South Highland Street and Walker Avenue businesses have started to support the Down Before Dark graffiti campaign promising to remove offensive or gang related graffiti within 24 hours of its appearance on buildings or parking lots.   

“It has been statistically proven that graffiti, if taken down within the first 24 hours after appearance, two times in a row, will not appear a third time in the same spot,” said TK Buchanan, community safety liaison between the University District and University of Memphis.

Dunn Hall on the University of Memphis was evacuated on April 15 when a report of a suspicious package was made to campus to campus police. A search off the building was completed and police found it to be a laptop computer sitting in the middle of a hallway. The student who owned the laptop said he recently purchased it and he forgot it.

One student was arrested March 8 in front of the Meeman Journalism Building one day before spring break hit and charged with simple assault for knocking the food out of another student’s hands.

Jason Kirby, 36, bought food at the Tiger Den where Olumide Adedipe, a 20- year-old former university of Memphis student, approached him

Captain Kevin Langellier, special programs coordinator of Police Services, who is in charge of the Crime Prevention through Environmental Design Initiative of the University Neighborhood Partnership, says fences, landscaping and locks are the three most common issues he sees when aligning homes with CPTED practices to make them more safe.

Tammy Duncan is conflicted.

Every other day, it seems, the Normal Station resident who lives near the intersection of Highland and Southern hears about a robbery, burglary or an instance of assault. Though it comes up less frequently, the word ‘murder’ is too much a part of her regular vocabulary.

Duncan can’t just up and move, either. This is where she grew up. The University District – Normal Station – is all she’s ever known. There are sentimental strings keeping her here.

Therein lies the dilemma: Crime is, on some level, a part of the fabric in this city, in concentrated neighborhoods and the metro at large. But, as ostensibly dangerous as it is, it’s still home – and it’s hard for lifelong residents, like Duncan, to leave.