Police look for armed robber near campus

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Police responded to a robbery report near the intersection of 18th Street and Montgomery Avenue around 2:20 a.m. on Dec. 10, according to a police statement released earlier today.

The complainant, a 37-year-old male, said he was on the 1000 block of North Columbus Boulevard when he entered a burgundy vehicle with another man that drove to the North Philadelphia location.

A third man then entered the back of the vehicle and placed what he felt to be a gun to the back of the complainant’s head demanding the complainant’s wallet, phone, and sun glasses, the complainant said.

He complied with the man then fled the scene. The Philadelphia Police are still looking for the driver and third man as suspects. They ask for anyone with knowledge of the incident to call at 215-686-8477 or submit an anonymous tip at online.

Snow causes minor disruption at Elmira Jeffries

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Fire and police crews respond to blocked vent at Elmira Jeffries on Dec. 17. Jenelle Janci TTN

Snowfall from early in the day blocked off a laundry vent on the second floor of Elmira Jeffries Residence Hall, leading to a brief evacuation of the dorm Tuesday evening, Dec. 17.

Charlie Leone, the acting executive director of Campus Safety Services, said about five students had to leave the residence hall around 5 p.m., as police and fire crews inspected the scene.

Leone said there were no injuries or damage to the dorm reported.

Crime Logs Dec. 7 to Dec. 12

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Main Campus 

An incident of underage consumption occurred on Dec. 7 at 12:30 a.m. in the 1300 Residential Hall. The School Code of Conduct handled the incident.

An incident of underage consumption occurred on Dec. 7 at 12:40 a.m. in the 1300 Residential Hall. The School Code of Conduct handled the incident.

An incident of underage consumption occurred on Dec. 7 at 1 a.m. on the 1700 block of North Broad Street. The School Code of Conduct handled the incident.

An incident of public drunkenness occurred on Dec. 7 at 3:20 a.m. in the Tech Center. The School Code of Conduct handled the incident.

An incident of public drunkenness occurred on Dec. 7 at 3:43 a.m. on the 1900 block of North Warnock Street. The School Code of Conduct handled the incident.

A theft occurred on Dec. 7 between 9:15 a.m. and 12:30 a.m. in the Temple Performing Arts Center. No arrests have been made at this time.

A theft occurred on Dec. 4 between 7 p.m. and 9 p.m. on Temple Performing Arts Center. No arrests have been made at this time.

An incident of criminal mischief occurred between Dec. 9 at 6 p.m. and Dec. 10 at 6:05 p.m. on the 2000 block of North 10th Street. No arrests have been made at this time.

A theft occurred on Dec. 10 between 9 a.m. and 8 p.m. on the 2000 block of North 13th Street. No arrests have been made at this time.

An incident of public drunkenness occurred on Dec. 11 at 2 a.m. on the 1400 block of West Oxford Street. An arrest was made in regards to this incident.

An incident of underage consumption occurred on Dec. 11 at 12:15 a.m. in Hardwick Hall. The School Code of Conduct handled the incident.

An incident of criminal mischief occurred on Dec. 11 at 10:40 a.m. on the 1400 block of West Diamond Street. No arrests have been made at this time.

An incident of fraud occurred on Dec. 11 at 7:30 p.m. in White Hall. No arrests have been made at this time.

A robbery occurred on Dec. 11 at 9:55 p.m. in the Student Center. No arrests have been made at this time.

An incident of public drunkenness occurred on Dec. 12 at 1:54 a.m. on the 1700 block of North 15th Street. An arrest was made in regards to this incident.

An incident of criminal mischief occurred between Dec. 11 at 10 p.m. and Dec. 12 at 11:20 a.m. on the 2000 block of North 16th Street. No arrests have been made at this time.

A theft occurred on Dec. 12 between 12:55 p.m. and 2:05 p.m. in Anderson Hall. No arrests have been made at this time.

An incident of harassment occurred on Dec. 12 at 5:05 p.m. on the 1700 block of North Broad Street. The incident was handled by PCC.

HSC

An incident of retail theft occurred on Dec. 8 at 10:35 p.m. on the 3000 block of North Broad Street. An arrest was made in regards to this incident.

A theft occurred between Dec. 9 at 7 p.m. and Dec. 10 at 8 a.m. in the Boyer Pavilion. No arrests have been made at this time.

A theft occurred on Dec. 11 between 3:15 p.m. and 7:45 p.m. in the Parkinson Pavilion. No arrests have been made at this time.

A theft occurred on Dec. 12 between 7:30 a.m. and 7 p.m. in the Boyer Pavilion. No arrests have been made at this time.

Spokesman: Athletic cuts not on tomorrow’s BOT agenda

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The university’s decision to eliminate seven intercollegiate sports from its NCAA sponsorship will not be an item on the agenda for tomorrow’s Board of Trustees meeting, a university spokesman said.

“It’s already been voted on and approved by the board,” said Ray Betzner, associate vice president for executive communications. “The issue’s already been decided.”

The Board of Trustees approved a recommendation from Athletic Director Kevin Clark on Friday to cut baseball, softball, men’s gymnastics, men’s crew, women’s rowing and men’s indoor and outdoor track & field, effective July 1, 2014. Betzner said no representatives from any of these sports or any other sports are scheduled to speak at the meeting.

When Temple was kicked out of the Big East Conference in 2001, men’s basketball coach John Chaney gave the president’s report in place of President David Adamany at a board meeting less than two weeks after the announcement. A representative from the women’s basketball team, Athletic Director Dave O’Brien and chairman Howard Gittis also gave presentations on athletics.

Tomorrow’s meeting will be held in public session at 3:30 p.m. on the 27th floor of Morgan Hall.

Student government meeting of Nov. 18

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New dining hours on-campus and a new student committee were the main announcements at the Temple Student Government general assembly meeting Nov. 18 in room 200c of the Student Center.

Temple’s Student Body President Darin Bartholomew announced that hours at Così, a Sodexo-run dining location in Pearson-McGonigle Hall, would be extended. Bartholomew said there are more dining hour changes to come in the future as part of efforts by TSG.

Andrew Salciunas introducing himself as the newly appointed director of the Committee of Recruitment and Retention. Salciunas encouraged students interested in joining the committee to contact him at andrew.salciunas@temple.edu.

Starting the director announcements, Director of Campus Life and Diversity Evan Raines asked the audience of roughly 200 if they would be interested in a new living learning community. After a sizable show of hands of those interested in the idea and lack of opposition, Raines said he concluded he would go ahead with planning the implementation of the idea.

Afterwards, Director of Local and Community Affairs Morgan Jenkins discussed the Temple Annual Christmas Party, a celebration held with CSS for the general public in the Liacouras Center on Dec. 8 at 9 p.m.

Jenkins said she is interested in bringing in student groups to the event, particularly performance groups. She asked that interested groups contact her at morgan.jenkins@temple.edu.

Thomas Montalbano, co-chairman of allocations, announced that of the $117,000 in allocation money for student organizations at the beginning of the year, roughly $58,000 is left.

The meeting came to a close after the open forum and organization announcements.

 

Marcus McCarthy is the TSG beat writer for The Temple News. He can be reached at marcus.mccarthy@temple.edu or follow on Twitter @Marcus.McCarthy6

 

Student busted for cooking molly

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A Temple student was arrested by Philadelphia police for cooking the drug Molly inside his off-campus apartment on the 1900 block of Gratz Street Saturday night, according to a report by NBC 10.

The television station reported that fire department crews responded to neighbor’s complaints about fumes coming from the apartment, and discovered the student inside with equipment for producing the drug also known as MDMA or Ecstasy.

The name of the student or the charges filed were not released.

Former football player sentenced to community service, anger management

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A former Temple football player was sentenced to community service and other penalties in Philadelphia Municipal Court yesterday, stemming from an April arrest.

Wyatt Benson, 21, a former starting fullback, was put in an Accelerated Rehabilitative Disposition program by Judge Hon. Gerard Kosinski for his one count of aggravated assault and simple assault of another person that occurred back in April 2013.

Benson was issued 25 hours of community service, anger management counseling and a stay away order, according to his docket sheet.

Benson was charged in connection to an incident where a University of Pennsylvania student was assaulted during an altercation at a party near the University City campus on the night of April 26. The victim was struck in the eye during an argument that involved a former girlfriend of the complainant, who Benson was dating.

Benson was nominated for the 2013 All-State AFCA Good Works Team earlier in the year, but did not win the spot. The special award gave recognition to student athletes who gave commitment to their community through volunteer and other means of service.

Temple Athletics did not respond to comment on Benson’s status with the team, which he was suspended from before the start of the season. He is currently a student at the university.

Student Government meeting of Nov. 12

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A series of proposals to the university regarding campus safety were announced Monday at the Temple Student Government general assembly meeting in room 200c of the student center.

Temple Student Body President Darin Bartholomew read through the five recommendations which aimed at improving the TU alert system and addressing building safety.

The first part called for a website which records the messages sent out by CSS. Bartholomew gave the example of the University of Cincinnati’s public safety website as a model for Temple. The tool, a list that can be scrolled up and down, is a record of all messages organized by severity reported and is free to use.

The other two suggestions of the first part called for the use of the categorization “alert” in all cases to avoid dictating severity of a situation as well as asking that TU alerts be sent out via all contact points including email and text message.

The second part of TSG’s suggestions called for improved ways to check IDs in all campus buildings and a review of the security in the student center.

After explaining the proposals, Bartholomew asked for student opinion in an open forum session. Students showed skepticism whether the proposals would do enough to deter threats in campus buildings, with several people telling personal stories calling in question the ability of security personnel.

Bartholomew finished with a vocal general vote from the audience by asking one at a time for “yea” or “nay.” Although there were voices of opposition earlier, no “nay” was heard and the proposal passed to be sent to university administration.

The next TSG meeting will be held Nov. 18 in room 200c of the student center at 4 p.m.

Body found in parking garage

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The body of a missing New Jersey man was found by campus police in a parking garage on Temple’s Main Campus early Friday morning, according to a report by the South Jersey Times.

Robin Outten, 54, a Temple pharmacist from Woodbury, N.J. was identified by the Times as the man police found. Outten was reported missing by his daughter on Nov. 3 after he did not show up for a visit.

Philadelphia police’s press office was closed Saturday, though the Times reported that Philadelphia’s Medical Examiner’s office said the death may have been suicidal.

In November 2012, police found a female student in the Liacouras Parking Garage who had died from self-inflicted gunshot wound.

In the 2012 instance, a TU Alert was sent out to notify the student body, while no alert was sent out in yesterday’s case.

The Medical Examiner’s office has yet to rule on an exact cause of death, the Times reports.

Panel held on sexual assault reporting

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Four panelists led a discussion on reporting sexual assaults in the news Thursday night, Nov. 7, at Temple’s Center City Campus. The focus of the discussion was to shift the focus off the victim in covering sexual assault cases and towards the perpetrator, according to the panel moderator Tara Murtha.

Murtha began the event by quickly chronicling the lack of coverage of sexual assault by the media. One of the panelists, Carol Tracy, explained how this has changed.

A few years ago, the Inquirer exposed the Philadelphia Police Department for decades of burying sexual assault cases through loopholes and technicalities. Tracy said that discoveries like this are what have started a wave of action in the country.

Another of the panelists, Allison Hraba, was a prime example of this. Hraba explained how she was part of a student protest at Swarthmore College that demanded the school do more to protect its students.

However, Tracy warned about the limitations for universities.

“I’ll just say it up front, it’s a very difficult situation for schools to deal with,” Tracy said. “It’s important to know how much universities can do. They can only expel at the most.”

The fourth panelist, Elana Newman, argued that journalists should be careful in what they promise and how they handle what they can control. Headlines, and accompanying media, and how people will interpret the information is all out of the hands of a journalist, Newman argued.

The discussion proceeded toward explaining how the panelists believed journalists should report sexual assaults, including word choice.

The event ended with a series of questions and answers.