Texas A&M The Battalion WEATHER CL FORECAST for TUESDAY: Mostly cloudy and warm with a 30 percent chance of thunder storms. HIGH:84 LOW:64 Vol. 88 No. 124 USPS 045360 12 pages College Station, Texas Monday, April 3,1989 Papers say George Smith changes story again By Stephen Masters SENIOR STAFF WRITER The saga continues. Former Texas A&M fullback George Smith resurfaced over the weekend by being quoted in two published accounts. One account has anew version of his recantation; an other has Smith recanting this new version. In a copyrighted story Saturday, the Dallas Morning News reported that Smith reversed his original story about “hush money” in November after he was offered $30,000 to do so by an A&M source he would not name. “And you know, I had to get something pretty good to do what I did,” Smith said in the Morning News story. “They promised me enough to Finish my education, which is all I ever really wanted to do — $30,000. In that neighborhood.” Then a report in Sunday’s Bryan- College Station Eagle quoted Smith as saying he never spoke with any one from the Morning News on the matter. George Smith "I don’t know nothing about that,” he said in the Eagle story. “1 didn’t talk to nobody.” Citing anonymous sources, the Morning News story also alleged that the NCAA has been given infor mation confirming a newspaper re port last year that Smith was allowed to move into Cain Hall, A&M’s ath letic dormitory, during Summer 1982, prior to his freshman year. The story also said Smith’s aunt, Elizabeth Jordan, has told NCAA in vestigators she heard Smith threat ening to tell about A&M rules viola tions if Athletic Department officials did not send him money. Jordan confirmed Sunday that she spoke with NCAA investigators “around March,” but when asked if she told the NCAA she heard Smith threaten to expose the Athletic De partment, she said, “Not really. I ain’t heard him say nothing about sending money. Not sending mon ey.” When asked what she told the NCAA, she said, “I don’t remem ber.” Jordan said she “heard Smith talk ing to somebody,” but she “didn’t know what all he was saying.” Jordan said she hasn’t seen Smith in person since he was living with her this past summer in Atlanta. It was during this time that she said she overheard Smith’s call about which she allegedly told investigators. She jaid Smith lived with her for four or five months. A Dec. 7 Morning News story quoted Larry Wilson, director of Parks Department in Douglasville, Ga. and Smith’s former boss, as say ing he had overheard another threatening call by Smith. Wilson said in the Morning News story that he overheard Smith yelling at for mer A&M receivers coach George Pugh telling him to “send him some money or he would tell what he knows.” In more than eight hours of taped interviews with the Morning News, Smith said former A&M athletic di rector and football coach Jackie Sherrill paid him $4,400 over a two- year period in return for silence over alleged recruiting violations during Smith’s tenure with the Ag gies. The fullback played for A&M for the 1982 and 1983 seasons before transferring to Clemson. The Morning News story broke Nov. 18 and the Texas sports media descended on A&M. At a hastily called news conference the following day. Smith recanted his accusations. Smith said the money he had re ceived from Sherrill was a loan. Smith was quoted in the story say ing Sherrill arranged for Smith to enroll in classes and move into Cain Hall during the summer of 1982, prior to beginning his freshman year, an apparent NCAA violation. Smith also said in the story that Sherrill paid for this room, board and tuition during Summer 1982. Smith said all statements he made about A&M recruiting violations were false and that he had made them up to help the saleability of a book he and Morning News reporter Doug Bedell were working on. Smith appeared before NCAA in vestigators with A&M officials Nov. 20 to reiterate that he his previous statements were lies. Saturday’s story, also by Bedell, al leges that Smith had documentation on “what had transpired before his recantation” and that this informa tion would be turned over to the NCAA in March. The story said Smith was to meet with NCAA en forcement representative Charles Smrt in March to recant his previous recantation. Smrt told the Eagle he could not comment on whether Smith had been interviewed because the inquiry is still incomplete. The Morning News story said Smith was planning to leave the country after discussions with Smrt. The story reported that Smith’s phone was disconnected “within days” of the session with Smrt. A&M released the findings of a two-month internal investigation into the allegations that payments by Sherrill to Smith constituted “hush money.” The summary of the report indicates that “there is no evidence to support the charge alleged to have been made by George Smith that these payments constituted ‘hush money,”’ the report says. Several paragraphs of the report and five pages of Sherrill’s 16-page affidavit have been withheld with University public information offi cials citing the “Buckley Amend ment” as the principal exception. The amendment exempts student records and other information from Texas Open Records Laws. OCA president announced incorrectly By Kelly S. Brown STAFF WRITER The position of Off-Campus Ag gies president was incorrectly an nounced Thursday when Student Government election results were given. The office will be decided along with seven other positions in a run-off election Tuesday. Candidates for OCA president are Curtis Rick, the 1988-89 OCA president and a junior biology ma jor, and Shawn Knight, a sophomore political science major. Rick received 251 votes, white ICmght garfiered 248 votes. The error occured during the evaluation of election returns by election commissioners, Kristin Hay, co-chairman of the election commis sion, said. Organizations within Student Government use different methods to decide elections — some use a plu rality method, by which the winner is the candidate who receives the most votes, while other organizations use a majority method, by which a candi date must receive more than half of all votes cast. OCA uses a majority vote system, but the election commissioners thought OCA offices required only a plurality, Hay said. Run-off elections will begin at 9 a.m. tornmorrow. Polling places in clude the Academic Building, Blocker Building, Kleberg and the MSC. All polling sites except the MSC will be open until 6 p.m. Stu dents may vote at the MSC until 8 p.m. Photo by Phelan M. Ebenhack March to the Brazos Senior Corps of Cadets member William Montgomery, peering out of an M113 armored personnel carrier, leads about 2,000 cadets down University Drive Saturday morning during the annual March to the Brazos. The event, which consists of military excersises and athletic activities, raises funds for the Muscular Dystrophy Association through pledges. Report shows no evidence Sherrill paid ‘hush money’ By Stephen Masters SENIOR STAFF WRITER An internal investigation released Friday shows no evidence to support allegations that Jackie Sherrill paid a former Texas A&M football player “hush money.” In his summary of the report, Vice President for Finance and Ad ministration Robert Smith said al though payments were made to for mer running back George Smith (no relation to Robert) by Jackie Sherrill, A&M’s former athletic director and football coach, there is no evidence to support the “hush money” allega tions of the Nov. 18 Dallas Morning News story. Robert Smith was put in charge of the internal investigation by Univer sity President William Mobley after the original Morning News story broke. The Nov. 18 story quoted George Smith as saying Sherrill paid him $4,400 from 1986 to September 1988 in return for keeping quiet about alleged recruiting violations during Smith’s time at A&M. Smith was a fullback with the Aggies for the 1982 and 1983 seasons. The summary says the report ex amined each of Smith’s original alle gations, including five confirmed payments made to Smith via over night mail. No record was found of an alleged July 10, 1987 payment. The six alleged payments covered in the summary total $3,000. The report quotes Sherrill saying he “can neither admit nor deny that money or anything else was sent to George Smith” in November 1986 and January 1988. Sherrill has ad mitted payments to Smith on June 6, Sept. 13 and Sept. 26, 1988. In Sherrill’s sworn affidavit, he says he sent Smith $500 on three separate occasions in 1988 to set Smith up in an apartment. Sherrill’s statement says he sent the money separately because he thought Smith would “make better use of it if it did not come all at one time.” An explanation for the reason Sherrill sent cash rather than checks to Smith is offered in a section titled “Informal Response to Addtional Inquiries.” “Sherrill carries cash,” the re sponse says. “No cash money is kept in or around the Athletic Depart ment, whether in the private office of Jackie Sherrill or otherwise. . . . Sherrill routinely pays cash for things that do not require a record or that do not have income tax impli cations. Simply stated, it is his habit to carry and pay in cash.” There is no speaker identified for the statement, labelled only “Not a Statement of Jackie Sherrill.” In a sworn affidavit. Bob Matey, director of Athletic Video Services, said that on two occasions in Septem ber 1988 Sherrill asked him to mail envelopes to Smith by overnight mail. In the first instance, Matey says he put his name on the return address. The second time, he said he “didn’t feel comfortable about” mailing the letter with his name on it. Because of this, the statement said, he used the name of an acquaintance, Mark Paulson, a Brazos County deputy Jackie Sherrill sheriff, on the return address. Matey said he used his own former address, 800 Marion Pugh, because he did not know Paulson’s address. Matey’s statement said he in formed Paulson of using his name “a few days later.” Paulson confirmed in an affidavit that Matey informed him of the in formation, but said he was not told until Nov. 18 when the Morning News story broke. Paulson’s statement says Matey told him “Coach Sherrill was known to help students who have been play ers after they are gone.” Smith’s affidavit says the only See Report/Page 6 Predominantly black universities experience increased enrollment HOUSTON (AP) — A generation after blacks fought for the right to attend white universities, many black parents are encouraging their chil dren to enroll in Texas’ predomi nantly black schools to get more per sonal attention and camaraderie. Officials say enrollments at Texas Southern University and Prairie View A&M University are following a nationwide upward trend. It comes as parents look for an affordable, competitive education for their chil dren and students look for smaller classes and a reprieve from the re surgence of racism at many predom inantly white colleges, the Houston Post reported. “For one thing, this is your own race,” said Karen Shaw, 25, a black University of Texas graduate who enrolled at TSU pharmacy college in “We (blacks) have a common bond,” Shaw told the Post. “We have a common interest to try and suc ceed in the white man’s world.” Donald Hill, chairman of the TSU Faculty Assembly Council, said when black parents saw white universities beginning to integrate in the 1960s and early 1970s, they urged their children to attend those schools, thinking that was the best track to mainstream American society. Now, as predominantly black schools have become more compet itive in their offerings and more so phisticated, parents are urging stu dents to return to them. Enrollments at two-thirds of the 42 colleges supported by the United Negro College Fund have increased this year, said Alan Kirschner, a vice president for the fund. In Texas, meanwhile, fall enroll ment at Prairie View A&M hit a re cord high of 5,640, and TSU re ported 8,554 students, up from 7,319 in 1987. Kirschner said part of the reason for black colleges’ growth is costs are about half that at private predomi nantly white universities and stu dents have taken advantage of more financial aid opportunities in recent years. Also, the schools are more com petitive in recruiting top students away from Ivy League schools by of fering honors and mentor pro grams, such as the Banneker Honors College at Prairie View A&M. “My parents realized it’s a good experience having black teachers who understand where you’re com ing from and who may be more sym pathetic,” said Judith Whitmire, who turned down an offer from Massa chusetts’ exclusive Wellesley College to attend Prairie View A&M, her parents’ alma mater. Still, the schools continue having problems attracting black male stu dents and acquiring substantial en dowments and other funding. Black male college enrollment na tionwide dropped from 470,000 in 1976 to 436,000 in 1986, according to an American Council on Educa tion study released in January. The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board reports that black male enrollment at state public universities reached a peak in 1984 of 13,010 and declined to 11,912 in 1987. “My god, it’s absolutely frighten ing,” TSU President William Harris said. “This is a male-dominated so ciety. If one group (black men) is not participating in the interest of the population, the whole group will suffer.” At TSU, the number of females applying for next fall is more than A Texas A&M student died Satur day morning after a pickup hit her at the intersection of Wellborn Road and West Main Drive on the west side of campus. Karen E. Miller, 34, of College Station, stepped backward into the roadway while videotaping the Al britton Tower at about 6 a.ru., Col lege Station police said. The driver of the pickup, who was travelling north on Wellborn Road double the number of males: 1,226 to 597. Currently, female students account for 54 percent of TSU’s spring enrollment. At Prairie View, women outnumber men 2,999 to 2,641. Glenn Terrell, 17, a high school junior, said he thinks Yale Universi ty’s law school still will offer him more than would an education from the predominantly-black colleges. “When it comes down to finding a job, I’ll have a better opportunity of finding a better job at Yale than at TSU,” said Terrell, who is ranked No. 1 in his class at Houston’s Jones High School. in the outside lane, told police he did not see the student in time to avoid the collision. Miller, a senior health education major, died before reaching Hu mana Hospital. Her two children and a friend were with her at the time of the acci dent, but they did not see it happen. No charges have been filed in con nection with the accident. Student killed by truck while videotaping tower Bill calls for professor on state regents boards By Alan Sembera SENIOR STAFF WRITER Testimony begins today in the state House Committee on Higher Education concerning a bill that would add a non-voting faculty member to university boards of regents. One of the faculty representa tives who will testify in support of the bill said Friday he supports the faculty-regent idea because of a need to facilitate communica tion between governing boards and faculties. Dr. Kenneth Margerison, pres ident of the 1,200-member Texas Faculty Association, said the cur rent system that relies on admin istrators to represent faculty con cerns falls short because university administrators don’t have a full knowledge of what happens in the classrooms. “We’re interested in trying to alert the boards as to what we see as the educational needs of the universities,” he said. One of the educational con cerns of faculties, he said, is the deterioration of university library resources. “University administrations don’t seem very interested in this problem,” Margerison said. Claudine Hunting, president of the TFA’s newly formed Texas A&M chapter, agreed with Mar gerison that there is a need for more faculty input to the boards of regents. One of the problems at A&M, she said, is the professional situa tion women face as a minority in the faculty. “In many cases among tenured faculty, especially among middle- level professors, women are looked down upon by their peers if they state opinions favoring equity between the sexes,” Hunt ing said. “They’re interrupted, and aren’t allowed to speak.” Hunting said she wants coop eration with the administration on this and many other issues. Having a faculty regent would lessen the feeling that professors are treated like numbers, she said, and would contribute to ward a more productive Univer sity. Gary Hart, president of A&M’s Faculty Senate, said the Senate has not taken a stance on the fac ulty regent bill, but said a com mittee had been formed to inves tigate it. Under the bill, which was in troduced to the House by Rep. Wilhelmina Delco, D-Austin, the governor would choose the fac ulty regent from a list of nomi nees provided by faculty bodies. Three nominees would be se lected for each university system by a council of faculty senators comprised of one senator from each member school. An identical bill has been filed in the Senate by Sen. Gonzalo Barrientos. D-Austin.