The Mississippi State University Police Department is taking extra precautions to ensure security on campus with a program called Bully Patrol.
Michael Simmons, crime prevention coordinator at MSU, said the purpose of the program is to deter crime by strategically placing Bully Patrol members around campus.
“Bully Patrol serves as our eyes and ears in the parking lots and around resident halls,” Simmons said.
Bully Patrol members wear bright yellow vests to make sure students see them walking around. People are less likely to commit a crime if they believe someone is watching them, he said.
Another responsibility of Bully Patrol is to escort students who are walking alone at night to their dorms or cars on campus. With the old system, a Bully Patrol member would leave his zone to escort a student, but the new system employs a few members to ride around on golf carts to pick up the students, ensuring no zone is left unattended. Currently, 11 people work during a shift, but the police department is hoping to hire more people in order to have 14 members working at a time, Simmons said.
MSU Police Chief Georgia Lindley said the program has been running for about five years and has been successful so far in reducing crime on campus. On some occasions, Bully Patrol has received 30 calls in one night for students needing an escort, she said.
The police department hires both students and retired individuals in the community to work as patrollers, she said.
“We employ students to work Bully Patrol, because it’s a good way to get your foot in the door if you are interested in becoming a police officer in the future,” Lindley said.
Jeff Kunz, Bully Patrol member and sophomore criminology major, said it has recently been rough working at night due to the cold weather. Because the program is necessary to keep people safe, he said it is worth it to bear the cold temperatures. In fact, he said he enjoyed his job so much he recently changed his major.
“Bully Patrol actually changed what I wanted to do with my life, so I changed my major to criminology this semester,” Kunz said.
Florenciana Abney, junior social work major, said she often used Bully Patrol last semester because she worked as an information assistant in Hurst Hall during late hours.
“I’ve used Bully Patrol about 10 times, and I’ve never had to wait long because they were always close by in the area,” Abney said.
She became familiar with the man who most nights walked her to her car.
“I felt comfortable walking with him, so I really wasn’t very scared,” she said.
According to the MSU Annual Security Report, campus has seen relatively low numbers of criminal offenses since the inception of Bully Patrol with the exception of one instance.
Simmons said the police department gave Bully Patrol employees the night off for graduation because the police department thought everyone would be at the ceremony.
“We saw 13 auto burglaries in one night because Bully Patrol was off duty,” he said.
Simmons said he hopes another night like that never happens again, but said this instance is proof of the success of the program. Other schools like Jackson State University have since emulated MSU in similar programs, he said.
“Bully Patrol helps keep the campus safer because people protect individual zones for a longer period of time versus the limited protection of police officers driving around,” Kunz said.
Students that need Bully Patrol’s services can call the MSU Police Department at 325-2121.