Campus
Student panel claims Islamic men and
men have equal rights.
Page 2
B
Opinion
THE
MICHAEL LANDAUER: People should discriminate when
they unload their problems. If you plan to bitch and whine
to someone, ask yourself if you would be willing to listen to
their problems, too. Page 9
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Sports
Lady Aggies prepare to play
Texas in Austin tonight.
Page 7
WEDNESDAY
November 2, 1994
Vol. 101, No. 48 (10 pages)
“Serving Texas A&M since 1893”
Briefs County judge denies Shamburger bail
South Africa peace
settlement reached
JOHANNESBURG, South Africa
(AP) — A peace settlement is struck in
Angola, and a rebel leader says he will
accept electoral defeat in Mozambique.
These two events, separated by
only days, could mark a turning point in
Africa — putting the southern third of
the continent solidly on the path to
peace and democracy.
The civil wars in Mozambique and
Angola were two of the longest and
bloodiest of the century. Between
them, there were more than three
decades of fighting and well over 1
million people killed.
Granted independence from
Portugal at the same time in 1975,
Angola, on the west coast of Africa,
and Mozambique, on the east, were
plunged almost immediately into civil
war.
Foreign countries including
Rhodesia, South Africa and the United
States sponsored rightist rebels against
Marxist regimes backed by Moscow.
Arms poured in and the countries were
devastated, but the balance of power
was such that no one side could
eliminate the other.
CNN sued for airing
Noriega conversations
MIAMI (AP) — CNN was found
guilty Tuesday of criminal contempt
of federal court by broadcasting
taped phone conversations of jailed
Panamanian leader Manuel Noriega
in 1990.
The network was convicted by
U.S. District Judge William
Hoeveler, who said CNN willfully
violated his order prohibiting the
broadcast of recorded conservations
between Noriega and his lawyers.
"I am ever mindful of the
importance of an essentially
unlettered press and the mandates
of the First Amendment, but I must
a/so de mindful of the vital
imporfance of compliance with
orders of the court,” Hoeveler said
in his ruling.
Agents responsible
for Waco raid fired
DALLAS (AP) — Phillip
Chojnacki and Charles Sarabyn
aren’t household names. But most
people know what they did last
: ebruary.
Chojnacki and Sarabyn were the
federal agents who gave the go-
ahead on the government’s deadly
: aid of David Koresh and his Branch
Oavidian followers near Waco.
Almost immediately, they were
swarmed with criticism by other
federal officers. They were singled
out for "gross errors in judgment” in
a September 1993 Treasury
Department report. They were fired
festweek.
Both have turned down all
interview requests, leaving two
fetters totalling 35 pages as their
only explanation of events while also
topping hints that they’ve become
to government’s scapegoats for the
oisaster, which ultimately claimed
fore than 80 lives.
Frequent-fliers insist
on program benefits
WASHINGTON (AP) — American
Airlines, inventor of the hugely
oopular frequent-flier plan, urged the
Supreme Court on Tuesday to bar
People from suing airlines that
restrict their programs' benefits.
But an attorney for frequent-flier
tlub members who sued American
said barring such claims from state
tourts would leave customers with
ho way to seek damages for
restrictions that reduce the value of
travel miles they have saved.
American, which has the world’s
largest frequent-flier club and gave
more than 2 million tickets last
fear, is trying to fend off a class-
action lawsuit over restrictions it
imposed in 1988.
Seeking to hold down costs,
American limited the number of
seats used on each flight for free or
discounted frequent-flier tickets and
began keeping customers from
ising such tickets during heavy
travel periods such as Christmas
kuy ldai 1 1
Classified
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Campus
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Opinion
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Sports
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loons
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Baker's father pleased with court's decision,
By Lisa Messer
The Battalion
A county judge denied bail Tuesday
to Ron Shamburger, the former Texas
A&M student accused of murdering Lori
Ann Baker while burglarizing her home
Sept. 30.
Shamburger faces capital murder
charges and remains in the Brazos Coun
ty Jail.
Assistant District Attorney Deena Mc
Connell said prosecutors will seek the
death penalty for Shamburger, a 22-year-
old biomedical science major from
Longview.
“There’s no question,” McConnell said.
“His own testimony said that he entered
through Lori’s window with the intent to
steal. In his own statement, he admits to
murdering her during the burglary.”
McConnell said Shamburger had
committed at least four prior burglaries,
including robbing Baker’s house twice,
stealing her credit card and an article of
clothing.
Prosecutors played Shamburger’s
taped confession in which he told Detec
tive Donnie Andreski, of the College Sta
tion Police Department, that he did not
think Baker and her roommate Victoria
Kohler were at home when he entered
their house.
He said Baker, who was in bed, woke
up when he entered her room and recog-
Barry Wilkerson, a
crime scene technician
with the College Station
Police Department, said
Baker’s hands were tied
behind her back and a
gun was placed directly
to her forehead when it
was fired.
McConnell said
Shamburger did not
commit the murder as a reaction or as an
act of passion.
“It was a cold-blooded execution,” Mc
Connell said. “He didn’t shoot her in
the back of the head. She saw that gun
coming.”
Kohler testified at the hearing that
when she came home around 2:30 that
morning and heard Baker’s bedroom door
open, she went to the back of the house to
favors death penalty
see Baker.
She said Shamburger was leaving Bak
er’s room, smiling, with a gun in his hand.
“I screamed ‘Who are you?,’” Kohler
said, “and he said T’m a friend.’ He
grabbed me by the hair, threw me to the
ground, sat on me and put a gun to my
back. He asked me if I’d seen him. I said
yes but gave him an off description.”
Kohler said Shamburger sat on her for
at least half an hour, talking to her while
he massaged her shoulders.
Kohler said Shamburger asked her if
she had any money. Kohler said when he
found the cash on her dresser, Shamburg
er said, “Six dollars, sweet, good bull.”
She said Shamburger decided to throw
a blanket over her head, lock her in the
trunk of her car and drive her away from
the house before he set the house on fire.
“He asked me if I could forgive him, if
he should commit suicide and if I had any
gasoline,” Kohler said. “He asked me if
there was anything in the house that I
needed because he was going to destroy
the evidence. I told him no, but the sec
ond time he asked I told him my scrap
books and pictures.”
Kyle Hawthorn, Shamburger’s court
appointed attorney, said Shamburger’s
concern about saving things from the fire
for Kohler and his turning himself in to
the police prove that he is not a threat to
society and that a jury will not return a
death penalty.
“There’s no prior criminal record,”
Hawthorn said. “There was no harm
done physically to Miss Kohler. He took
steps to take responsibility. The state
hasn’t shown bad character. There’s no
evidence to indicate future dangerous
ness. I don’t think the state would come
back with the death penalty.”
Derrel Baker, Lori Ann Baker’s father,
said he favors the death penalty for
Shamburger.
“It was nothing but a cold-blooded exe
cution,” Baker said. “I think he went
there to confront somebody. If he knew
her habits at all, he would’ve known she
would be there. There are indications it
wasn’t so random.
“He had the audacity to say Lori was
a nice girl. He took Lori’s life away.
Even though it’s been a month, we think
about it every five to ten seconds. The
hopelessness of the future is just so
overwhelming.”
nized him.
Shamburger
Within less than a week, Fightin’ Texas Aggie Bonfire has been to
tally rebuilt. Hard work from Aggies everywhere has proven just
how deep Aggie spirit runs.
TABC to concentrate on
campus visitors at Bonfire
By Stephanie Dube
The Battalion
Local officials are encouraging people to cele
brate the spirit of Bonfire without alcohol.
Lt. Bert Kretzschmar, crime prevention offi
cer for the University Police Department, said 92
minor in possession (MIP) citations were issued
by the UPD on Bonfire site last year during Bon
fire. In addition, 23 public intoxication citations
were issued.
“Considering the amount of people there,”
Kretzschmar said, “this was a moderate amount.
But we try to discourage drinking at Bonfire.”
Sometimes, drinking at Bonfire leads to phys
ical violence, he said. In 1993, 24 disorderly con
duct citations were issued at Bonfire.
“Some people mellow out when they drink,
others get very aggressive,” Kretzschmar said.
“In the past years there have been assaults. I’ve
broken up some fights before.”
Kretzschmar said the type of people who re
ceive MIPs at Bonfire is mixed, but many are
A&M students.
“But we have written a lot to people from out
of town and high schoolers,” he said.
Kretzschmar said there was talk a few years
ago of canceling Bonfire due to alcohol-related
problems during the event.
Dr. Dennis Reardon, coordinator of the Texas
A&M Center for Drug Prevention and Education
(CDPE), said one of the most likely ways Bonfire
could get canceled would be if alcohol problems
got out of hand. .
“In the mid to late 1980s, the alcohol prob
lems at Bonfire got really bad,” Reardon said.
“People did not want to bring their children
anymore.”
Because of the complaints about alcohol-relat
ed behavior, Dr. John Koldus, former vice presi
dent for student services, formed a committee of
staff and students to review alcohol at Bonfire,
Reardon said.
“This worked well to decrease the amount of al
cohol consumed at Bonfire,” Reardon said. “Now
people are coming back with their families.”
Reardon said the majority of the MIPs issued
now are to visitors.
Tod Campbell, graduate assistant for the
CDPE and supervisor for the Alcohol Awareness
Bonfire Subcommittee, said the committee’s
message is to encourage responsibility and to
keep alcohol away from the Bonfire site.
“The subcommittee targets student groups on
campus,” Campbell said. “Our motto is to ‘Keep
Alcohol From Shattering the Tradition.’”
Campbell said alcohol is one of the primary
threats to Bonfire, and the subcommittee was
formed to curb unwanted alcohol-related behav
ior at Bonfire. However, he said, the group is not
anti-alcohol.
“We are pro-Bonfire and pro-responsible be
havior,” Campbell said. “Bonfire is for everyone
— families and kids. We do not want to deal with
drunken behavior at Bonfire.”
However, Campbell said behavior at Bonfire
has improved a great deal in the past few years.
“The general consensus is that the A&M stu
dent body is better at accepting responsibility,”
Campbell said. “Now we have to focus on people
from out-of-town. It’s not perfect yet, but it’s get
ting better.”
Sgt. Laban Toscano, of the Texas Alcoholic Bev
erage Commission (TAJBC), said the TABC will be
focusing its efforts on the areas around Bonfire
rather than the Bonfire site itself this year.
“We want to be at the areas where there is a
good probability of underage drinkers getting al
cohol prior to going to Bonfire,” Toscano said.
“We may have greater success decreasing the
number of injuries from alcohol consumption
that way.”
Toscano said officials from TABC will be mon
itoring store sites, parking lots and other areas
around Bonfire to discover where the alcohol is
coming from and who it is going to.
The fine for serving alcohol to a minor, even if
the person providing the alcohol is also a minor,
ranges from $100 to $500, Toscano said.
A first offense MIP can cost $25 to $200 and a
second offense ranges anywhere from $500 to
$1000, Toscano said. In addition, a minor can
also be charged for attempting to purchase alco
hol. A first offense fine in this category can be
from $25 to $200, he said.
Kretzschmar said he encourages people not to
bring alcohol to Bonfire.
“We want people to have a good time,” Kret-
zscnmar said. “We don’t want alcohol to ruin it
for them. We want Bonfire to be as enjoyable
and safe as possible.”
Investigation into Indiana plane crash continues
ROSELAWN, Ind. (AP) — Crews built
a gravel road across a boggy soybean
field Tuesday to help investigators reach
bodies and clues in a commuter plane
crash that killed all 68 people on board.
American Eagle Flight 4184 gave off a
high-pitched whine of engines at full
throttle as it streaked to the ground in a
driving rain Monday en route to
Chicago’s O’Hare Airport.
National Transportation Safety Board
spokesman Ted Lopatkiewicz refused to
speculate on the cause of the crash. One
witness said he saw the almost-new twin-
engine propjet plunge toward the ground
with a wing sheared off; Lopatkiewicz
said he had no comment on that report.
Searchers found the plane’s cockpit
voice recorder and flight data recorder.
Both were sent to Washington for analysis.
On Tuesday, crews brought in truck-
loads of gravel to put down a road. Inves
tigators needed the 200-yard trail to
overcome mud too deep even for four-
wheel drive vehicles.
The barren field where the plane went
down “smelled like a
butcher shop,” said Les
Smith, who lives nearby.
Searchers who made it
through the muck on
foot soon after the crash
described small chunks
of smashed airplane and
pieces of bodies. The
largest piece of plane
was a 6-to-8-foot section
of the tail.
“What we did see, we
didn’t like,” said fire
fighter John Knapp.
“There’s not one body
that’s intact,” said anoth
er firefighter, Jerry
Cramer.
Gov. Evan Bayh
stammered as he described what he saw
from a helicopter. “There is a small
crater there and the wreckage is strewn
in a fairly close radius
around the impact site,”
he said. “The destruction
is complete.”
The gymnasium of
the North Newton High
School, 15 miles from
the crash site, was des
ignated a morgue and
classes were canceled for
at least a week. Officials
hadn’t begun removing
bodies by mid-afternoon.
It could take a week
to a month to recover
all bodies and debris,
state police Sgt. Jerry
Parker said.
The flight from Indi
anapolis to Chicago had
been in a holding pattern about 60 miles
southeast of O’Hare and was descending
from 10,000 feet when it crashed.
The French- and Italian-built Super
ATR plane was registered in March and
had experienced no problems through
September, except a broken floor light,
according to Federal Aviation Adminis
tration records.
Bob Hilton, who was working under
the hood of his truck at the time of the
crash, said the plane sounded like the pi
lot “had it full throttle, like a stunt pilot,
like he was going to try to bring it up.”
Wind gusted to 49 mph in Gary, 30
miles north, at the time of the crash, but
NTSB chairman Jim Hall said the weath
er alone wouldn’t explain it.
“Airplanes operate every day in this
type of weather,” he told ABC. “We’ll
have to look to see whether there were
any unusual weather occurrences that
might cause the result.”
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plane crash
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