Photo by: Megan Westervelt

Five girls were living in a townhouse near campus.

On March 10, a man broke into their home, broke through one of the bedroom doors and threatened one of the girls, saying he had a gun. A second roommate climbed onto the roof, yelling for help. The man left the house with just a wallet, and no one was physically hurt.

But, it was the third time the girls’ house had been broken into, and it was enough for all of them.

“It was really hard to be home alone for even 20 minutes to do laundry because evidence of what happened was everywhere,” Amelia Zommer, a senior, said. There was fingerprint dust on all of the doors from the police and two doors were broken.

Since then, Zommer and all of her roommates have moved out. She is currently living in Nagel Hall and is one of five students who have taken advantage of the university’s offer of free accommodation to students living off campus who feel unsafe.

A suspect in more than a dozen robberies and burglaries in off-campus neighborhoods near campus has yet to be caught. The two most recent s were during the week of March 9.

Justin Price, director of Housing & Residential Education, said the university has 150 beds available for students for the remainder of spring quarter.

“The students I have worked with have been very appreciative of the offer and feel much safer living on campus and the ability to stay for free because many of them are still paying for their off-campus apartment,” he said.

The rooms have been available since March 13.

“The chancellor wanted to make sure the people living off campus had the ability to still live nearby and feel safe,” said Jim Berscheidt, associate vice chancellor of University Communications.

Free accommodation is just one of the things the university is doing to help students and the police.

In an e-mail sent to the DU community on March 13, Chancellor Robert Coombe said the university added $5,000 to the original $2,000 reward offered by Crime Stoppers.

Although off campus incidents are not in Campus Safety’s jurisdiction, the department has increased patrols in the neighborhoods around DU, said Berscheidt.

The Denver Police Department has also increased its presence, with undercover cops around and cameras set up in some of the neighborhoods.

Numerous calls to the DPD were not responded to by press time.

Even with the university and the DPD adding all of these safety features, Zommer and her roommates’ story is not a unique one.

A DU junior, who asked to remain anonymous, and all of her roommates moved out of their home two months ago after their house was broken into a second time.

On Jan. 5, a man burglarized their home, which is located a few blocks west of campus. “I heard him come in, thinking it was one of my roommates.

“When I saw that it wasn’t (but instead a tall man) I sat up and started screaming,” she said of the event.

After threatening to shoot them, he left with a bunch of electronic equipment, including a laptop, camera and iPod. They all moved out the next day to secured off-campus apartments.

“We were literally ‘gun shy’ and didn’t at all feel safe at that location,” she said. “We didn’t sleep there another night.”

They all have mace under their beds and are careful about keeping their doors locked.

“It’s very scary that these occurrences keep going on and infuriating that the suspect still hasn’t been caught,” she said.