Your assignment is due next week. All the work is done and saved on your treasured laptop. You're confident with the job you have done, and you can't wait to hand it in and get it all over with. When you return to your desk, you find everything is gone. The laptop has been stolen without a trace.

That is the nightmare that has come true for many students and staff on campus following a spate of thefts in the last few weeks, most of them from the Art Department in Building 82. The thefts have seen at least five Apple laptops stolen.

Graduate student Karon Radzik, 34, marine biology major, had her laptop stolen last week from Building 58. The laptop contained her graduate thesis.

"I was stunned that someone could do something so horrible," Radzik said.

"I was raised with the ideal that normal decent people don't steal," she said.

Naturally, she called the campus police immediately. She was not the only person to have had her computer stolen.

Two Apple computers were stolen from Building 82, one at the information desk and another Apple computer was stolen from an art professor's office.

"These computers were stolen at a time when the building was very open," said Lt. David Faircloth, campus police. 

"They were taken by someone who knew where to find them and who knew what was going on," he said.

Building 82 stands in the center of the campus and is connected to the Performing Arts Building. Due to art students working late, the building remains wide open through most of the day, making it vulnerable to thievery.

Students are advised to take more care of their computers by writing down serial numbers, backing up material diligently and permanently marking computers.

"Password-protect, such as when first turning it on or coming out of screen saver mode," said Radzik.

 "Get a locking case for it, and keep the computer stored there," she said.  "If you must leave the room, take the computer with you if at all possible, and if you can't, make it hard for it to walk away, and have someone you trust watch it."

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