As people were arrested and it became less of an issue, we had a harder time maintaining a force out there. When they perceive there's not a problem, it's a very difficult thing to convince those people to stay. Archer's spokesman, Greg Bowens, said city officials have encouraged involvement. We ask, and usually get, almost 30,000 volunteers for Angel's Night. If we can get people involved, then we will be successful, and if we don't, we will fail.
Students cope with their fear in the aftermath of last year's rapes in different ways.
At 7 a.m., the Royal Hamburger diner near MacKenzie High School on the northwest side had just begun serving coffee when Alicia Taylor walked alone from her bus stop to school for an early student council meeting. She said she wants to be treasurer, so she has been attending early meetings all week. She's not afraid. Her uncle taught her some self-defense skills and her mom told her to jump in the street if someone attacked. Not a day has gone by since the rapes that someone hasn't walked Conesia to and from school, her mother said.