The Emory Wheel regularly meets with Emory Police Department (EPD) Records Manager Ed Shoemaker (87G, 90G) and Director of Campus Safety Communications Morieka Johnson (94C) and uses EPD’s public crime log to inform the Emory University community about recent crime on and around Emory’s campuses.
To report a crime, contact EPD at 404-727-6111 or police@emory.edu.
Attempted theft and damage to property at Emory University Hospital
Shortly before 6 p.m. on Sept. 24, Emory University Hospital (EUH) security notified EPD that the donation box inside the chapel on the second floor was damaged.
An unknown suspect had pulled the lock off the box and attempted to pry the box open to steal the money inside, according to Shoemaker. The last time the box was seen intact was on Sept. 3, and it was found damaged on Sept. 5. By the time EUH security notified EPD, it had been almost three weeks.
EUH staff responsible for managing the facility removed the box from the chapel to repair the door. EPD has no information on where the box was taken to be repaired or whether that is the reason for the delay in EPD being notified. They also are unsure if the box was attached to the door prior to being tampered with. When the maintenance and upkeep workers opened the donation box to repair it, they discovered that there was still money in the box.
While there is no definite estimate of the cost of the damage, EPD believes it to be more than $500. The case is still an active investigation, according to Shoemaker.
Online sextortion and stalking
A non-Emory affiliated male resident at Emory Point contacted EPD on Sept. 26 around 10 a.m., reporting he was being blackmailed by a woman he met on the internet.
The man told EPD he had been scrolling through TikTok around 1 a.m. that day while his girlfriend was asleep and found a profile of a woman who had posted “fun” videos, Shoemaker said. The man was unable to recall her screen name.
The man started to communicate with the woman through direct messages on TikTok. The nature of their conversation became sexual, and the woman asked the man for explicit nude videos and requested that they move their conversation from TikTok to Telegram. The man obliged and gave the woman his phone number so that she could contact him on Telegram. After she contacted him, he sent her the explicit pictures she had requested.
Soon afterward, she requested the man pay $150 in exchange for sex. He was confused whether the request was for internet or in-person sex and refused the request. Around 2 a.m., the man received messages from another source that said that he needed to send money. Otherwise, they would publish the photos he had sent to the woman for the man’s family to see.
The subject claimed that the second source had found his family through his Facebook profile, according to Shoemaker.
The man agreed to pay $400 through Zelle, paying the amount to a third, unknown point of contact. According to Shoemaker, this means that there were possibly three separate parties involved in this extortion.
The woman told him shortly after that he would have to pay another $1,000 to have the nude photos deleted. He argued with them until about 2:30 a.m. when he decided to cut off communication and delete their text exchanges.
“The best advice we can give people is don’t put yourself in this situation,” Shoemaker said.
Johnson added that perpetrators often start on one platform and then move to another platform so it is more difficult to trace their identity.
This case is open and still under investigation.
Criminal trespass on Eagle Row
Around 2:40 p.m. on Sept. 28, EPD received a complaint that an individual was flying a drone at the intersection of Eagle Row and Means Drive.
When EPD arrived on the scene, they found a woman who appeared to be packing up and putting away a drone, according to Shoemaker. EPD approached her and asked what she was doing, to which she responded and claimed to be an Emory student. When EPD asked to see her Emory ID, she admitted that she was actually a student at Boston University who was visiting relatives in the area. She claimed that she created YouTube and social media content about the aesthetics of different college campuses and that she needed to use drone footage for content.
Emory has a no-fly policy without advance approval from the University. According to Shoemaker, this is due to Federal Aviation Administration Regulations as well as the helicopter port at EUH — a drone flying around could interfere with helicopter traffic.
Because the woman violated the no-fly policy and lied about her identity, EPD issued her a written criminal trespass warning, which prohibits her from entering Emory property unless it is to receive emergency medical treatment.
EPD offered the woman transportation, but she declined and left in an Uber a few minutes later.
