Northwestern officials will allow the FBI to assist UniversityPolice in helping identify the persons responsible for scrawlingtwo racial slurs on the doors of a residence hall earlier this week–�a sign some students say shows administrators arecommitted to apprehending and punishing the perpetrators.
Lt. Glenn Turner of UP said FBI officials called Thursday afterreading about the racist messages written on two doors in AyersCollege of Commerce and Industry early Tuesday morning.
“It’s not unusual for them to help out whenever we havehate-related incidents,” Turner said. “Their concern is sometimeswhite supremacy groups recruit kids on college campuses. But thiscould also be just a kid messing around in the dorms. It neverhurts to get people from the outside involved.”
Although Turner said UP officers are capable of interviewingstudents about the crimes, he said the department would appreciatehaving access to the FBI’s substantial resources and databanks.
Turner also said the Illinois State Police has asked to beinvolved in the investigation.
“They’d like to know the different names that come up in theinvestigation because they keep a national databank of these kindof things,” he said.
Roommates Jonathon Milam and Lilai Gebremedhin discovered “blackmonkey” written on their door and found the word “nigger”accompanied by a depiction of a man being lynched on another doordown the hall.
Officials have decided to classify the lynching sketch as a”hate crime” instead of an “incident of bias,” because the drawingpromoted violent actions.
FBI spokesman Frank Bochte said his organization hasjurisdiction in hate-crime investigations.
“Where the crime occurs doesn’t have a bearing on ourdepartment,” Bochte said, adding that officers also will try todetermine if a civil rights violation has taken place.
Vice President for University Relations Alan Cubbage said thelast time the FBI responded to a situation at Northwestern was whenwhite supremacist Matt Hale came to campus more than three yearsago.
“It’s very out of the ordinary for this campus,” Cubbage said.”We have not had the sort of incidents and crimes that have broughtthe FBI in on a repeat basis.”
Black students upset with administrators’ response to otherinstances of racial and religious vandalism from Winter Quarterpraised the decision to bring in the FBI. Tracy Carson, coordinatorof black-student alliance For Members Only, said the presence ofFBI officials might help some students “reconcile their initialfeelings of fear.”
“The FBI coming in is a great symbol that the university isplacing the utmost importance on these crimes,” said Carson, aWeinberg junior. “There are a lot of things the students andadministration are seeing eye-to-eye on here.”
Carson and Associated Student Government President Mike Fongalso met with Vice President for Student Affairs William Banis onThursday to discuss the administrative response to the racialslurs.
Carson and Fong presented Banis with a copy of legislationpassed at a heated ASG Senate meeting Wednesday that brought aplethora of speakers to demand action. The legislation calls forthe creation of an 11-student task force to discuss issues such asallowing victims to have extensions on class assignments and toswitch rooms.
Banis and the students decided at their meeting to take actionto rewrite a portion of the Student Handbook, given to eachincoming freshman class, and re-emphasize the Code of StudentConduct.
“We want to put forth a policy about expected behavior andemphasize civility and respect,” Banis said. “The Northwesterncommunity is aligned in taking a stand behind this. We are takingthe incidents very seriously.”
The Daily’s Jesse Abrams-Morley and Jared Goldberg-Leopoldcontributed to this report.
