Man Jailed for Trespassing After Students Call Police
By John Byrne
 

After a 911 call to police early Sunday morning, a non-student male who had been sleeping in Harkness was arrested and charged with criminal trespassing.
Jon Christian, 32, with no legal residence, was not allowed to post bond because he was found to have been living on the streets and in dormitories. He has been arrested numerous times for various assault charges in four states and has used numerous aliases, police said.
Christian pled no contest to criminal trespass and was given a 30-day jail sentence, part of which has been suspended. He will be incarcerated until early next week.
As a condition of his release, he will not be able to set foot on campus. If he does, he will be forced to serve the remainder of his sentence, Director of Safety and Security Robert Jones said.
“If by chance this person does get out of jail and he does come on campus,” he added, “we would want to inform the courts, and he would be in violation of the court order.”
According to Security, Christian had been staying in various places on campus. A student called Security on Saturday afternoon and stated that he felt unsafe with Christian in the dorm. The situation came to a head Monday, when another student called city police, fearing for residents’ safety.
“Many of the students were fearful that Mr. Christian would come back and hurt someone,” said Oberlin police. “Several of them wanted to leave the building until we found him.”
Police called Jones and he requested that Christian be taken into custody for criminal trespass and until further charges could be investigated.
OSCA’s Housing Coordinator, junior Lindsay Baker, said that Harkness has been dealing with the safety issues posed by the incident.
“This could have happened in any dorm, and it’s a little bit frightening to us that it is happening in a co-op where we have an attitude where we want to be welcoming,” she said.
“This guy totally had access to get into any building he wanted to…and he posed a threat, whether or not that threat was manifested,” she added. “There were definitely people in the house that were threatened by him.”
Harkness held a house meeting Monday evening in which they discussed the issue of safety and issues of class. Some students felt that they were being classist by refusing to let him stay in the dorm.
“It is a community where people need to feel safe to some extent,” she said. “And sometimes you have to make compromises to make sure everybody feels safe.”
“The house came together very quickly as a community and decided that people feel uncomfortable,” she added. “They stopped propping their door so much.”
Security says they’re taking every measure possible to ensure students’ safety.
“We’re taking every precaution there is,” Jones said. “We have announced it to the RAs and the Area Coordinators at our division meeting.”
Security has also sent Christian’s photograph to relevant Residential Life personnel, Jones said.

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