The Yard was not immune to violent crime either--two students were robbed at knifepoint in October as well.

The first robbery took place through a window of a room in Wigglesworth Hall early one morning. The second occured outside Lamont Library in the middle of the afternoon.

The University responded by installing 39 new lights and eight emergency phones in and around the Yard in March.

These crimes came on the heel of reforms undertaken by the Cambridge Police Department (CPD) and the Harvard University Police Department (HUPD).

HUPD Chief Francis D. "Bud" Riley initiated bike patrols and other measures this summer in an attempt to fully integrate police into the Harvard community.

Ronnie Watson, who became CPD's police commissioner this year, put effective community policing at the top of his agenda as well.

Watson said his goals include improving communication between officers and city residents, making the department more accessible and sending officers to various community meetings.

Watson said he will initiate quarterly meetings in each of the city's 13 neighborhoods, in which comments and complaints can be addressed.

Officials say these changes have made their units more responsive to the Cambridge community at large.

Unfortunately, there have been several high-visibility incidents in the city the department has had to respond to.

On Sept. 21, a man broke into a woman's apartment in the vicinity of First, Fifth, Binney and Cambridge streets and violently raped her.

Halfway across town on the same day, Margo Beckers was arrested for stabbing an unidentified female in the CambridgeSide Galleria Mall in an argument over a man.

On Nov. 22, a 51-year-old homeless man named Laurence Cooper was fatally stabbed repeatedly in the heart and throat at 6:40 p.m. on the corner of Mass. Ave. and Ellery Street.

And on April 19th in the heart of Harvard Square, 34-year-old Store 24 employee Russell T. Yeager allegedly stabbed Robert Gayner after arguing with him and is also accused of injuring innocent passerby Shana Dirke when she attempted to intervene.