Recently, the Daily Nexus ran two articles that were intended to highlight police abuses in I.V (“Fall Defensive Set to Even the Score” and “Seize Your Legal Rights,” Nov. 8). Both articles were long on conclusions and apocryphal stories but short on facts – actually, they were devoid of any facts.

For the A.S. Student Lobby to spend money to educate students about how to thwart law enforcement and get away with illegal activities is ridiculous. The A.S. Student Lobby should spend the funds to make I.V. a safer and better place to live – not all the people who need to live in I.V. want to live in a cesspool of drugs, alcohol, noise and violence.

The gist of one of the articles is that since Isla Vista police received funding from the California Dept. of Alcoholic Beverage Control, they must now create more alcohol-related arrests. Since when would the police need to manufacture drug- and alcohol-related problems in I.V?

The transparency of the A.S. Student Lobby’s attempt to hobble the police would be painfully funny if it were not so serious. Here is how the A.S. Student Lobby intends to carry out its little “artful dodge.” First, they foment hate for the police with their “Fall Defensive.” They then distribute literature that is designed to create more confrontations and to encourage anonymous reports of nonexistent abuses. They will then use their self-generated “statistics” to demand control of the police agencies. By their own admission, one of their goals is to “establish an I.V. citizen review board.”

Perhaps, instead of “educating” the criminal and irresponsible elements of the UCSB population on how to get away with criminal activities, the A.S. Student Lobby’s time and money would be better spent on:

1. Working with the police to actually determine if there is police abuse. If the abuse can be documented, work to eliminate the offending officers.

2. Educating students to not engage in criminal activities. Work to develop a community culture that is not related to drugs and alcohol and the resulting violence.

3. Working to expel students from the university and the community who are criminals. The police need our support, not the claptrap the A.S. Student Lobby is shoveling.

James Baron is the parent of a former UCSB student.