Nearly 70 people have been charged with trespassing at The Ridges within the past 10 years.
Although the Athens Mental Health Center has been closed for years, buildings at The Ridges are not always vacant.
David Torok II, a junior studying sociology, was already at The Ridges for his job with university groundskeeping when he decided to go inside one of the buildings during his break.
Torok said he asked one of his co-workers what it was like inside the buildings, and his friend said he could show him what it was like.
“He unlocked the door to the basement where all the boiler rooms are and I went in there," Torok said. "Even though it was 12 o’clock in the afternoon, there were rooms with windows opened that were straight black. I couldn’t even see the front of my hand.”
Adventuring inside buildings at The Ridges is trespassing and the Ohio University Police Department caught 88 individuals and pressed charges against 75 individuals for trespassing between Jan. 1, 2005 to Oct. 6, 2015, according to OUPD reports.
OUPD filed 45 separate trespassing reports during that time.
Those caught are often charged with criminal trespassing, an offense that comes with a fourth-degree misdemeanor charge — which carries the weight of up to 30 days in jail as well as the possibility of a $250 fine.
“Over 10 years, I don’t think that’s a shockingly high number, but definitely I think (with) the old Beacon school reputation for being haunted, I would expect it to be much more then and less now,” OUPD's Lieutenant Tim Ryan said.
Ryan said he had been in the building and had never seen a ghost.
Officially known as Building 26, the Beacon School or the Tuberculosis Ward, was demolished by OU in March 2013.
“It was really hard to keep people out of,” Ryan said. “We had a barbed wire fence that ran across the courtyard, the windows and doors were boarded up. There were a couple places people would cut through the fences to get into it. This reputation of being haunted … people really needed to get in there.”
There used to be signs at The Ridges that said 'No Trespassing,' but people kept stealing them, according to an OUPD report.
Sydney Pickett, a sophomore studying retail merchandise, went up to The Ridges “for the hype.”
She said she walked around the buildings and peeked inside, noting what she saw inside was “kind of creepy.”
However, Pickett did not venture inside the buildings.
“I may at some point (go inside), but not anytime soon,” Pickett said. “Maybe if I’m a senior and I’m bored or something like that, but I don’t think I’ll go out my way anytime soon to go in there.”
In 2009, OUPD saw a spike in trespassing reports with 20 for the year, which “is partially due to the way we kept records at the time,” Ryan said in an email.
Back then, each person would be charged with a different report, Ryan said, noting that OUPD doesn’t do that anymore.
Now, all the people charged would go into one report.
“As I looked through the 2009 reports, there were at least three separate incidents with five or more people,” Ryan said.
In recent years, the charges have been on the decline, but so far this year eight people have been charged with trespassing, as of Oct. 6.
“The old Beacon school was really the driving force of our trespassing in the past so we don’t see as many as we used to,” Ryan said.
Martha Compton, director of Community Standards, said she has had no reports of students trespassing at The Ridges come across her desk.
Regardless, that doesn't mean people aren't breaking in.
“I would assume that proactive patrol does catch people that are where they shouldn’t be,” Ryan said. “While it is not unusual to see people walking around on the paths, if we see people closer to windows and doors after normal business hours, that’s usually a clue. Also, sometimes we get complaints of suspicious people, things like that.”
Abby Rechel, a senior studying strategic communication, said she has ventured up The Ridges once.
“We were on a scavenger hunt so it was at night too and it was supposed to freak you out and everything,” Rechel said. “Obviously, it’s pretty scary up there, but I’ve never been around any of the buildings.”
Despite not going into the buildings, she said they should open up The Ridges' buildings so people can go inside.
OUPD normally charges people when they catch trespassers, although “each officer has discretion,” Ryan said.
“Generally speaking, you know you are not supposed to be in the building and if you are in the building, then you are probably going to get charged,” Ryan said.
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