Post
by NeonBluSXT » Sun Sep 23, 2007 5:03 pm
DOVER -- Law enforcement officials acknowledged Saturday that friction among students from the Washington and New York City areas has emerged as a possible contributor to the shooting of two students at Delaware State University early Friday.
The same concerns have surfaced in the past, involving tensions between students from Washington and Philadelphia.
"That would be consistent with what I was told when I was first briefed," said Beverly C. Williams, Dover's interim mayor. "That was a theory."
Injured in the incident were Shalita Middleton and Nathaniel Pugh, both 17 and both graduates of the District of Columbia Public Schools system.
One law enforcement official familiar with the case said that at least one of the two students questioned afterward was from northern New Jersey and that quibbling between students from the two areas might have figured in the shootings.
"I've gotten literally thousands of e-mails," since news of the shootings was first reported, DSU President Allen L. Sessoms said during a news briefing Saturday afternoon. Some of the messages talk of an issue of a turf battle between groups of students.
"This issue of turf battles, I don't fully appreciate it," Sessoms said.
Sessoms said the campus has an "exceptional" police and security force, and is a test site for "advanced" surveillance systems that help keep track of campus activities. He added that the campus is working through "interesting and difficult times."
"We'll make some more adjustments in the next weeks and months," Sessoms said.
Still, violence has been a sporadic visitor to Delaware State University's tightly contained campus over the years, raising fears that the school itself could become a casualty after a shooting that left two freshmen wounded early Friday.
"There's no question that a parent, seeing that students were shooting one another on a college campus, would have cause for concern," said Rev. Paul Sadler, a Howard University graduate from Cleveland, Ohio. "I'm the parent of a recent college graduate, and certainly safety was a very high concern for me."
The shooting this week came as the school struggled to regain its balance after the August slaying of three students during an apparent robbery in their hometown of Newark, N.J. All three of the those killed were enrolled at DSU and about to begin the new school year.
Carlos Holmes, a spokesman for the university, described the latest incident as "an aberration" in an otherwise safe and typical campus environment, one that was unlikely to affect the school on ongoing recruitment efforts.
"We're trying to communicate that at all turns. What happens here can happen anywhere," said Holmes. "Certainly an incident like this raises the need to give assurances to parents that this is a good and safe place to come."
Educators and former students say that hometown ties are important in the formal and informal groupings that help young people transition into campus life, especially at smaller, historically black colleges and universities that recruit students from a wide area.
"We always had what we called 'bragging rights,' in terms of city or state pride, but it was always in good fun. It never escalated in terms of people not getting along," said Tommie Farley Jr., a Florida A&M University graduate and alumni association president in Hampton, Va.
FAMU is a Historically Black College.
"Most black colleges are smaller in nature, so you get to know people more closely than you do at a large university," Farley said. "You tend to develop friendship and kinship bonds a lot faster, and they tend to be more lasting."
Sessoms noted Friday that students "bring some of the tension and concerns with them when they come to this campus from their home communities."
Last fall, DSU was rattled by a dorm room robbery in Cromwell Hall, not far from the scene of last week's shootings. Two masked men, one armed with a shotgun, stole a video game in that case.
Other cases of violence at DSU hurt both the victims and the school more deeply.
According to News Journal reports, in December 1991 -- when DSU was known as Delaware State College -- a freshman from East Orange N.J., was shot in the chest as he walked through the student center parking lot at 2:30 a.m. after a dance.
Police accounts indicated Keith Jarvis, 18, was an innocent bystander that got caught in the middle of a feud between student Maurice Vann, an 18-year-old from Hollywood, Md. and three other students.
Vann, a freshman, told police the group shot at him and he returned fire, apparently striking Jarvis.
Clifton Coleman, the then-director of campus safety, traced the problem to a factional feud between students from the Washington, D.C. area and the Philadelphia area.
A second shooting that year, involving two non-students on campus led to a new security policy at the school in the spring and fall of 1992.
The school announced it would close all but the main entrance to the school on weekends and weekday evenings and require visitors to the campus after dark and on weekends to check in at a security booth at the main entrance.
The school also installed an electronic card access system on dormitory doors so outsiders could not get into the residence halls and announced plans to install 12 to 15 security phones around campus.
In June of 2004, a student was shot when a group of 12 to 20 students confronted a group of football players outside the school's gates.
Former DSU football player DeShaun Morris later pleaded no-contest to two counts of third degree assault, second degree conspiracy and riot and was sentenced to six months in prison for his role in the shooting of William Jones, a defensive back on the team.
Nikki Chapple, president of the Student Government Association and a senior majoring in nursing and psychology, spoke at the news conference Saturday and said she heard the rumors that the incident was between rival gangs in Washington, D.C. and New Jersey and believes them to be false.
"There are no gangs here on this campus," she said. "Students do come from different areas and some may be in various cliques, but gang activity isn't an issue."
Chappel went on to say some people believe turf battles are an issue at Historically Black Colleges and Universities, but cautioned, "This incident has nothing to do with race. ... It can happen anywhere, at any campus, at any time."
Delaware State University Police Chief James Overton said that the investigation doesn't point to any turf battle, nor do they have evidence of another circulating rumor: a love triangle.
After the formal press conference Saturday, Overton took reporters to see the area where the shootings occurred.
He said investigators believe the two shooting victims walked from the Village Cafe on the south side of the campus, crossed the pedestrian mall by Grossley Hall and met up with another group in front of Memorial Hall.
The shootings occurred at the southwest corner of Memorial Hall, where Middleton was found. Pugh ran toward the "Plot" area where fraternity and sororities are located, Overton said.
Overton did not say in which direction the shooter came, but stressed guns are not allowed on campus.
"You get expelled," he said. "It's one of our zero tolerance offenses."
Holmes said Saturday that no warrants have been issued in connection with the shooting. Although Pugh was initially described as reluctant to cooperate, Holmes disputed that account.
Two students who were questioned "did provide information that was very useful," Overton said. They are now considered to be witnesses, he said.
Campus police plan to talk to two more witnesses and one other person of interest, he said.
The Rev. Christopher A. Bullock, pastor of Canaan Baptist Church in Wilmington, said he wanted to know more about the case before forming an opinion.
But Bullock, whose son is a sophomore at DSU, said that he considered DSU's diverse population an asset.
"My son's best friend on campus and roommate is a young brother from Baltimore," Bullock said. "He knows people from New York to Chicago. The overwhelming majority of the kids on campus get along. But with human nature, some people just sometimes don't like each other."
The Rev. Al Sharpton was expected to attend a prayer service focused on the victims today at Wilmington's Canaan Baptist Church, part of a wider celebration of the third anniversary of Bullock's ministry.
Bullock said that Friday's shooting might provide a new example of the dangers of intolerance.
"There's a bigger issue here, in light of Virginia Tech and other campuses across America," Bullock said. "Unfortunately, some of the ills of society have found their way onto college campuses. That's the reality of the time in which we live. So instead of pushing the panic button, let's get a plan and live in reality, and not in some illusion."
And the madness continues..... How sad. Crazy that its right down the street. Having the Nascar Race is bad enough, now another school shooting. My thoughts an prayers go out to the families of the victims.
