fi
}
■i
1
D
3
*
i)
3
5
3
3
-
The Battalion
Vol. 87 No. 109 USPS 045360 14 Pages
College Station, Texas
Friday, March 4, 1988
Jurors find Soldier of Fortune negligent
From Staff and Wire Reports
HOUSTON (AP) — A federal jury
Thursday found Soldier of Fortune mag-
[zine was negligent in publishing a classi-
led ad that led to the 1985 slaying of a
Bryan woman and ordered the magazine to
ay $9.4 million to the victim’s family.
Dr. Don Tomlinson, Texas A&M assis-
ant professor of journalism and an attor-
fiey specializing in media law, said the case’s
nain question is whether there is enough of
causal relationship between the mag-
izine’s publication and Black’s death.
“Obviously, this jury thought so,” he said.
Jurors, who deliberated for 12 hours
tarting Tuesday, said the magazine should
pay $1.5 million to the woman’s son and
$400,000 to her mother. The two received
$7.5 million in punitive damages.
Ron Franklin, who represented Marjorie
Eimann, 64, the victim’s mother, and Gary
Wayne Black, 18, the victim’s son, said the
verdict should not be read too broadly.
“This will have no effect on the legiti
mate press,” Franklin said. “Soldier of For
tune knew in fact that it was advertising for
contract killers. They’re obviously going to
appeal, but we’re going to do everything we
can to collect every penny.”
Sandra Black, Gary’s mother and Mrs.
Eimann’s daughter, was shot to death Feb.
21,1985 at her home in Bryan.
Mrs. Black’s husband, Robert, is on
Texas’ death row for paying John Wayne
Hearn $10,000 to kill her. Hearn is serving
three life terms in Florida for the Black
slaying and two others in that state.
Robert Black contacted Hearn through a
personal services classified ad Hearn placed
in Soldier of Fortune in late 1984.
Thompson said he will appeal but doubts
the punitive damages will be upheld.
“There was no evidence of gross neg
ligence in this whole case,” he said. “. . .
You’ve got the emotions and prejudice out
of the case and you can concentrate on the
First Amendment.”
Tomlinson, however, does not believe
that the First Amendment has any applica
tion in this case.
“Clearly, the First Amendment gives the
defense (Soldier of Fortune) the right to
publish anything it wants, but doesn’t grant
anyone the right to avoid liability for any
harm caused by the publication,” he said.
Tomlinson cites “proximate cause” as the
determining factor.
“The family is trying to connect the ini
tial event with the eventual thing that hap
pened — publication of the advertisement
with the death of Mrs. Black — and in or
der to make that connection, they must
show proximate cause,” Tomlinson said.
“There must be a logical nexus.”
Tomlinson’s opinion is that if this link is
too weak, the decision will be overturned on
appeal on that basis, in which case the plain
tiffs will receive no award.
“It will be good for the plaintiffs if they
can show in court, to the satisfaction of a
jury, that the people at Soldier of Fortune
knew what was going on — that these peo
ple were using ads to get together and com
mit crime — and didn’t care,” Tomlinson
said. “Then they would be much closer to
being upheld on appeal.”
Private dancer
Sophomore Jennifer Pak warms up in her begin
ning ballet class by practicing pli£s. Pak, a psychol-
Photo by Shelly Schluter
ogy major from Dallas, works on perfecting this
basic ballet movement.
3 3oj
d or.
3 XS
0 (0 g ;
r, Vi S. |
West German hostage
released by kidnappers
DAMASCUS, Syria (AP) — Pro-
Iranian kidnappers freed West Ger
man hostage Ralph Schray in west
Beirut on Thursday after holding
him for Five weeks, and he was
turned over to the West German
Embassy in Damascus.
The West German charge d’af
faires, Klaus Auchenbach, refused
to make any comments to reporters
as he shuttled between the embassy
and the Foreign Ministry, about a
mile apart in the Syrian capital.
He said it was “not worthwhile”
for them to wait around, indicating
that Schray would not appear in
public.
This raised speculation the for
mer captive may not be as well as
Bonn portrayed him to be after his
ordeal. The Bonn Foreign Ministry
had said earlier that Schray, 30, was
in “good physical condition.”
Friedholm Ost, the West German
government’s chief spokesman in
Bonn, said only that the Syrian gov
ernment had handed Schray over to
embassy officials.
Schray, a Lebanese-born indus
trial engineer, was freed before
dawn. A Syrian military source in
the Lebanese capital said he was
driven the 55 miles to Damascus un
der heavy Syrian escort.
On Wednesday, the Holy War
riors for Freedom claimed responsi
bility for Schray’s abduction and said
he would be freed within hours as a
result of Syrian mediation.
The official Syrian Arab News
Agency said Foreign Minister Fa-
rouk al-Sharaa contacted his Ger
man counterpart, Hans-Dietrich
Genscher, by telephone to report
that Schray has been released.
Application deadline nears
to file for student positions
By Drew Leder
Staff Writer
Students wanting to run for Stu
dent Government positions to be
Filled in the March 20th general elec
tion must have their names on re
cord at the Student Government of
fice by 5 p.m. today.
Students filing to run for student
body president, yell leader or any of
the Student Senate Chairmen posi
tions must have 100 students’ signa
tures accompanying their applica
tions, election commissioner Bryan
Tutt said. Candidates for any other
position must have 25 students’ sig
natures to get their names on the
ballot, he said. Filing for a position
also requires a $5 fee.
All Student Government positions
except those appointed by the stu
dent body president will be filled in
the March 30th election or in a run
off election on April 4.
Positions to be filled include:
• Student body president.
• Academic affairs chairman of
the Student Senate.
• Student services chairman of
the Student Senate.
• External affairs chairman of
the Student Senate.
• ’88 Student Senate seats.
• Presidents for each class.
• 3 senior yell leaders.
• 2 junior yell leaders.
• All elected positions of the Off
Campus Aggies.
• All elected positions of the Resi
dence Hall Association.
To be eligible for student body
president, a student must have at
least a 2.5 grade-point ratio and
must have attained at least a 2.0 GPR
in the last semester he was enrolled
at Texas A&M. Eligibility for any of
the other positions requires an over
all GPR of at least 2.25 and a GPR of
at least 2.0 in the preceding semes
ter.
Jay Hays, speaker of the Student
Senate, said Thursday the number
of students who already have filed
exceeds the level of recent years.
“In the past, people usually wait
until Friday to file, but this year
we’ve had people filing all week,” he
said.
Hays said that in past years the
Student Senate has had 30 percent
to 40 percent of its seats still open af
ter the spring general election but
there seems to be a lot more interest
in being a part of the Student Senate
this semester.
“The Senate is really filling up
quick,” he said. “People are going to
have to earn their seats this year.”
Hays attributed this increased in
terest to many students’ awareness
and support of what the Senate has
been doing this semester. In partic
ular, many students supported the
Senate’s stance against the current
senior finals schedule.
At the time the Student Govern
ment office closed Thursday, only
one person had filed to run for stu
dent body president. Hays said that
candidates for the highest-elected
student office traditionally wait until
the final day of filing to submit their
names.
Campaigning for offices begins
March 20.
3 V (/]
j c &
’ «•*
^ r*
calls ELI symbol
of problem rather than source
jj’ c
oo
«
2, 3
*“<
C/) fil
0 $
English proficiency at A&M
Part four of a four-part series
Committee asks for changes in ELI system
Editor’s note: Texas A&M’s En
glish proficiency program for for
eign students has come under re
peated fire in recent months. The
controversy centers on the forced
enrollment of foreign graduate stu
dents in the English Language Insti
tute. When international students
arrive at A&M, they are required to
make a certain score on the Univer
sity’s English Language Proficiency
Exam. If they don’t make the score
on any section, they must enroll in a
non-credit ELI course — taught by
non-tenure track faculty — for that
sections
More than two-thirds of interna
tional graduate students are re
quired to enroll in at least one course
at the institute. Costs range from
$400 to $1,300 per four-month ses
sion. depending on the number of
courses, they have to take. In this
week’s four-part series, The Battal
ion looks at the controversy sur
rounding the English proficiency re
quirements.
By Karen Kroesche
Senior Staff Writer
Texas A&M’s English proficiency
system has been the subject of
By Karen Kroesche
Senior Staff Writer
Texas A&M could have a new English language pro
ficiency system by the fall semester, says Dr. Duwayne
Anderson, associate provost for research and graduate
studies.
A graduate studies ad hoc advisory committee on
Tuesday adopted and endorsed recommendations call
ing for “immediate attention to needed changes in pro
cedures” in A&M’s English language proficiency re
quirements, Anderson says.
Anderson says the committee did not make specific
plans, but it did address complaints that have been
brought against the current system.
“Although this committee doesn’t have detailed rec
ommendations, they called attention to these points and
recommended that the provost and his staff continue to
work on this problem, urging us to resolve this issue
swiftly,” he says.
Some of the problems the committee has asked An
derson to address include handling of international
graduate student applications, minimum English profi
ciency standards for graduates and the cost of A&M’s
English Language Institute, where at least two thirds of
all foreign graduate students are required to take non
credit courses taught by non-tenure track faculty.
“The committee was concerned, as I am, with the fi
nancial burden of the ELI that is imposed on newly ar
riving graduate students under the present procedure,”
Anderson says.
Enrollment in the institute for a four-month session
costs students from $400 to $1,300 depending on the
number of courses they are required to take. The costs
are high because the ELI does not receive funding from
either the state or the University, although it does use
University facilities.
Dr. Ry Young, a tenured professor of biochemistry
who is outspoken against the ELI system, says one solu
tion to the high costs of ELI courses would be to teach
them within the regular curriculum — a method that is
already in practice at the University of Texas at Austin.
“I think that there’s a need for international students
to develop communication skills rapidly if they’re going
to be in teaching positions,” Young says. “But I think
what we need to do is if we are going to give them reme-
See Changes, page 14
heated debate among faculty, ad
ministrators and students. No mat
ter who’s doing the talking, the En
glish Language Institute inevitably is
at the center of the controversy.
But Lloyd Colegrove, president of
the Graduate Student Council, says
the ELI is getting a bad rap. Mem
bers of the council conducted a
study of the ELI and A&M’s English
proficiency requirements. They con
cluded that there are some problems
See ELI, page 14
Legislation would end
use of lie detector test
for most job interviews
WASHINGTON (AP) — Lie
detectors, likened by one law
maker to “20th century witch
craft,” largely would be banned
from use in job interviews and the
private workplace under legis
lation approved by the Senate on
Thursday.
On a 69-27 vote, the Senate ap
proved a bill co-written by Sens.
Edward M. Kennedy, D-Mass.,
and Orrin Hatch, R-Utah — nor
mally adversaries on labor-man
agement issues — outlawing
about 85 percent of the current
use of polygraph examinations.
Conservative opponents pre
dicted that President Reagan
would sign the legislation once a
final version of the bill has
emerged from a Senate-House
conference.
An estimated 2 million people,
most of them job seekers, are re
quired to take lie detector tests ev
ery year and that number is grow
ing exponentially, said Kennedy,
who chairs the Senate’s Labor
and Human Resources Commit
tee.
Hatch, the committee’s rank
ing Republican, said an over
whelming majority of the tests are
conducted in brief 15-minute ses
sions and under conditions that
render false results between 15
percent and 50 percent of the
time.
“I’m sick and tired of the way
people are using these devices,”
he said. “Some 320,000 honest
Americans are branded as liars
every single year. That’s a stigma
they have to wear every day the
rest of their lives and careers.”
Similar but more restrictive
legislation was approved by the
House 254-158 last November.
Kennedy said he planned to
meet with Rep. Pat Williams, D-
Mont., chief author of the House
version, within the next two
weeks to work out a plan for re
solving differences between the
two versions in a compromise that
could win passage in both houses.
“They ban about 90 percent
and we ban about 85 percent,” he
said, predicting the new prohib-
tion will become law before the
end of the year “with or without
the president’s support.”
Just prior to the vote Thurs
day, after more than two days of
debate, Senate opponents com
plained that the administration
had softened its opposition after
threatening last year to veto any
polygraph bill.