Halloween sees more arrests, emergency calls despite smaller crowd

Although rain and cold weather helped keep Monday’s Homegrown Halloween celebration at its lowest turnout yet, new police figures show an increase in arrests and emergency calls this year.

Police estimated about 27,000 people came to Franklin Street Monday night — a decrease of 8,000 from last year.

The town began the Homegrown Halloween initiative in 2008 to reduce the size of Halloween celebrations after crowds reached upwards of 80,000 people in 2007.

Despite the decrease in crowd size this year, Chapel Hill Police Department spokesman Lt. Kevin Gunter said the department made four arrests, while Orange County EMS responded to eight emergency calls throughout the night, compared to one citation and five emergency calls last year.

Early estimates indicated that there were only two arrests and one EMS call, but as information came in later on in the night, Gunter said the figures increased.

John Whitt, 54, of Roxboro, was arrested at 10:43 p.m. Monday on Franklin Street for felony secret peeping, according to Chapel Hill Police reports.

Three others were arrested during the celebration for assault on a law enforcement officer, indecent exposure and drunk and disruptive behavior.

Of the eight calls EMS responded to, seven were alcohol related, but only one call from Linda’s Bar & Grill on Franklin Street led to hospitalization, said Frank Montes de Oca, director of Orange County Emergency Services.

Owner Chris Carini said an adult female was taken to the hospital after having a reaction to medication she was taking.

Although police and EMS officials said they were pleased with the smaller turnout this year, many local business owners expressed different sentiments.

Carini said business was slower than he expected.

“For a Monday, it was fantastic, but that doesn’t say much for Halloween,” he said. “It was not as good as I’d like it to be.”

He said access to Linda’s, which is on the eastern end of Franklin Street, was restricted to customers because of the road blocks set up by town police.

“The town subverted our customers,” he said.

Caty Holmes, a manager at Qdoba, said business was lower than she expected Monday night.

“I was a little disappointed,” she said. “We were really hoping to get sales up.”

Despite these complaints and an unexpected increase in emergency calls and arrests, Gunter said he would like to see Homegrown Halloween decrease crowds even further.

“We want to stay with this initiative and reduce those numbers even more,” he said.

“We want to get this down to something that’s more manageable and doesn’t cost as much for extra personnel.”

Contact the City Editor at city@dailytarheel.com.