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About The Battalion. (College Station, Tex.) 1893-current | View Entire Issue (Jan. 16, 1996)
MUSIC REWIND Clark: The 1995 music industry had little to offer fans. Aggielife, Page 3 IL102, No. 72 (14 pages) A DAY TO REMEMBER EYEING TEXAS Martin Luther King jr. Day prompts thoughts on the The A&M Basketball Team seeks its meaning and significance of the civil rights movement. first SWC win tonight against UT. Opinion, Page 13 Sports, Page 9 Battalion % .1 Serving Texas A&M University Since 1893 Tuesday • January 16, 1996 Sexual 3 The Texas A&M graduate was arrested after the survivor saw lim in a Bryan store. lyGretchen Perrenot The Battalion The suspect in the January D5 sexual assault of a Texas ji&M student near Olsen Field Las released Friday on a 'ioO.OOO bond. assault suspect released on bond Don Richard Davis, Jr., a Class of ’95 environmental de sign graduate, was arrested and charged Jan. 9 with aggravated sexual assault. His arrest is the culmination of a police search that began almost a year ago. See related EDITORIAL, page 13 DNA testing showed that Davis’ blood sample matched that of the semen taken last year from the rape survivor’s clothes after the assault. Bob Wiatt, University Police Department director, said police are investigating whether Davis was also involved in the May 1995 sexual assault of an A&M student near Research Park. An other sample of Davis’ blood is being compared with a semen sample from the second victim. “A second charge of aggravat ed sexual assault will be made,” Wiatt said, “if the results posi tively match those from the sec ond victim.” Wiatt said both survivors identified Davis in a photo graph lineup. University detectives and Texas Department of Public Safety officers are investigating items retrieved from the suspec t’s parents’ home in Houston, he said. These items, which may have been taken from the vic tims during the attacks, could lead to an additional charge of aggravated robbery. If found guilty of the aggra vated sexual assault charge, Davis could face five to 99 years in prison. Davis was arrested in Dallas two months after the first victim recognized a cashier while she was shopping at a Bryan grocery store as her attacker. “She was very shaky, very nervous,” Wiatt said of the sur vivor. “She wrote the check and left. Then about two days later, she somehow got hold of our offi cers and said, ‘All I know is his name tag said Don.’” See Suspect page 6 "A second charge of aggravated sexual assault will be made if the [blood and semen] results positively match those from the second victim." — Bob Wiatt University Police Department director Rejoicing in the Legacy of a Leader Speakers share King’s inspiration, passion □ B-CS elementary school and A&M students honored Martin Luther King Jr. during Monday night's celebration. By Wes Swift The Battalion It was a time when the bearers of the future honored a great man of The Martin Luther King Jr. cele bration at Rudder Theatre was filled with song and impassioned words Monday, as a group of sever al hundred people heard about King’s impact on the lives of a myr iad of speakers. The gathering was the second an nual King celebration at Texas A&M. The University recognized Martin Luther King Jr. Day as an of ficial University holiday for the first time last year. Yesterday also marked the first time all schools in the A&M System celebrated the holiday. Dr. Ray Bowen, A&M president, and Dr. Pierce Cantrell, Faculty Sen ate speaker, spoke of the changes the slain civil rights leader made. But the night belonged to youth, as students from Bryan-College Sta tion schools and from A&M shared their thoughts about King. Courtney Harnsberry, a second- grade student from Milam Elemen tary School in Bryan, said King’s ef forts have made it possible for her to experience a life of equality. “Because (King) was concerned with equality and freedom for all, I can go to any school I want, I can live wherever I want, I can eat in any restaurant, and I can sit wher ever I want to in any public trans portation,” Harnsberry said. The parade of youth continued with Marcus Moore, an eighth-grade student at College Station Junior High School, who characterized King as a man of determination, excellence, See MLK, page 6 Tim Moog, The Battauon The Voices of Praise choir sings Monday evening in the finale to the Martin Luther King, Jr. celebration in Rudder Theatre. Students travel civil rights road through Deep South By Wes Swift The Battalion The civil rights movement swept across the United States in the 1950s and ’60s, blazing a trail of hope and blood. In December, 12 Texas A&M stu dents retraced the rocky civil rights road, leaving their own trail of tears and inspiration. The students traveled through six states in the Deep South on a civil rights tour sponsored by the Depart ment of Multicultural Services. The tour stopped at civil rights land marks in Alabama, Georgia, Arkansas and Tennessee. Museums, memorials and churches dotted the tour’s track, each landmark telling its own chapter in the struggle that led to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The students toured Selma, Ala., where demonstrators marching to the the state capital were beaten by state troopers on March 7, 1965. Today, in the National Voting Rights Museum in Selma, a wall is covered with notes from those who marched in that city. Niki Gerra, a senior civil engineer ing major, said the Selma Museum and similar stops in Memphis, Term., and Atlanta, Ga., put a human face on the civil rights movement. “There was a card (at the Selma museum) from a lady who had walked 57 miles to Montgomery,” Gerra said. “When she got there, she was beaten. All her teeth were knocked out. She couldn’t go on the second Selma march because of that. But she was there again on the third. It felt like I was there.” The reality of the movement thun dered into the students’ emotions when they visited each site and met people involved with the movement, Raymond Boney, a senior speech com munication major, said. “Once I got to visit these places and talk to people who were actually part of the movement, it just struck me,” Boney said. “I think that’s what we re ally needed (to realize the power of the movement).” After touring Atlanta, where the Martin Luther King Jr. Center for Non violent Social Change stands, and Birmingham, where King was jailed in 1963 and the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church was bombed, killing four young girls, the group reached Memphis. See Civil RIGHTS, page 6 Legislation affects student workers’ paychecks IQ Some state employees will be compensated for 1 the impact a new state social security law will jhave on their pay. 18y Heather Pace | The Battalion I Texas A&M student workers | sired after Sent. 1, 1995, will find that their paychecks are smaller | this semester than those of their I fellow workers. The state of Texas used to pay | both the employer and employee portions of social security for all state employees, but as of Dec. 31, 1995, some workers became re sponsible for their own social se curity taxes. Pete Stovall, a clerk in A&M’s payroll office, said the University uses a method called benefit replacement pay, which results in slightly higher hourly wages, to protect em ployees hired before Sept. 1, 1995, from the effects of this statewide change. “The state Legislature decid ed to quit paying portions of so cial security, but the state of fered benefit replacement pay to make up for the lost bene fits,” Stovall said. The difference in pay will be determined by the A&M payroll office, which uses a formula to fig ure out how much additional pay is necessary to replace lost wages. Payroll officers figure out how much employees were earning on Aug. 31 and then determine how much employees should be earn ing per hour to compensate for lost social security payments. For example, student workers who receive $4.53 an hour will re ceive $4.80 after the formula is applied to their earnings. Deborah Johnston, senior staff accountant in the payroll office, said that once benefit re placement pay is determined, it does not change as pay increases or decreases. “As they work, they will get so much more per hour to make up for the lost social security,” John ston said. The new legislation, Senate Bill 102, was initiated to save the state money. Harold Stone, special assis tant to the Texas Senate Fi nance Committee, said the bill makes the state’s social securi ty policies more like private business policies. “The bill brings new workers in line with the private sector,” he said. New employees, however, will not receive the benefit replace ment pay compensation. Building purchased for proposed day-care center |^Bowen's goal is for a 150-child I day-care facility on West Campus lobe in operation by Fall 1996. By Lily Aguilar The Battalion Texas A&M students, faculty and staff in search of convenient day-care services for their children may soon have a new option available to them. A&M purchased the Grenada Building on West Campus in December and plan to house a proposed day-care center there. The building will also house the Universi ty Police Department and several academic departments. Sandi Osters, assistant to the vice presi dent for student affairs, said 7,900 square feet of the Grenada Building is being reno vated to house a full-time day-care facility. The initial cost of the day-care center will be paid for with concessions money, which will come from contracts between the A&M and the campus bookstore and other businesses. Osters said that after the full-time day care facility begins operating, it will be self- supporting and funded by the faculty, stu dents and staff who use the center. In order to ensure that the day care is in full operation by September, A&M Presi dent Dr. Ray Bowen appointed a day-care task force. “Right along with the full-time day-care center,” Osters said, “we are looking for a See Day CARE, page 7 Spring semester brings new registration fees Late registration or missed payment deadlines will cost stu dents up to $200 this semester. New late-registration penalties will be assessed to students who do not register before the first day of class in an effort to offset losses in state funding. A late-registration penalty of $100 will be assessed to all stu dents who register after the first day of classes but before the 13th day of class. Students registering on or af ter the 13th day of class will be penalized $200. Students will also be fined $50 for adding courses after the 12th class day, if adding the class in creases their number of semester credit hours. But students who have already registered for even one credit hour will not be penalized for adding credit hours to their schedules on or before the 12th day of class as long as they pay the day they register. Bobby Piwonka, student finan cial services manager, said A&M has lost funding in the past, in the range of $1 million, because of students who were dropped for missing payment deadlines or for registering after classes began. ihoursth The state determines Universi ty funding based on the number of enrolled students and credit hours they are taking each se mester, and the University does not receive state money for stu dents who enroll after the 12th day of class. Piwonka said late registration also hurts academic departments because it causes confusion about which classes need to be offered and how big they should be. The provost’s office decided to increase late-fee penalties after a Fall 1994 funding audit indicated the University was losing money because of late registration.
