The Carbondale Police Department held a community meeting Monday after a sexual assault was reported Saturday night.

During the community meeting at the Old Thompson Barn in Carbondale, Police Chief Kirk Wilson said he would release as much information as possible about the suspect, listing the description as a man in his 30s wearing a black hoodie.

Any other information about the suspect, Wilson said, is false and asked the public to stop spreading rumors about the suspect’s race because they have no information to confirm or deny anything else about them.

“This is not a political thing,” he said. “We’ve had a lot of people politicking online… when people post this misinformation, there’s a human being who’s been through a horrible, traumatic event who’s reading it, that everybody in this community and agitators outside the community , post.”

He also dispelled misinformation about whether a kidnapping was involved.

“This was not a 48-hour incident,” he said. “The time frame is about 30 minutes to an hour, whether you have it or not, based on her (the victim’s) recollection.

Wilson said he is looking for that person on sexual assault charges and clarified that more charges will be brought after that person’s arrest.

Some people in the crowd asked why law enforcement did not come to the victim’s neighbors to tell them what happened for their own safety.

“We have two officers working at a time,” Wilson said. “We had one person transported to a medical facility; an officer had to go with. This allowed an officer to remain and collect evidence at the scene before that evidence was lost. Our first and foremost responsibility is to preserve the scene so that we can hopefully end up with a successful prosecution in the future.”

He said additional officers have come in to help gather evidence, but that the department has a total of 18 people and 15 sworn officers.

Another question asked was why more information about the incident could not be shared.

“As a practice, the police department does not share sexual assault information with the public,” Wilson said. “This is to protect several things: number one, is the victim. There’s a victim… if we post all the information about the case, just to make people feel better about what’s going on, if someone comes along and says they’re the person who did this and they’re not, that makes it very difficult . for us.”

Some in the crowd were curious if the police had the suspect’s DNA.

“We can collect DNA evidence. Unless that person is in CODIS (Combined DNA Index System) as a DNA hit because they have DNA in the system, even the DNA evidence we collected that night will be inconclusive in terms of identifying a people”, said Lt. William (Bill) Kirkland. “We collected DNA evidence; it’s sent to a lab to be tested, but unless that person whose DNA it belongs to is in the system, … it doesn’t just create a person and tell us who they are.”

However, others wanted to know how they knew this sexual assault was not an isolated incident and how the police would protect them.

“Do we know it’s an ongoing threat? No, Kirkland said. “We have no way to say it isn’t and we have no way to say it is.”

He said he would love to put a police officer with everyone in the room to help people feel safe, but it wasn’t practical and they can’t.

“Community safety is a shared responsibility,” he said. “We have to keep each other safe. The police department can’t do that for everyone…do we think people should lock their doors and windows? Yes.”

Kirkland said he understood it’s Carbondale: People don’t feel like it’s something they want to do, but maybe it’s time to change things as the community changes.

Wilson said adults can carry pepper spray, meaning anyone over the age of 18, however minors may not be able to, especially on school campuses.

“It’s not that we don’t want to give you information. The information we give you is the information we have,” Kirkland said. “People who are victims of a crime, especially a crime like this, go through a very traumatic experience. It may take time to remember this information.”

He stated that they spoke with the victim after arriving on the scene to obtain this information and remain in contact with her.

“The information we have is what she was able to give us at that time,” he said.

The Police Department will have updates for the public on the City of Carbondale’s website and people can sign up for alerts at carbondalegov.org.