RCPD Director calls Fake Patty’s Day a bane on Manhattan, promises more efforts to “snuff it out”

Data released last week showed an uptick in arrests and citations issued during Fake Patty’s Day activities earlier this month.

The Riley County Police Department says it took 533 calls for service between the evening of March 1 and the early morning of March 3, by far the most calls for service since before the COVID-19 pandemic. Director Brian Peete joined KMAN’s Morning News Monday, expressing frustration at the event, which he says is becoming more destructive.

“It’s becoming more violent, like at night when we were out there at the substation we almost had a full-blown riot out there. There was a professional football player that was there, several individuals from other colleges and athletic teams and it’s just becoming, I think, a bane and the more that I can snuff this out, I will be doing my best to snuff this out from happening again,” he said.

RCPD put an emphasis on city codes and ordinances on social media prior to Fake Patty’s Day. Some interpreted that added police presence as harassing event-goers. Peete says that is a misnomer.

“Because we’re so short-staffed and outnumbered, if you will, you pretty much have to talk yourself into a ticket. You pretty much have to talk yourself into an arrest because we don’t have time to deal with an hour’s worth of paperwork with one individual and then move onto the next. So those numbers that you’ve seen respectively, should’ve been doubled, or tripled,” he said.

Peete says he stands by the decision not to bring in additional officers from area agencies, as RCPD has done in the past.

“We were able to maintain some semblance of control for this non-sanctioned event. We were able to move people from point A to point B when they were trespassing on people’s property,” he said.

Peete estimates RCPD will pay out over $50,000 to its officers in overtime expenses for Fake Patty’s Day.

There were 57 arrests made this year, including 24 for interference and obstruction, the highest number since RCPD began tracking information in 2017.

The future of the event is uncertain, but local leaders will likely continue to discuss ways of mitigating some of the illegal activity and disperse large gatherings in the neighborhoods surrounding Aggieville and the K-State campus. There has been some chatter in the community regarding a desire to shift the crowds back to the Aggieville area in a more controlled environment.

Aggieville Business Association Director Dennis Cook says it could be done if people were allowed to roam within the district in a controlled environment.

“The liquor laws (common consumption laws), are really restrictive and it puts everybody in a bad spot. We’d have to see some help there,” he said.

As for keeping minors from drinking in Aggieville, Cook says the simple solution would be lowering the legal drinking age from 21 to 18.

“So now what we’ve done is making 18, 19 and 20 year-olds criminals. I’m not so sure about that, but as long as the drinking age stays 21 and that’s a focus for enforcement, yeah, that’s going to be a real problem,” he said.

The legal drinking age is 21 in all 50 U.S. states.

The City of Manhattan approved a common consumption area last October for Downtown Manhattan’s Third Thursday event.