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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Feb. 18, 1988)
Texas ASM Battalion Thursday, February 18, 1988 Final exam forum draws few faculty ajevo, ] ohnson i i off his i ly zippdi e the golf •right spr .'hat doesii 88? Hed 1 to pm 0)1 irbrigge' o both a They si rland ha dedentec] rmance.' ey team, romise; en whal uld kill he At third rakia Ti Is after a the fir.il as a 7-5 si s match 2i ; Eaters i le dreadi ed States! pected af{ t sh S.hockei:] the Sos* ould be li i, after ad ould fate I io upse'l nd actiotf ias theo Pool B I i, a groiifj ovakia. ovietl® ikit'saP; s Cana^ ndssusj* ioIA nee, M ’oland impres len Sam!*] IS,! 1 League 1 he 199-' well ichael j kinssfl e and - 1 ne' , m IT ^ : Seoul ' . enouflj idiau J 'l s Gtwl ie lonff Vinteh 1 iting 1 ' The 1 for*| ska- res i over 1 ' ried' <k | he to eter 1 For whom the bell tolls Freshmen James Ezell, left, and Chris DeCluitt read Albritton Tower’s inscription. It says, “I ring Photo by Jay Janner with pride and honor for all past, present, and fu ture students of Texas A&M University.” By Karen Kroesche Senior Staff Writer An open hearing for faculty on the senior finals issue drew a full house of students Wednesday — but very few faculty. The hearing was scheduled by the Executive Committee of the Faculty Senate to give all faculty members a chance to express their opinions to the Faculty Senate on the scheduling of finals. Around a dozen faculty members showed up for the meeting, only one of whom was not a faculty senator. However, approximately 100 stu dents filled the packed room of the MSC where the hearing was held, around half wearing Corps uni forms. Prior to the open hearing, Faculty Senate Speaker C. Richard Shum- way said the hearing was scheduled strictly as a forum for faculty, and that he had invited some student leaders to answer questions from the faculty. Afterwards, he said he was disappointed in the faculty turnout and that he had not anticipated the large student attendance. The Faculty Senate called the hearing to discuss an alternative fi nals plan to the one that is in place. The alternative plan is a compro mise that Student Senate and Fac ulty Senate leaders arrived at during a recent meeting between the two groups. The compromise has already been approved by the Student Senate, and will be presented for discussion and possible endorsement at the next Faculty Senate meeting, March 7. If implemented this spring, the proposal would move undergrad uate finals to May 9-13. Seniors would take finals with undergrad uates May 9-10, but would take fi nals not scheduled on those days ei ther the previous Saturday (May 7) or at another time. The compromise proposal, for the most part, was criticized by the faculty members present at the meeting as being impractical. Stu dents maintained that while it would create some logistical problems, the See Finals, page 7 Israelis kill one, wound 4 as crowd impedes arrests Gunmen kidnap Marine in Lebanon BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) — Gun men on Wednesday kidnapped a U.S. Marine officer serving with the U.N. peacekeeping force in south Lebanon as he drove along a high way. It brought to nine the number of Americans held hostage in Leb anon. U.N. and Pentagon officials iden tified the victim as Lt. Col. William R. Higgins, 43, a native of Danville, Ky., and chief of an observer group attached to the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon. The 76-officer U.N. group from 16 countries monitors cease-fire vio lations on the Lebanon-Israel bor der. Higgins was the top-ranking American officer assigned to the force’s observer group, holding the title of senior U.S. military observer. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the abduction, which occurred about 4:15 p.m. on the coastal highway between Leb anon’s southernmost port of Tyre and the border town of Naqoura, the location of UNIFIL’s headquarters. “Higgins was driving in a U.N. jeep station wagon from Tyre to Na qoura behind a similar vehicle in which two other observers were trav eling,” U.N. spokesman Timur Gok- sel said. He said the first vehicle went around a bend in the road, “and when the two observers noticed that Higgins’ car was not following them, they stopped and drove back, only to find Higgins’ station wagon aban doned.” He said Higgins was alone in his vehicle. Goksel said UNIFIL heli copters and ground troops were searching for Higgins. The observers in the other station wagon were another American and a Dane, but UNIFIL officials did not name them. Security sources in Tyre said two gunmen in a brown Volvo passed Higgins’ car, blocked the road, forced Higgins into their car and drove north toward Tyre. They said the abduction occurred between the villages of Ras el-Ein and Deir Qanoun. The two villages are controlled by Justice Minister Nabih Bern’s Shiite Amal militia. U.N. sources said Amal was helping UNIFIL search for Higgins. Reporters in Tyre say the influ ence of the Iranian-backed Hezbol lah, or Party of God, has been stead ily growing in the two villages. Hezbollah is believed to be the um brella group for Shiite Moslem fac tions holding most of the foreign hostages in Lebanon. Higgins was returning from a meeting in Tyre with Abdel Majid Saleh, a political leader of Amal in the area, Saleh told reporters. One of the things they discussed was ef forts to free foreign hostages in Leb anon, Saleh said. HEBRON, Occupied West Bank (AP) — Israeli soldiers fired on a crowd trying to stop them from making arrests during a pre-dawn raid on an Arab village Wednesday, killing one and wounding four, wit nesses and the army reported. A merchants’ strike in the occu pied West Bank and Gaza Strip kept most Arab businesses closed except for the three hours from 8 a.m. to 11 a.m. Numerous cases have been re ported of threats to shopowners who remained open. Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir returned from Italy and rejected a trade of territory for peace with the Arabs. Secretary of State George P. Shultz proposed the idea and it was accepted by Foreign Minister Shi mon Peres, Shamir’s partner and ri val in the governing coalition. Neighbors identified the Palestin ian killed in Shuyukh village, 20 miles south of Jerusalem, as Ismail Hussein Mohammed al-Halaiga, 21, a university student. The army con firmed the death. An army officer at the village said the soldiers aimed at legs only, but doctors said the victim was shot through the heart. One of the wounded, 16-year-old Khaled Abu Rumei, was in a Hebron hospital with a bullet wound in a thigh. A doctor said he had ex tracted a metal bullet. Rumei’s mother said soldiers broke into her house about 5 a.m. while the family was sleeping and dragged another of her sons out into the cold rain. “I tried to protect him, and they beat me with clubs,” she said at the hospital. “Later they started shoot ing” CS announces reduced hours for post offices llq ieeni"! 1 #e, ng ho» ; earn a# hilif ebeif? e aaf for 1 , ,ve vfr ;,' Ik-', sWj ,eM 'huf* rves ilT Killer says ad brought crime offers HOUSTON (AP) — A convicted killer whose classified ad in Soldier of Fortune magazine is the source of a $22.5 million suit after the murder of a Bryan woman, says most re sponses were for illegal activities such as bombings, assaults, jail breaks and murder for hire. John Wayne Hearn, serving three life terms in Florida for murder, said in a deposition Wednesday that ac tivities also included political assassi nation involving the president of Canada. Hearn’s deposition was the first evidence presented in a civil suit ac cusing the magazine, a self-pro- claimed “Journal for Professional Adventurers,” of negligence. Sandra Black of Bryan was shot to death in 1985. Her husband, Robert, is on Texas’ death row for paying Hearn $ 10,000 to do out the killing. They are seeking $2.5 million in actual damages and $20 million in punitive damages. Hearn said the ad generated 10 to 20 calls a day, so many he had to hire an answering service to handle them. “When I was home, the calls came 24 hours a day,” he said. “I had to get an answering service so I could get some sleep.” Hearn, who at the time was a truck driver living in the Atlanta area, said it cost him $ 1,000 a month in long-distance charges just to re turn all the calls. “Probably 90 percent of the calls I received concerned illegal activities,” he said. Three to five of those daily concerned killings, he said, while others were for drug transportation and sales, illegal arms transportation and sales and assaults. The deposition, as read in court, did not go into any detail about the Canadian assassination request. By Jeff Pollard Staff Writer For College Station Postmaster Clinton Matcek, it’s time to put Plan 2 into action. After announcing a new, reduced schedule for College Station post offices, Matcek was told Tuesday by U.S. Postal Service offi cials that his cutbacks were not enough and more cuts were needed. Last week, Bryan and College Sta tion postmasters received word that they would have to reduce retail win dow service by the equivalent of one half day per week. New hours were put into effect on Tuesday, but Tuesday afternoon, Matcek received word that his plan had not been ap proved by the director of field oper ations in Houston. “Basically, it was a misunderstan ding,” Matcek said. “Originally, I thought that they wanted work- hours, but they wanted window- hours cut. I thought that, if I cut back one hour when four people were working, we would cut four hours.” Matcek said Tuesday that they started working on a schedule as soon as he heard the first one had not been approved. He said they sent the new schedule to the Postal Service Division office in Houston Wednesday morning and received word that it had been approved. The schedule calls for closing the main post office at Northgate one hour early (4:30 p.m. instead of 5:30 p.m.) and changing the Redmond Terrace hours, which are 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., to 9 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The hours at the Aggieland Station in the MSC will remain the same. “They (Postal Service officials) wanted to cut the hours at the MSC also,” Matcek said, “but I talked them out of it. I convinced them that the hours there were at a minimum already.” Matcek said the new schedule al lows for the main post office to re main open on Saturdays from 9 a.m. to noon and the cutbacks will not af fect regular postal delivery. Bryan Postmaster Earl Pophin told a different story about the af fects of the budget cuts. While Bry an’s retail window schedule was ap proved, the cutbacks caused the Post Office Hours COLLEGE STATION • Main Post Office: 8 a.m.-4:30 p.m. M-F 9 a.m.-Noon Sat. • Redmond Terrace: 9 a.m.-4:30 p.m. M-F (Closed on Saturday) • Aggieland Station (MSC): 10 a.m.-3 p.m. M-F (Closed on Saturday) BRYAN • Main Post Office: 8 a.m.-4:30 p.m. M-F 9 a.m.-Noon Sat. • Downtown (201 W. 25 St.) 9 a.m.-4:30 p.m. M-F (Closed on Saturday) Speakers: A&M students fail to take proper precautions By Tracy Hamm Reporter Speakers at the presentation “Lock it up or Lose it” agreed that student apathy toward crime is the major contributor to its in crease. The Wednesday night pro gram was sponsored by the Texas A&M University Security Aware ness Task Force and was part of C.A.R.E. week. “The rise in thefts and burglar ies is because of apathy and the lack of responsibility of victims who are not taking precautions,” Bob Wiatt, director of the Uni versity Police Department, said. “People here don’t lock their doors,” he said. “Unless the locks are utilized they are useless.” Bernie Kapella of the College Station Police Department agreed. “Many students leave things in their vechicles and think that they are perfectly safe,” Kapella said. “I can guarantee you that if you leave anything in your vechicle, somebody will take advantage of it.” Kapella said burglaries have in creased 120 percent in the last year in College Station. In 1987, there were 484 bur glaries.This year, 86 burglaries have been reported already.Wiatt said A&M leads the other 37 Texas academic institutions in burglary and theft. “Since September, there have been 276 misdemeanor thefts,”' he said. “Of these, 132 were bicy cles.” Tony Taylor, the Bryan police officer in charge of the Neighbor hood Watch program, said the key to combatting crime was to remove the opportunity for the thief. “The only way to prevent you See Theft, page 7 suspension of work being done on Bryan’s new 124,000 square-foot postal station. Pophin said the budget cuts also cut off funds for new construction and equipment. Not only was con struction halted on the Bryan sta tion, but plans for post offices in Houston and Dallas have been stopped. “This new station would have met our needs locally for at least the next ten years,” Pophin said. “The ground work will be completed be cause we already have a contract, but the building will probably have to wait for about two years.” Matcek said that work on the new station is about 99 percent complete. Because all contracts have been signed, he said, it probably will open on schedule in late March. The new station is located on F.M. 2818 near Texas Avenue. These cutbacks were mandated by the Postal Service after the U.S. Con gress, in December, told the postal service they owed the U.S. govern ment $1.4 billion and it had to be re paid in 21 months. The U.S. Postal Service is an independent govern ment corporation, not included in the federal budget since 1971. “Congress decided that we owed them for pension and retirement benefits for all postal employees who retired before 1971,” Pophin said. “We have to cut the budget to pay that money back.” Student Senate officers say smoking ban threat to rights By Karen Kroesche Senior Staff Writer Student Senate officers say students’ rights are being threatened by a resolution that calls for a complete ban on smoking on the Texas A&M campus. The resolution was approved by the Faculty Senate in December and is now under consideration by Presi dent Frank E. Vandiver. “We will agree on the part of the resolution that is banning smoking in public buildings, but we will go against the part that bans smoking in the dorm rooms,” said Melinda Moore, chairman of the Student Services Committee of the Student Senate. “We felt like — and I think Mason (Hogan) and Jay (Hays) have felt the same way — it’s an infringement on your rights to be told that you can’t smoke in your own room.” The resolution recommends “that smoking be banned in all buildings on the Texas A&M University campus, including classrooms, dormitories, eating places, student and faculty lounges, lavatories, hallways and athletic facilities (including seating areas in Kyle Field and Olsen Field).” Moore said her committee is still studying the resolu tion, but some preliminary determinations have already been made. The Faculty Senate’s resolution cited evidence from the American Cancer Society linking passive smoking to lung cancer and heart disease. Dr. Benton Storey, pro fessor of horticultural sciences and chairman of the Faculty Senate Personnel and Welfare Committee, told The Battalion that second-hand smoke is a problem in most buildings on campus — including dormitories. Because of the way the ventilation systems in most campus buildings are designed, Storey said, cigarette smoke is not confined to “smoking” areas, but is circu lated throughout entire buildings. Illustration by Carol An alternative to a complete ban on smoking in dorm rooms might be to improve the air circulation in the res idence halls by introducing more new air, Moore said. But she added that such a process would be costly. Moore said the committee hasn’t formed an opinion yet on the athletic facilities included in the resolution. She said a formal resolution probably will be presented to the Student Senate by her committee at Wednesday’s regular meeting. If the Senate passes the revised ver sion of the resolution, it will be sent to President Frank See Smoking,page 7