Labor Law Center Blog » Blog Archive » Wisconsin Workplace Violence

Wisconsin Workplace Violence

September 28th, 2007 Posted by Amelia

Despite federal statistics that show workplace violence is on the downswing, there have been a number of high-profile cases of it in the news recently.

In the most recent case, on September 25, police searched areas of the University of Wisconsin Madison for a suicidal man who had fired shots near a local hospital and threatened to bomb it. Police now say the that bomb threat was spurious, but that the man had a gun and intended to force a shoot-out with police, hoping to be killed in the process. “It’s a simple case of attempted ‘suicide by cop’,” according to Burt Bruins, an officer on the scene.

Police cancelled classes and put the university on lock-down as they searched the campus for a 19-year-old Madison man who was serving a work-release jail term for armed robbery. According to Dale Burke, assistant UW-Madison police chief, the man quit reporting to his parole officer earlier in the month. The man, who has a history of mental illness, was believed to be armed. Police cancelled a soccer game scheduled for that evening, and urged visitors to stay away from the University of Wisconsin Hospital.

Several recent incidents of violence have occurred on college campuses. While many violent incidents involve students, they alos endanger the lives of countless professors, administrators and staff members who must work on college campuses every day.

In the wake of the Virginia Tech massacre earlier this year, colleges are becoming especially careful to limit activities and warn students and employees of possible dangers. In this incident, the University of Wisconsin Madison sent two emails to students and faculty, advising them of the danger. Still, some did not get the message. One student walked home after being told that his football game had been cancelled for unspecified security reasons. He had no idea until arriving safely in his dorm, that he put his life in danger by walking through the exact area where police were searching for a suicidal, armed man.

In response, the university began checking student IDs before admitting anyone to dorms, and paying for cab rides to ensure that some students safely arrived home.

In a bizarre coincidence, this was the second security scare in 2 weeks for the UW Madison campus. Last week, police arrested a 52-year-old man who was in violation of a restraining order, requiring him to stay off campus and stop harassing female students.

In a tragic event in September, two 17-year-old students were shot outside a college dining hall. Police in Dover, Delaware interviewed a student regarding the early morning shooting of two students on campus at Delaware State University. The university was put on lockdown after the two were killed near Memorial Hall, the school sports arena.

The Virginia Tech massacre remains the greatest workplace tragedy of the year. On April 16, 2007, an assailant armed with semi-automatic weapon and “enough ammo to start a war” chained the doors of a campus building shut. Seung-Hui Cho killed a total of 32 students and staff on the sprawling campus, and wounded 17 others before turning his gun on himself as police closed in.

As tragic as this story is, it is becoming a less common one in the workplace, according to a recent report. According to an annual report by the Bureau of Labor Statistics or BLS, homicides in the workplace are on the downswing. In 2006, OSHA reported the lowest number of workplace homicides since the BLS began keeping records. The rate was a decline of more than 50% from the highest reported workplace homicide rate, in 1994.

Total assaults and violent acts resulting in death decreased from 792 in 2005 to 754 in 2006. That’s a reduction of about 5%.

Like all the BLS workplace fatality records, these have been adjusted to eliminate deaths associated with the 2001 terrorist attacks in Washington, D.C. and New York. Had those fatalities at work been included, 2001 would have had far more workplace homicides than any other year.