Abstract
With recent headlines of school shootings and vehicular homicide dominating the news, social concern about the prevention of violent crimes and violent behavior only continues to increase. It seems logical that the issue of violent crimeshould also be a concern for campus police departments and administrators of college campuses. However, despite recent advances in identifying risk factors related to violent criminal behavior and in the development of theories and methods of perpetrator identification, there is no published data regarding how or if these advances are being put to use in settings such as college campuses. This paper presents a preliminary survey of campus police officers' perceptions of their training, their concerns about areas of additional training and their level of current understanding of mental illness, and risk for violence. The officers' perceptions were obtained by a brief three-page survey that asks the officers basic questions about their length of service, their position, and then asks questions related to events that have occurred during their duties. Data was collected from four regional universities in Michigan and analyzed at GVSU by the investigators.