Purdue University installs new security cameras on campus

"I don't walk alone at night. I just don't feel it's that safe," said one Purdue student.

Campus police at any university would advise the same. Officers can't have a presence everywhere at once. At Purdue, where they can't have a body, they can at least have eyes.

"We have embarked on a process to begin installing external digital video camera in key areas around the campus," explained Chief John Cox of the Purdue University Police Department.


Fifty of them to start, passively monitored from police headquarters, where a bank of about a dozen are in use now. They'll help officer respond to crimes like theft and criminal mischief, and later investigate and prosecute those crimes.

"The other side of that is the life safety issue," added Cox. "Put those cameras out there where we have a high concentration of students and staff."

Eventually those cameras could be tied to call boxes around campus. Someone presses the emergency button and the camera automatically zooms in and starts recording. That's down the road, for now they're going up at the campus' parking garages.

"Parking can be a very heated issue around campus," said Cox.

That means police will be watching where they weren't before.

"It depends what they use if for," said freshman Derek White. "Catching drunk kids, that's not cool, but for strong arms, that would be good."

"I get texts of things they alert us to of things going on late at night, that I didn't hear of," said fellow freshman Kristina Tomasik. "So stuff goes on that I don't ever know of."

And by May, when the first set of cameras are installed, campus police will know even more.

Campus police hope to add another 50 cameras by the end of the year. The total cost is $1.4 million.