Numbers game
Voiceofsandiego.org’s Will Carless has this story today about discrepancies in the number of students actually arrested as part of “Operation Sudden Fall”—the joint DEA/DA/SDSU investigation into student drug-dealings on campus. As Carless points out, only 33 students were arrested as part of OSF; the remaining 43 were arrests that happened during normal day-to-day campus patrols. The DA’s sticking with the 76 number, Carless reports, while SDSU officials are saying that the real number should be 33.
Meanwhile, the media’s getting pegged for “sensationalizing” the story, though here’s the headline of the Tuesday morning press-release from the DA’s office: “Undercover operation targets SDSU campus; 96 arrested on drug-related charges.” Later on in the press release is this: “As a result of the investigation, 75 SDSU students and 21 non-students have been arrested for various drug offenses ranging from possession of marijuana and cocaine to sales of cocaine.”
The DA’s Damon Mosler told Carless that many of the 76 students were already arraigned prior to the Tuesday bust—some on minor counts, others not charged at all, though he doesn’t have exact numbers.
