University of Virginia Library

Charles 'Headline' Haugh

The winner of this month's Charlottesville
Headline Grabber Award goes to Charles
R. Haugh, County Commonwealth's
Attorney, for his sensational charges that the
University is "covering up crimes" and is not
allowing its security force "to act like police
officers." The performance was lamentably
weak in substance, but the acting was superb.

After Mr. Haugh had made his point, the
University thought it might be interesting to
see how dedicated he is to the law and proper
legal procedure by asking him to take his case
to the City Corporation Court where it
belongs. His answer was a flat no–he wants to
handle it all by himself in Circuit Court. So
there the matter sits.

Our first reaction to Mr. Haugh's charges is
that the facts should be put on the table for
everyone to see. A great deal of what goes on
in law enforcement is never known by the
public; this is often proper, but the public
tends to get a little more interested when
charges of corruption are made about their
police force or their University officials. But
we are not interested in the unsubstantiated
harangues of Mr. Haugh or anyone else. What
we would like to see are a few facts to
support his claims, if indeed there are any.

There have been well-known difficulties
in the University Security Department's
operations in the past, so it is not
inconceivable that Mr. Haugh may have
something. But is he the only attorney that
can investigate the case? Does he have so little
regard for the abilities of his colleague, Mr.
Camblos of the City, that he cannot allow Mr.
Camblos to see his information without
fearing that Mr. Camblos will bungle the case?
Does he think that this is such a dynamite
political issue that he would hate to drop it in
the lap of Mr. Camblos when he himself might
be able to get more headlines with it? Just
what is it that makes him so certain that the
case can only be properly handled in his
court?

Actually, the whole thing has gotten just a
little childish during the past month. The
University has admitted that the security
operation is not without some problems. But
we have seen no evidence that the University
is complacent about whatever problems may
exist; rather it seems to us to be dedicated to
rectify them.

So what is Mr. Haugh talking about when
he says that "the University grounds are
unsafe for women and University officials
have not sufficiently warned coeds of this
feet?" Or that hangers-on who commit crimes
come to the grounds "because they don't
think they will be arrested?" He is almost
saying that for some obscure reason the
University would like to be known as a crime
haven and encourages attacks on women by
coddling criminals. And anyone who takes
that charge seriously is pretty confused.

We fully expect that the report of the
International Association of Chiefs of Police
will be released shortly after President
Shannon has reviewed it, and that it will cover
many of the areas Mr. Haugh is interested in.
It will certainly not be entirely flattering, but
it is not likely to contain any charges of gross
corruption or mishandling of responsibilities
in the Security Department. We look forward
to it, and hope that whatever problems it
outlines will be taken care of by the
department and the University post haste.

We remember last April when we first
heard from Mr. Haugh with his charges in the
same vein during the Chaffin case. He has
been wanting to investigate the Security
Department for a long time, and has issued an
abundance of vague, undocumented charges
all along. Once the Police Chief's report is
made public, which we have every reason to
believe it will be, we will know whether Mr.
Haugh was on to something or not. In the
interim, if all Mr. Haugh has to offer are a few
headlines, we will be looking elsewhere for
more substantive news.