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Nov 2, 2006 11:00 pm US/Central
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Library Confidential: Crimes Kept Secret
Indecent Acts, Violent Attacks And Sex Crimes Not Reported To Police
by Dave Savini
NAPERVILLE, Ill. (CBS) ―
Most people view libraries as a safe place to study and spend time.
But the CBS 2 Investigators obtained security tapes and official internal library files from more than a dozen libraries that show serious crimes and inappropriate behavior are happening across the city and suburbs.
As Dave Savini reports, more and more of these crimes are kept confidential and police are not being called.
"The library is supposed to be a haven a safe haven," said former teacher Jane Myra Bland.
It is not supposed to be a haven for people like Richard Blaszak.
What Blaszak was doing at a Naperville library was caught on a security camera and stunned the woman behind him.
"I looked at him and he was touching himself," said Lauren Gauger, who is now a college student. Gauger was living in Naperville and attending Naperville North High School in 2004 when she was sitting behind Richard Blaszak in the Nichols Library computer lab.
"There were little kids around and it was really inappropriate for him to be doing that in a public place," she said.
Gauger went to library officials, who refused to call police.
Two weeks later Blaszak returned. This time high school students, Dustin Teves and TJ McNichols, complained.
"He visibly had his hand down his pants," McNichols said.
And for a second time they say library officials did nothing.
"So we are like, are you going to call the police?" Teves said.
Just how safe is your public library? Our 2 Investigators obtained thousands of confidential files from a dozen libraries in the suburbs and Chicago and found cases of indecent acts, violent attacks and sex crimes, raising serious safety questions about libraries and your safety.
In addition to Naperville, some of the libraries which turned over their internal files included Aurora, Joliet, Bolingbrook, Elgin, Waukegan, Wilmette and Chicago. The investigation was launched after a series of complaints to CBS 2 from various library patrons about crime, pornography and library security.
Some library users feared crimes occurring at libraries were not being reported to police unless a patron called 911.
For example in Naperville, records show seven men were caught viewing pornography at libraries and touching themselves in a sexual manner during the last two years. At least two of the cases were the subject of internal library incident reports but were not reported to local police.
In Joliet, a man was written up for printing what a library worker said appeared to be child pornography, but police were not called.
At Aurora's main library, a woman reported to staff in July an assault that included the grabbing of her buttocks and verbal harassment about her breasts, but again police were not called.
"Anytime a crime is committed we want to know," said Aurora police spokesman Dan Ferrelli. "They apparently didn't call us."
Eva Luckinbill, the executive director of Aurora Public Library, admits they could have called police in the assault case so a sketch of the alleged suspect could have been made.
"The staff person involved made a bad judgment call," Luckinbill said of the Aurora incident.
Police say to the credit of Luckinbill and library staff, most crimes are being reported at Aurora facilities in a timely matter, a point Luckinbill wants stressed to patrons: "We have a responsibility to the safety of people who come to our buildings."
Aurora's three library branches have been the site of 1,118 police service calls since 2000. Aurora police records reveal 108 assault, battery or disorderly conduct calls; 83 theft calls; 44 drunkenness or public intoxication calls; and two bomb threats.
Luckinbill says the CBS 2 Investigation has revealed crime and safety issues facing librarians across the country.
Bland, a former teacher, says she was at Chicago's Harold Washington Library when she saw men and children watching Internet pornography. She says library staff refused to do anything.
"If someone says something you need to call police," Bland said.
At Harold Washington Library alone we found 138 cases of assault, battery and disorderly conduct; 127 thefts; and 32 sex crimes over the past 2 1/2 years.
"Oh my goodness, I didn't know it was all this," Bland said.
"It is atrocious what is going on in some of these libraries through out the metropolitan area," said Naperville Police Chief David Dial.
Dial and Bolingbrook Chief Ray McGury say libraries are becoming sanctuaries for criminals.
"We were amazed at the amount of crime," McGury said.
Since 2000, in Bolingbrook there have been 432 incidents at its one library, including 71 thefts, 83 cases of assault, battery and disorderly conduct.
"Alarmed would be an understatement," McGury said.
CBS 2 also found similar crime incidents occurring in Waukegan and Elgin, which say they try to report crimes to police. And then there's Joliet, where a staff member made an internal report about a patron printing "pornographic images" of a "female" he thought looked "underage." Police were not called, nor were they called in Wilmette when a patron was caught masturbating.
"You have to report this stuff," said Judith Krug with the American Library Association.
American Library Association officials say librarians must report crimes to police. An internal report within the library is not enough.
"While the problems are few in number, when they occur they need to be dealt with and dealt with quickly," Krug said.
And that's what should have happened in the Blaszak case.
"They still hadn't taken any action so I pulled out my cell phone and dialed 911," McNichols said.
But McNichols says Blaszak got away. He is one of seven people reported touching themselves at Naperville libraries over the past two years.
"I think you have pointed to me a couple of incidents where we would say not calling the police was an oversight," said Naperville Library Deputy Director Susan Strunk.
Strunk says they are not trying to hide anything, they just made some mistakes and staff is now being trained on when to call police and handle cases like Lauren Gauger.
"They made it seem like I was the one doing something wrong and to mind my own business," Gauger said.
Blaszak pled guilty to public indecency and is on probation.
Police say to make matters worse if a suspect leaves the library before officers get there, a little known law called the Library Confidentiality Act goes into affect and libraries are not allowed to tell police the name of the suspect without a court order.
Because of this, it took another two days before Blaszak was finally caught.
Police in Naperville and Bolingbrook are currently trying to get a bill passed in Illinois that would give law enforcement immediate access to library records in cases of serious crimes. If a suspect leaves a library before a police officer arrives, a subpoena or search warrants is needed to access any library information related to the suspect's identity.
"I think it protects criminals unduly," Naperville Police Chief Dial said. "We do not want to tread on anybody's rights to privacy or anything else, but we do not believe that the libraries should be sanctuaries for criminals."
Chicago and Waukegan public library officials say they have private security guards and they help decide when to call police. They and all libraries we mentioned say they are safe, considering the thousands of people who use them weekly.
There will be more on the library confidentiality in Friday's editions of the Naperville Sun and the Beacon News.
(CBS 2, the Naperville Sun and the Aurora Beacon-News are news partners covering stories in the western suburbs of Chicago.)