had a case of "stranger rape" reported in over three years, while no crimes of this kind have been reported in Medford since 2001.
As for Tufts, Keith and King said that they cannot remember a case of stranger rape in the over 18 years that each has been at Tufts.
"When we have reports of sexual assaults, a lot of times it has to do with some type of dating, not a stranger per se that jumps out from behind a bush and attacks somebody," Keith said.
King characterized Tufts as "a very safe campus" and said that the attacks are "an unfortunate wakeup call" for the community.
Students who live in the Boston Avenue area, where two of the crimes with which Chacon is being charged occurred, note that while the tension has eased somewhat since his arrest, the atmosphere has changed permanently.
"To be frank, I don't feel that much better about it because the initial sense of safety has already been broken," said senior Bic Leu, who lives on Boston Avenue. "Before this I knew that there was a degree of care that needed to be taken when I was walking home alone at night. But for some reason I trusted that because it was around a college campus it would be in this bubble where nothing could happen."
Police and administrators hope that this disillusionment will result in greater student vigilance.
"It's good to feel relaxed and secure about your environment, but there's also usefulness about heightened awareness, which isn't a bad thing," Dean of Student Affairs Bruce Reitman said.
Keith said he continues to urge students to not walk alone, or at least to not distract themselves with iPods while they walk.
He said that the "escalation" in the use of TUPD's escort service is proof that attitudes toward safety are changing for the better.
Keith said that requests for the escort service rose after the Winthrop Street attack from "a handful a night" to between 50 and 70 per night, though this number is now in decline.
Even so, TUPD will continue to employ the additional nighttime resources, such as an additional patrol car and extra officers, that were available before Chacon's arrest until demand for them decreases, Keith said.
Additionally, the administration and the Public Safety office are reevaluating Tufts' emergency notification system.
"Between the Virginia Tech incident and this, it's caused Public Safety and many of us in the administration to look into communication systems," Reitman said.
He said that TUPD public safety alerts, which are posted in buildings on-campus, as well as the e-mail notification system, are both "passive" methods of communication.
Voicing a need for better communication, Leu said that she heard about an attack that happened on "the next intersection away from my house" only from a newscast the day after they happened. "An e-mail a lot earlier would have been nice," she said.
King mentioned that text messaging may be a possibility in the future, and Reitman suggested a system similar to the city's reverse-911 phone communication.
This is complicated, however, by the fact that "maybe two percent" of students use campus phones, and "maybe 30 percent" have current phone numbers on file, Reitman said.
He mentioned that in the past, administrators tried to withhold registration privileges until students updated their phone numbers, but "it was awful" - many students missed their registration time and the requirement had to be rescinded.
The administration will seek the input of students on emergency notification systems through the newly formed Crisis Communication Committee, an administrative committee that will include some student representatives and begin its operations next semester, King said.
Ultimately, public safety officials and administrators remain confident that their efforts will succeed.
"[Tufts] is an institution that takes safety and security very seriously," King said.
Exemplifying this is the fact that TUPD is one of only 23 police departments in Massachusetts accredited by the state government. There are over 400 police departments in the commonwealth, according to King.
Additionally, "the working relationship between the Somerville, Medford and Tufts police departments is truly a model," he said. "The cooperation that is there, the mutual respect, the sharing of information - there are virtually no barriers in the information-sharing between the agencies."
"We've always had a good working relationship with Tufts University, and they have an excellent police department," Upton agreed.
Because criminals have an increasing amount of resources at their disposal, he said, "it's more important than ever that we all work together."
Students agree that this relationship is crucial.
Senior and Boston Avenue resident Rachel Leven said it is "very important," and Leu, who said she has noticed an increased amount of patrol cars from the two cities as well as from TUPD, noted that their presence made her "feel a lot safer."
While King said that "our crime statistics are lower [than other schools']," he pointed out that there are not always "apples to apples" comparisons available.
Still, consensus is that Tufts is located in "an extremely safe area" in a city that is already "very safe," Upton said.
Reitman emphasized that this should not be considered a given. "Our track record is very good. But that doesn't mean we should give ourselves the luxury of taking that for granted," he said.
Be the first to comment on this article!